[galbayfisher]

I have a lot of old pictures and negatives. I would like to have the negatives scanned in and saved.

Walgreens charges 39 cents a frame to scan. Do you know where I could get this done cheaper or is there a scanner you could recommend to do this with?
thanks.:goldfish:

 

[Arlon]

I have a scanner you can borrow if you want. I also copied a lot of slides by shooting them on my camera with a macro lens. I just made a little fixture on a 1x4 to hold the camera and slide at the same distance every time. Was WAY faster than the scanner and equal or sometimes better results because of the custom white balance and shutter control.

Here are some samples of the ones I did: http://www.pbase.com/arlon/old_slide_copies

 

[grayfish]

Never used this company. I found them on the net.

http://www.scancafe.com/pricing.php

 

[Arlon]

Just for fun I grapped up an old slide out of the drawer, grabbed my little A530 pocket cam and shot it handheld against my shoplight (with a diffuser).. Not bad for a 3 minute effort from concept to finish.. Never tried it with a P&S before. About as well focused as the original.

larger: http://fototime.com/87010D403148DAB/orig.jpg
larger:

 

[Koru]

well, that's sure an easy way of updating all those old photos! slip 'em onto cd storage until the next leap in technology comes along.

awesome!

and it looks like you've ALWAYS been a great photographer! that is a very beautiful building.

rosesm

 

[Arlon]

Karen, that was one of my dad's old ektachrome slides from the late 50's. It had turned totally red. I shot it with the P&S, threw it into Elements and made it BW. Much more pleasing than the red slide. Just a "proof of concept" for our bay fisher. I'm sure it could have been done better if I had taken time to set up a little stand for it and maybe could have gotten some color back in PS. I think they even make some little slide/negative copier attachements for some of the more popular P&S cameras. Works on negatives too. Just have to PS them back to positives. Arlon

 

[MT Stringer]

I used to have a light box made out of plywood. It had a frosted plexiglass cover to lay the slides on and a GE Bright Stick underneath to light them up. Worked pretty good too.
Mike

 

[galbayfisher]

thanks for all the input. Do the scanners come with software that will convert the negatives into a "positive" picture?

 

[Arlon]

I'm not sure what the scanner software can do. I remember it has a few gadgets but I was doing slides so I didn't need the negative stuff.. Arlon

Scanner is pretty time consuming. If I could just give someone $100 and have them deliver 500 negatives scanned to a CD, that's probably what I'd do. To scan 500 negatives will take you a month of weekends..

 

[Pocketfisherman]

Look at an Epson Perfection scanner bundled with their "ICE" software. It has a holder to scan 6 slides simultaneously. The ICE software lets you repair scratched or damaged negatives or slides automatically. It is one of the highest rated pro-sumer film/slide scanners out there, and does double duty as a copier and fax too.

 

[grayfish]

thanks for all the input. Do the scanners come with software that will convert the negatives into a "positive" picture?

Not sure what software comes with what scanners, I image that changes on a regular basis.

You may already have such software. Most all photo editing software will covert a negative to positive and vice versa. It is called different things in different applications. I have several editing applications. The simpliest comes with MS Office. It is not installed by default. You have to customize installation to get it. It is called Microsoft Photo Editor. In it, you choose Effects and negative. If you make a negative of a negative you get a positive. Called the same with MS Picture It!.

In my Corel Photo-Paint you have to go to Image, Transform, Invert to do the same.

I am sure others may name the effect differently.

What ever scanner you may choose, use the highest resoluton that is not scanner software enhanced, to scan your negative film. (assuming you are using 35mm). As an example, my older HP scanner, scans at 1200 DPI, an optical limitation, but will also scan at 9600 DPI in enhanced mode. I never use it as I do not want the scanner software to perform any magic to get the 9600 dpi. I want an image the best the hardware can do. I will take care of any ehancement with photo editing applications if needed. Enhanced images in either case have an overall softness to them.

And of course make sure the scanner is options to scan slides or film strips. That means it has a back light capibility.

 

[galbayfisher]

Grayfish,
thanks for your input. I do have a lot of negatives. but with some of these scanners, I think I can scan at least 6 at a time.

 

[grayfish]

That ScanCafe looked interesting to me. Scanning at 3000 dpi and paying for only the ones you want sounds good, compared to spending hour upon hour doing your own. I would be tempted to do them myself but I got lots of time. Their turn around seemed way to long however. Since you are working on a special project, doing them yourself my be the way to go. Plus you end up with a scanner to use for other purposes. Mine has turned into mostly a copy machine.

 

[RustyBrown]

Chiming in...

I purchased an Epson Perfection 3490 a couple of years ago. It does a great job with slides, but I prefer to make alladjustments in PS as I feel I have more control over the end result. Should be about $90 on ebay so if you had alot of slides at .39 apiece it would pay for itself.

The setting to remove dust and scratches (again to me) also degrade to image sharpness. It will also do 3200x6400 not that you'll ever need it.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Slightly-used-EPSON-PERFECTION-3490-PHOTO-SCANNER_W0QQitemZ120146730951QQihZ002QQcategoryZ44977QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem