Upload the portrait to an AI colourising tool, let it generate a colour version automatically, then check the result carefully against what you actually know about the photo before treating it as accurate.
What you need
- A digital copy of the black-and-white portrait
- An AI photo tool with a colourise feature (for example, within Photoshop Elements’ Neural Filters, or a dedicated colourising app or website)
- Any known facts about the photo — hair colour, eye colour, clothing colour — from someone who remembers, if possible
- 15 to 20 minutes
What AI colourising actually does
AI colourising is a guess dressed up as a photo. The AI was not there — it is picking plausible colours based on patterns from millions of other photos, not recovering the real colours of this specific person or place. Treat the result as an interesting version, not a fact.
How to colourise with an AI tool
- Make a copy of the original black-and-white file and keep it untouched.
- Open your chosen AI colourising tool and upload the copy. If you are using Photoshop Elements, this is usually under Enhance, then Auto Colorize, or a Neural Filters panel depending on your version.
- Let the tool generate its automatic colour version — this usually takes a few seconds to a minute.
- Look closely at the result: skin tone, hair colour, and clothing. Some tools let you nudge individual colours afterwards — use this if a colour looks obviously wrong, like bright blue skin.
- If you know real facts about the photo — say, that a shirt was actually red, or hair was blonde not brown — compare them against what the AI produced.
- Save the AI version under a new file name, separate from both the original and any hand-colourised version you might also make.
Check the colours look plausible
Ask whether the colours look plausible for the era and setting — very saturated, modern colours can be a sign the AI has overreached. If you have living family members who remember the photo, show them the result and ask if anything looks off; their memory is a better source than the AI’s guess.
If the result looks flat or wrong
If the tool produces a flat, washed-out result, some apps have a strength or intensity slider — try increasing it slightly. If skin tones look artificial, a hand-colourising approach may suit a portrait better than a fully automatic one.
Next step
Compare two AI restoration results before choosing one walks through weighing up more than one automatic attempt side by side.
Sources and date checked
General documentation from AI photo-editing tools that offer automatic colourisation, plus Adobe’s Photoshop Elements Neural Filters documentation. Checked 22 September 2026. This is researched guidance, not a hands-on test of a specific tool on this photo.