Photographs and negatives are a few of our most valued possessions. They journal our lives and our journeys. They keep the faces of our family members who have died .They hold every phase of our kids lives .It is terribly upsetting to see that our pictures and negatives have been through fire damage. Folks are chomping at the bit to see if there is any chance that these dear treasures can be recovered. If this tragedy has happened to you the first and foremost thing you ought to do is phone a photographic restoration professional, if at all possible one who is experienced with fire damage restoration. Set an appointment to get the pics and negatives to the fire damage restoration expert as fast as you're able to. The more the photographs stay in this condition the further the fire damage they will suffer.

Photographic negatives are damaged by the warmth of a fire. When heated the coating of a negative that has the photograph gets gluey. It will attach to any surface it comes into contact with. The coating can split, deform, or shrink after undergoing fire damage. Colored can modify their color or lose color. Black/White negatives are not as liable to become lighter. Touch the negatives with caution while moving them following the fire damage as they will mark very easily. Dust and larger pieces of remains will attach to a hot negative many times becoming forever ingrained in the negative.

Images are also damaged by the heat from fire. If the warmth of the flames are hot enough the bottom of the pic will smolder. The coating on the photo will turn out to be gummy and bind to any other thing it touches Photos piled together will get adhered together. If the pictures are in a photo album do not try to remove them. Fire damaged pictures can be marked quite easily when handled. When the coating is hot and sticky soot can get embedded in the print and the acidity of the soot can damage and modify the coloring in a print. The longer the soot is touching the photograph the more severely it will damage the image. If water comes into contact with the print the emulsion will get gelatin- like and attach to additional photos or something else. Do not try to pull the prints apart as the emulsion will be removed thus taking away a piece of the image from the print.

If the photographs are wet,from water damage place them in plastic bags and put them in the freezer until you can get them to the photographic restoration professional. If they are dry take them from the fire damaged spot and keep them safe until they are brought to be restored. The fire damage restoration specialist might be able to clean and restore some of the negatives and prints. After the professional has restored the prints as much as can be there might be a few images that are merely partly restored. There might be parts of the images that are missing from the photograph. Programs on the computer are able to repair the missing parts of the images. The photograph can be scanned, the absent part reconstructed, and a new picture prepared that has the total image. This is great news for every person that cherishes their pictures.

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