How We Turned a Vintage Photo of Audrey Hepburn into a Floral Masterpiece

Audrey Hepburn is one of the most iconic and elegant actresses of all time, known for her roles in films such as Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Roman Holiday, and My Fair Lady. She was also a humanitarian, a fashion icon, and a timeless beauty.

We wanted to create a unique and stunning art print that would capture her essence and charm, and also add some floral elements to give it a fresh and vibrant look. In this blog post, we will show you how we digitally remastered and altered a vintage photo of Audrey Hepburn into our Floral Audrey Hepburn print, which is exclusive to Download Artwork.

Sourcing the Photo

The first step was to find a suitable photo of Audrey Hepburn that we could use as the base for our print. We searched online for public domain images of her, and we came across this lovely photo of her from the 1960s:

Audrey Hepburn
Audrey Hepburn

Albeit the quality is poor, we loved the pose, the expression, and the lighting of this photo, and we thought it would be perfect for our print.

Digitally Remastering It in Photoshop

The next step was to digitally remaster the photo in Photoshop, to enhance its quality and resolution. We used various tools and filters in Photoshop, such as the healing brush, the clone stamp, the sharpen tool, the curves adjustment, and the noise reduction, to remove any scratches, blemishes, or imperfections from the photo, and to make it more clear and crisp.

We also cropped the photo to focus on Audrey’s face, and we changed the color mode from grayscale to RGB, to prepare it for adding colors later.

Upscaling It with Our Software

The next step was to upscale the photo with our software, to increase its resolution and size. We used powerful software to enlarge and enhance images without losing quality.

We decided to increase the resolution by 4 times, and to preserve the original aspect ratio. We also selected the option to enhance the details and sharpness of the image, to make it more realistic and smooth whilst giving us the capacity to make more detailed adjustments in Photoshop and Lightroom.

Here is a close up of the result of our first upscaling:

Audrey Hepburn close up of first upscale
Audrey Hepburn close up of first upscale

As you can see, the size of the image has increased and much of the quality has been maintained – except for specific areas such as Audrey’s eyes which we deal with in our second pass in Photoshop.

Going Back into Photoshop and Adjusting the Lighting and Remastering It Again

The next step was to go back into Photoshop and adjust the lighting and remaster the photo again, to make it more suitable for adding colors and flowers later. We used various tools and filters in Photoshop, such as the dodge and burn tools, the levels adjustment, the vibrance adjustment, and the color balance, to modify the brightness, contrast, and tone of the photo, and to give it a softer feel.

We also used the liquify tool to slightly reshape Audrey’s face, to make it more symmetrical and balanced.

Finally we recreated Audrey’s eyes using references we had from a previous picture we had created of the Legendary actress.

Here is the result of our second remastering in Photoshop:

Audrey Hepburn 2nd Pass in Photoshop
Audrey Hepburn 2nd Pass in Photoshop

Upscaling It Again

The next step was to upscale the photo again except we increased the resolution by 2 times instead of 4 times, to avoid making the image too large or pixelated.

Going Back into Photoshop and Creating the Flowers, the Depth, the Focus and the Lighting

The next step was to go back into Photoshop and create the flowers, the depth, the focus and the lighting, to give the photo a floral and artistic touch. We used various tools and filters in Photoshop, such as the brush tool, the gradient tool, the blur tool, the layer styles, and the blend modes, to paint and place different types of flowers around Audrey’s face, and to create a sense of depth and focus by blurring and fading some of the flowers.

We also used the lighting effects filter to add some light sources and shadows to the photo, to make it more dynamic and dramatic.

Here is the result of our final editing in Photoshop (prior to Lightroom):

Audrey Hepburn Final Pass in Photoshop
Audrey Hepburn Final Pass in Photoshop

Going into Lightroom and Finalising the Lighting

The final step was to go into Lightroom and finalise the lighting, to make the photo more consistent and harmonious. We used various tools and filters in Lightroom, such as the exposure, the contrast, the highlights, the shadows, the whites, the blacks, the clarity, the dehaze, the temperature, the tint, the saturation, and the split toning, to adjust the overall lighting and color of the photo, and to give it a more natural and balanced look.

We also used the vignette tool to add a subtle darkening around the edges of the photo, to draw more attention to Audrey’s face and the flowers.

The Final Result

And here is the final result of our Floral Audrey Hepburn print, which is now available for download on our website:

Audrey Hepburn Floral Print
Audrey Hepburn Floral Print

We hope you enjoyed this blog post and learned something new about how we created our Floral Audrey Hepburn print. We are very proud of this print and we think it is a beautiful and unique tribute to Audrey Hepburn, one of the most iconic and elegant actresses of all time.

If you like this print and want to download it for your home, you can find it on our website here, along with many other exclusive and stunning printable art prints. You can download them in high-resolution JPEG formats, and print them yourself or at a local print shop. You can also choose from different sizes and orientations, or ask us customize them to suit your preferences.

Thank you for reading and happy printing! 🌸