The purpose of this exercise is to help you learn how to apply a sepia tone to a black & white photograph using Adobe Photoshop. First things first, you may be asking yourself, “What in the heck is Sepia?” Sepia is a warm rich brownish tone that gives photos a nice antique feeling. It is used monochromatically rather than using full color or black and white.

Wikipedia states, “(Sepia) was originally produced by adding a pigment made from the Sepia cuttlefish to the positive print of a photograph taken with any number of negative processes. The chemical process involved converts any remaining metallic silver to a sulphide which is much more resistant to breakdown over time. This is why many “old time” photographs are sepia toned—those are the ones that have survived until today.”

Being the owner of an historic home in Albany Oregon I have a keen interest in old photographs of our home. We were lucky enough to come across a handful of photographs – one we believe is from the 1920’s and a handful from 1946. All are in black and white.

I have seen many sepia-toned photos and wanted to turn my plain-Jane black and whites into Sepia, to really give them that old-fashioned feel.

I own Adobe Photoshop and use it some, but am pretty much a novice. I learned how to create sepia-toned photographs by muddling my way though various online forums and such. So, when this project came up I thought, what a great opportunity to share with others how to do this!

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