Leave A Legacy now offers on-line video preview. This 
allows you to view your production – created from your video tapes, movie films, photos or slides – on your home or office computer. We connect your computer and our computer over the internet. You can watch what we play or while we make edits on our computer. You can hear the audio of your production over the phone.
We’ve had one client couple who previewed their production playing on our computer in Fort Collins while they each viewed it at their work computers at two different locations in the Denver metro area.
While a client previews their video production they see changes that they want made. Clients can either make notes as they watch or may talk to one of our team to tell them about needed changes.
At Leave A Legacy, we do our best to find convenient solutions to help you preserve your memories with digital creations. With on-line video preview of your video production you’ll know just how it will look when you take the final product home with you.
At the end of this past school year a returning client brought us another unique photo manipulation project. 
Her daughter’s school has a tradition of the graduating class donating something of significance to the school. This is just elementary mind you, so it might be more the parent’s thoughts and money going into it. They came up with a great modern idea to buy a flat screen TV, have some lettering made and create a dynamic information wall by the school office. Their biggest problem was time so she thought of presenting it virtually at the graduation ceremony. 
She took several photos at the school (the wall, the couch, etc.), 
we found some images of a widescreen on the internet and also the school’s logo. We manipulated the photos by “removing” all of the things on the wall, did some masonry work on the wall, added the text in a curve and gave it an effect to look gold and 3 dimensional “hung” the wide screen and “projected” some images on it.
The final result (a jpg file) was projected on the screen after the graduation slideshow. What an interesting photo manipulation project!
She had to sue to get her wedding day negatives, Leave A Legacy was there to generate a “positive” outcome.
Can you imagine paying a professional photographer to shoot your wedding and then before you get your photos the photographer 
goes bankrupt? That is precisely what happen to one recent client. The wedding is a few years past but at the time they had to take the film studio to court in order to obtain their 21 rolls of negatives. That trauma was in the client’s past, she was coming in to get all of the negatives scanned so that she could actually print out some photos of her special day from her past. We scanned in all of the color and black and white 35mm negatives for her and saved them to disks for her. The possibilities of what she can do with them now are now endless. We can create a digital photo book and bind it, we can create all sorts of photo gifts using the images, and even create a DVD slideshow of all of the images.
I’ve been quiet the last few weeks because our family went on an inspiring family trip to Hamburg, Paris, and Rome. Many people told me, “take lots of pictures”. That is a silly thing to say to me. But in addition to taking lots of pictures I also journaled the events of our memory filled trip.
I have the guide book that I used to plan our travels which also gave great descriptions about what we were seeing. I have my notes about where we were going and what we were seeing each day.
I wrote in my journal as the trip went along and wrote about the hits and misses on the food we ordered. “Wes and Cheryl were trying to play it safe and order something with beef. It wasn’t until the dish was served that we remembered that beef tartar is finely cut raw beef steak. They both struggled to choke it down.”
I also wrote about our experiences with new forms of travel. “The doors on the Paris Metro are reminiscent of the guillotine that was once a popular form of correction. Our first try on the Metro was painful, at least for Aspen. When the doors closed she had half of one arm, and elbow of the other arm, and her suitcase one half in the train when it was ready to leave the station.”
My digital photo books always have lots of text in them to go with the lots
of photos. I also kept lots of memorabilia that I will scan in: bottle labels, ticket stubs, coins, a unique ice cream spoon, sand, stones, and bark.
While on the metro in Paris I saw that Leave A Legacy has some competition. The photo shows an advertisement poster in our metro car.
A recent interesting project that came into
Leave A Legacy was a lady who was working on a shadow box honoring her husband’s football career. He passed away a few years ago but he had kept quite a scrapbook of his football career from high school through college and the pros. She just needed our help to reprint a few photos in just the right size. The shadow box will ultimately contain these photos and the 2 jerseys from his college and professional football career. We can’t show you a photo of it as she would like to keep it private, but we thought it might give you a good idea for preserving your family memories.
Options abound for modifying or repairing your photo and video memories. You may want to have someone removed from an image, be it a former girlfriend, husband or a stranger lurking in the background. This can be more easily done with a still photo of course.
I once replaced an ex-boyfriend with a bush in a large family photo. We even modified the images from an old 8mm movie film. The client was fortunate that the unwanted individual was on the edge of the frame. We made clips at the beginning and end of where he appeared and then adjusted that segment over to the right which cut him off and left the rest of the people showing.
The image at right is of a photo of a car that was identical to our client,
Tom's car restoration
Tom’s, first car. Unfortunately the photo that he brought in had someone sitting in his car! Using Photoshop we were able to extricate the unwanted individual and we reprinted the image for him to treasure in his home office.
When unwanted individuals are present in the background of your precious photo we can use burning tools to darken the background and make them less noticeable or if you want to be transported elsewhere we can cut you out and put a totally different background behind you.
The sample at right is actually made from 3 photos.
