Services to convert old slides to digital images

[tbaxte]

Do you have experience with any of these services, or know of a website that has reviews by pros or consumers?

[Bob]

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;"]<span style="line-height: 115%; font-size: 16pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"]<span style="font-family: Calibri;"]Tbaxte,
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;"]<span style="line-height: 115%; font-size: 16pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"]<span style="font-family: Calibri;"]Most services do a poor to fair job.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"] This is why I bought a film scanner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"] If you do the scan properly you will need to adjust each slide to get the proper framing, exposure and color shift.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"] So it depends on how many slides you need to have scanned.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"] Send them a couple of underexposed and over exposed slides/neg and see if the service does a good job.
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 10pt;"]<span style="line-height: 115%; font-size: 16pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"]<span style="font-family: Calibri;"]<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"]Bob<o></o>

[elmo_2006]

I agree, look into the price of a scanner that has film scanning capabilities, you'll be surprisedat the quality. I purchased a film supported Canon scanner 5 years ago and the output generated was amazing - the capability is there to edit at your pace and requirements! BTW, I'm still using this scanner!


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[jimr]

With the in-laws 50th wedding anniversary last summer I took about 10 boxes of slide they had accumulated and was going to scan the best ones in. What a process. The cost get them done was large... large enough that I could easily pay for a really high end slide/film scanner and a new computer! I did buy the slide/film scanner.... what a pain to use in a bulk fashion. I could see why it cost so much to hirer someone to do this.


As I looked at them through a slide projector on the screen I wonder if I could just snap photos with a DLSR. I set up the DLSR on a tripod and lined it up right beside the side projector. Set the camera to full manual mode and started to 'play' with the settings. With the help of a wireless remote I started taking photo's of the slides. The slide projector quickly focuses and with the only light the camera sees is the projected image on the screen ... presto less than 1/2 second later I have captured it digitally.


I ran through about 5000 slides in one evening and captured about 500 with the DSLR of them and the then narrowed that down to about 200. The end image quality was good and with some bulk tweaking of the photos they looked just as good as any result I got off the medium priced slide/film scanner I had bought. I returned the slide/film scanner and did the last 5000 the next evening. I found great time savings as I could go through one wheel of slides and just snap a photo of the images that where important and look good compared to stopping the process and pulling the slide out and setting it aside for later detailed scanning via the dedicated slide/film scanner.


I printed a bunch of the photos as 4X6's for family members and I felt my reproduction from slides looks better then the ones generated right from the slides. I think it had a lot to do with the age and condition of many of the slides. Digital post production work can do a lot to clean up. I am sure pictures produced Kodachrome slides and done professionally would be far superior.


For a small number of slide a service maybe good and reasonable prices, especially if you do not have a slide projector and screen (but you can rent these). Once you hit a 100 or so photos the cost start to really high and alternative solutions become cheaper - ie buy a film/slide scanner.

[barba]

Owing a good quality scanner and a nice SLR or rangefinder (or better yet a Holga) is a lot of fun. I would seriously investigate buying a nice flatbed. I use an Epson that does great slide and negative scans and doubles as a useful bit of home office kit.

[tbaxte]

Thanks everyone for the thoughtful advice. I would sure like to spend my time picking out the good images, and then outsource the conversion. Bit I will definitely give more thought to a scanner, after I get a better handle on my volume.

[Daniel Browning]

Another option is to rent a high quality scanner. If you only need it for 1-3 days, it can be less hassle then buying and then selling it used.