03 February 2011

Slide Scanning - FotoBridge - Getting them ready!

Do you feel like you are swimming in 35mm slides? Depending on how many you have, it can feel like drowning. Or it may just be that you have no idea what to do with them. Here is what M.J. brought back for me the other night: 


Not too overwhelming. This is just a tiny fraction of Bubba's slides, so if you are dealing with boxes and boxes, I feel your pain. My sister and I spent a long weekend viewing and sorting most of roughly 10,000 slides. These are the slides that were sorted into the 'pictures of Scrappy Gen' pile. There is also a baggie labeled 'Garden', which includes slides of Bubba and Grandma's magical, mystical backyard. Today I am packing all of these up to send to FotoBridge for scanning.

Packaging slides is a relatively easy process. The most difficult part was the counting. :) For each group of slides I counted them, counted them again and secured them in stacks with elastic bands. Fifty was the max I felt comfortable putting in one stack. Here are some of my stacks ready to be put in baggies and boxed: 


Because the slides were already sorted by year, I chose to package each year individually. FotoBridge will send them back in their original groupings if you indicate that you would like this done in the notes section of your order. 

Once your slides are packed, it's time to place your order. Be sure to take a look at the packages before you start choosing and packing your slides. Packages range from 250 to 10,000 slides.

My first order has 500 slides. I am upgrading to the 'Gold' package, slides scanned at 3000dpi instead of 2000, and am adding the TIFF files. Even with the TIFF option added, the service is still reasonable when you consider how much time I will save by not having to tinker with each slide. My package will then arrive with three formats; jpg, tiff and web ready, perfect for uploading to The Scrappy Genealogist. :) 

Time to go to the post office and send these babies off. 

Happy Sunny Thursday! 


Scrappy Gen
Let's Remember!

4 comments:

  1. I am really interested in hearing about your experience. I am in the same situation as far as being inundated with slides.

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  2. I too am very interested in this process as we took many, many slides during the time our kids were little. Thanks for walking us through the process. I'm anxious to hear the results, but the quality of pictures you've posted thus far is amazing!

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  3. You will know the results as soon as I do. The hardest part is waiting, but my sister said it did not take all that long. Thanks for reading.

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  4. I bought a slide scanner which does fine for 35mm and for rolls of "normal" film, but I also have a bunch of very old negatives, which are about the size of 4x5 and 5x7 pictures (and black and white) . THOSE are troublesome! But for the normal ones, I just pay my grandson to sit and scan... what is fun is he comes up with questions about what he sees in the scans, which helps pass along some of those memories...

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