One photo made from three images
The man, woman, and background came from 3 separate photos. The client was a very friendly German who lives up in the mountains west of us in Colorado. He is the man in the photo (taken several years ago). His appearance has changed in the years since as he is now well weathered with a big bushy black and grey beard. The lady is a lady friend of his from long ago in Germany. He brought the photos in since he had recently reconnected with her and wanted to create a photo to remember their long ago beginnings. Some color and texture effects were added to make the three images blend together better.
Happenings at Leave A Legacy
We now have several other options for communicating to the public besides our once a month newsletter that you many want to consider. There are lo
Our video clips are on youtube at http://www.youtube.com/LeaveALegacyColorado you may choose to subscribe to us. Videos can also be seen on the Video Gallery tab of our revised website.
Our business connections are at http://www.linkedin.com/in/leavealegacy
Our facebook account is at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Fort-Collins-CO/Leave-A-Legacy/118684934818243?v=wall it would be great if you “like” us.
Read our blog with lots more ideas and samples and stories of client projects that have come in at: http://www.leavealegacytoday.com/blog.html
It’s difficult for a family when a loved one passes away. At times like these, it’s best to focus on making the family-gathering a celebration of life. Often photos can play a role in that commemoration. Many clients come to us to do DVD transfers of old photos for memorial slideshows, and it’s always touching to play a small part in their healing process.
A small token of thanks for a sunny memorial slideshow
One particular client had a concept for making the memorial profound. She brought in a collection of photos of her mother through the years: from when she was young, getting married, having children, playing with grandchildren and finally when her health was failing towards the end.
She also brought in a video recording of her two daughters (who were five and two years old) singing “You are My Sunshine”. We did a video to DVD conversion and then put the song snippet at the end of the slideshow. My client also brought in a piece of art that one of her girls had colored ‘specially for Grandma.
The slideshow started with a custom graphic title screen “Celebrating the life of…” and progressed through all of the photos…with music to accompany the images we together had selected. At the end, the granddaughter’s painting came on the screen while the audio of “You are My Sunshine” played. What an emotional moment.
The DVD transfer was flawless and the photo quality was excellent. We were proud of our work and the family was very pleased with the outcome.
When the mother and two young girls came into the studio to pick up the final cut, the mother handed me a rock and told me that it was from her young daughter (she was too shy to tell me herself). The rock was obviously just one that the child had picked up in the driveway. But its significance as a thank-you present to Leave A Legacy for doing the slideshow for her grandmother was not lost on us.
I still have the rock on a display shelf in the studio to remind myself of the little girl who missed her Grandma – but now has an animated touchstone (by way of that slideshow) to remember her by. Always.
Sometimes the most amazing people (and pictures) come through the Leave A Legacy front door.
A tall man with a kind face visited our Fort Collins office recently and inquired about our negative scanning service. Out of an old folder, he pulled a very large and antique-looking negative – about 5 by 7 inches in size.
He doubtfully asked if we could handle a negative this big – and I said indeed we could. (Our negative scanning service can handle negatives up to 12 by 17 inches).
After a quick look at the image, I blurted out “Is that Custer?” Quite the opposite it turned out – it was a historic portrait of Sitting Bull and Buffalo Bill. At least I was in the right era!
I felt sure this negative had to be quite valuable so I suggested it not leave the client’s hands for long – we did the negative scanning and B&W and sepia printing of it right on the spot.
While I was producing the final prints, the client regaled me with all the facts he knew about the amazing portrait. He pointed out the incredible detailing of Buffalo Bill’s jacket, told me what color Sitting Bull’s headdress was, and informed me about the historic occasion which caused these two legends to be sitting together for a souvenir photograph.
We do hundreds of photo reproductions and restorations each week, but I’ll certainly never forget this one!
We thought we’d share some ideas about how to set up a series of photos which illustrate a larger theme. Think of it as ‘storytelling’ with images that all share a pre-planned purpose.
We’ll focus on creating an intentional photo series about children growing up – perhaps all too quickly.
That’s the theme. Now what can you do with it? Inspiration can be as close as your closet!
One Outfit through the Years
Find a remarkable piece of clothing. Maybe an heirloom wedding dress, grandma’s colorful paisley blouse, the morning coat that your father wore on his wedding day, or your own polyester pantsuit from “the good ol’ days.”
Next, dress your newborn or toddler in the article of choice. Then take a photo of the child every year in that very same outfit.
Granted, the first few years your child will be drowning in the polyester suit or the morning coat, but you’ll see him or her slowly fill it out until she ‘owns’ it.
Imagine having such a progressive image showing your child from one year to 18 years of age – displayed at his or her high school graduation party. It’s a time-lapse shot that you planned two decades prior! This ‘same suit of clothing’ is also a great idea for making your own photo calendar.
Leave A Legacy is beginning a new adventure into social media. We’ll be sharing stories from some of the interesting projects that come through our door. They will make you laugh and may make a tear come to your eye. Our blogs, posts and video clips will show you new ideas on projects you might want to consider doing with your own photos, videos and audio memories. We’ll have a place for discussions and sharing ideas.
Videos will demonstrate tips, tricks and techniques that all relate to preserving your memories. We have a passion for preserving memories and social media will give us a great venue for encouragement and inspiration.
