How We Restore an Archive Scan

Last updated 2026-10-22

Our Japanese prints, and any other piece we make from a historical original, start as a high-resolution scan published by a public archive such as the Library of Congress. Each product page names the archive, links to its catalog record, and says what kind of impression was scanned, including when it is a later reprint rather than a sheet from the artist’s own lifetime.

What we do to every scan

1. Crop to the printed picture. The scan usually shows the whole sheet: paper margins, mounting, sometimes tape or a collection stamp. We crop to the image itself, set by eye for each print, so a canvas shows the picture and not the paper around it. When a print has a printed border line, we keep it.
2. Correct levels and color cast. Old scans often come out dim or tinted by the scanner. We stretch the tones and remove the cast, then blend part of the original back in, so the warm tone of an old sheet is kept rather than bleached white.
3. Remove dust and specks. Small dark or light specks that differ sharply from their surroundings are replaced with the color around them. Larger marks, stains and creases that belong to the sheet are left alone.
4. Sharpen gently. A light, even sharpening pass so fine lines read well at large sizes.

Nothing is repainted or redrawn. Where a scan needs more than that — a seam between two sheets of a large map, a tear or a crease that cuts through the picture — the gap is filled from the paper and ink around it (a repair, not a new drawing), and the product page says so. The record of exactly which of these steps ran on a print is shown on its product page under “What we did to this scan”.

Enlarging for the largest sizes

We offer a size only when the file can print it at 150 pixels per inch or more. Many scans are enlarged for the largest canvases with upscaling software (Real-ESRGAN, an AI upscaler): it sharpens edges and keeps brushwork and engraved lines crisp, but it invents no new subject matter, and the product page names the step and the enlargement (2× is typical). The product page always shows the scan’s own resolution at the size you pick, so you can judge for yourself. Each size keeps the print’s own proportions: we never stretch a picture to fit a frame.

Studio pieces

The designs made for this shop (the abstracts, the generated landscapes, the Amalfi Coast and farmhouse scenes, and so on) are not restorations at all: they are made with an image-generation model from our own written description, then cropped, color-balanced and enlarged by hand and with the same upscaling software, and the product page says which model was used. They are digital designs, not hand-painted, and not copies of any existing picture.

What we do not do

We do not sell originals or antiques. Every piece is a new print, made to order from the archive’s scan. If a sheet has something worth knowing about, such as a trimmed edge, a repair or a later printing, the product page says so before you buy.