# Un-edit edited photo



## G-Stress (Feb 4, 2008)

I ran across something weird tonight while looking for a picture I couldn't find for the life of me. I decided to use windows built in search function. I happen to notice a picture of me and my ex from along time ago, one that I sorta cut out her face to cut her out of the picture with like a black spot, the weird thing is the picture showed up in it's original state in the thumbnail.

When I open it, it's still edited like I did along time ago, but the thumbnail shows the original pic. After a bit of research I come to know that it's because windows caches thumbnails, but I was wondering is there anyway I can un-edit this picture and restore it to it's original state?


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## Hughv (Jul 22, 2006)

All I can tell you is that I tried this a while ago and was never able to find a solution.
I suspect it's not possible if the original image wasn't saved prior to editing.


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## G-Stress (Feb 4, 2008)

hmmm... yea I thought the same until today. The way I see it, when editing a photo typically with photoshop any edits done are just like adding a "layer" over the original image. Also what really gets me is the pic I'm speaking of was never before on this machine at all until today so it's hard to see that it cached the thumbnail when the only time this machine has as ever seen it was after the edit. I never seen the original pic that was on my lap-top only.

I'm not big in imaging and all that or else I would probably have a better idea


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## xgerryx (May 16, 2003)

G-Stress said:


> but I was wondering is there anyway I can un-edit this picture and restore it to it's original state?


Depends on how you saved it but recovery very unlikely.
What file type is it ?


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## G-Stress (Feb 4, 2008)

It's a .jpg What I did was when we split I liked the picture so I just opened the image in paint and painted a black spot over her face and saved it. Didn't keep a backup of the original.


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## Hughv (Jul 22, 2006)

G-Stress said:


> hmmm... yea I thought the same until today. The way I see it, when editing a photo typically with photoshop any edits done are just like adding a "layer" over the original image. Also what really gets me is the pic I'm speaking of was never before on this machine at all until today so it's hard to see that it cached the thumbnail when the only time this machine has as ever seen it was after the edit. I never seen the original pic that was on my lap-top only.
> 
> I'm not big in imaging and all that or else I would probably have a better idea


First rule of editing images:Never work on the original. Always save a copy first.
Some edits are layers, but those edits can only be undone if the layers are saved, like with the psd format.


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## G-Stress (Feb 4, 2008)

I'll have to remember that. I know I should have saved a copy of the original and I usually do, but of course I was a bit upset and didn't want to think about her at the time so I did what I did.


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## xgerryx (May 16, 2003)

In that case she's history.

Good rule of thumb is never edit an original or be very careful how you save.


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## G-Stress (Feb 4, 2008)

hmmm... for some reason it just don't make sense to me. I'm one of the type that is always thinking outside the box. I guess I just don't understand how, because when I seen the thumbnail on my lap-top and saw that it showed the original pic, but when I opened it, it still showed it as I edited it. I then copied the edited photo to my desktop which the pic has never at all been on this machine and it also showed the thumbnail in it's original state.

guess I should get into imaging more. Thanks for the advice and quick responses.


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## xgerryx (May 16, 2003)

G-Stress said:


> for some reason it just don't make sense to me. I'm one of the type that is always thinking outside the box. I guess I just don't understand how, because when I seen the thumbnail on my lap-top and saw that it showed the original pic, but when I opened it, it still showed it as I edited it. I then copied the edited photo to my desktop which the pic has never at all been on this machine and it also showed the thumbnail in it's original state.


It appears that when it was saved its saved the original thumbnail info. Paint is a very limited editing program.
PS: Just had a play with MS Paint and it yes it does still save the original thumbnail.


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## Knotbored (Jun 5, 2004)

Make a screenshot of the thumbbnail
resize that thumbnail to exactly match the size of the altered picture (crop away the rest of the desktop)
surround the exwifes picture and copy it
paste that over the "good" picture matching as perfectly as you can
use various photoshop tools to improve the wifes picture as much as you can (or use smudge tool from other picture programs)
The result won't be perfect but perhaps better then just a snapshot of the bad thumbnail.


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## G-Stress (Feb 4, 2008)

hmmm... very good information guys, thanks. I did think about doing the whole thumbnail thing and resizing it. Been awhile since I've done any imaging and I'm not that good at it, but i'll probably give it a go.


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## Hughv (Jul 22, 2006)

One tip about up-sizing:do it in small increments, like 5% to get a better result.


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## hewee (Oct 26, 2001)

I use PhotoImpact and guess other Imaging programs you can do the same but I use the custom menu and took away the default save button and replace it with the Save-As button so anytime I save I always have the Save-As. 
Then if I save it to the same folder and don't change the name I have it ask if I want to over write it too so I will get a warning and can change the name or add a number to the end of it.


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