Tin Can Sailors
Photo Services
 

Photos are available only by phone.  Our list of available photos is constantly expanding.  Please call us at (800) 223-5535 to find out if a photo of the ship you are interested in is available.

Notes on Photo Quality

We have invested a great deal of time and effort to make the photos we offer for sale the best possible, however, we want you to be aware of what is being offered.

We sell computer reproductions rather than photographic reproductions. After considerable experimentation we found that this gives us better control over focus, contrast, and cropping.

You should be aware that there are limits to how good some photos can be.

Original Official USN photos are not all clear, sharp, free from spotting, etc. Photographing ships can be difficult due to motion, glare, shadows, etc., and many Official USN photos suffer as a result. The photo labs did not always do a flawless job, either.

Sometimes we cannot find a really good photo of a ship during a certain time frame. In those cases, we'll bring you the best we can get, and we'll note the problems in our quality comments (see below).  Most of these photos were taken for internal Navy use, and were never intended to be portraits for framing. They may have classification stamps on them, shipyard markings, etc. Often when a photo was declassified, someone simply took a scissors and cut off the portion of the photo with the Confidential stamp on it. As a results, an 8" x 10" photo might become a 6" x 10" photo. There's not much we can do about this (the damage was probably done 50 years ago), so some photos will have white or black bands at the top and bottom.

Please be assured that we are selling the best product we can. We have seen photos marketed by some other firms and feel that ours are at least as good, often better, than what you can obtain elsewhere.