RePhoto

Context

RePhoto is a free tool for standing where the old photographer stood. It aligns a historical photograph with the live camera view, so that a before and after comparison slider lines up exactly when a visitor drags it, without the jump that happens when two images are not properly matched.

The problem

Most heritage apps show a side by side of an old and a new photograph and leave the matching to the eye.

The approach

RePhoto is the alignment work underneath: a ghost overlay of the historical image over the camera, a warp to correct for the angle the original was shot from, and an export of the matched pair.

It runs entirely in the browser. Nothing is uploaded: the images stay on the device, which matters when the photograph belongs to an archive or a family rather than to the person holding the phone. It installs as a progressive web app and works offline, so it is usable standing in a field with no signal, which is where it is actually needed.

RePhoto is built on the Nearmark location stack, and the two are designed to work together: Nearmark knows where a visitor is standing and what was photographed there, RePhoto handles the matching.