Taking and Using Sepia-Toned Photographs

I remember as a child looking through old photographs and wondering why some of them were that brown color. I understood that they didn't have color photographs back then, but I didn't understand why anyone would make their pictures brown instead of just black and white. Over the years, I have come to appreciate the elegance of those sepia prints. They bring back a sense of history and provide a warmer feeling than the black-and-white photos of that era.

Fast forward a century and we have digital cameras, photo-editing software, and the ability to print our photos in any color combination we would like. Despite all of these options, there are still times where sepia-toned photos work best for our scrapbook pages.

Remembering the Past

Whether it's museums, historic towns, or old trains, everyone visits an old place sometime. If you print your photos in bright colors, you get a nice modern look. By printing those same photos in sepia, it looks like you actually stepped back in time to visit that old place when it was new. In this layout, I used sepia tones to make the layout looked like we stepped back in time 100 years, instead of just riding on a 100-year-old train.

Journey to Paradise by Boysmom

Another way to remember the past is through vintage photos, which look great in sepia, as in this layout from mborrero:

Sepia Prints by mborrero

Capturing the Old West

Somehow, nothing captures the feeling of the old west and cowboys like a sepia-toned photograph. The sepia photos go perfectly with the bandana and rope in this layout by critter:

Canton TX Flea Market by critter

Removing Distractions

Sometimes a great photo has a background item in a distracting color. Of course, there are lots of modern photo-editing techniques that can be used to remove them or turn them into a less distracting color, but sepia tones can be an alternative with great results. Look at this layout from Janice Nielson:

Glorious Food by Janice Nielson

She used the sepia tones to create a nice photograph emphasizing the cute little girl instead of the turquoise refrigerator that she posed next to.

Traditionally, scrappers have been using sepia-toned photographs on heritage pages. However, our modern photo software is making it an easy option for newer photos as well. Whether you're trying to remember the past, create a western feeling, or just fix a poorly-colored photo, there are lots of options to use sepia tones for your newer photos. Start experimenting and I'm sure you'll be pleased with the results.

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