Tons of slides need to be digitized!

[bighatphotography]

My grandmother has crates and crates of old photo slides like from a projecter. Starting in the 50's to the 2000s, And she would like a way to show them digitally, instead of pulling out her projector, and finding the right box of slides and etc, etc. She has this: Amazon.com: VuPoint FS-C1-VP Film and Slide Digital Converter: Electronics but these are the pictures you get from it: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B65aYotms1pea2doby1SbUQ3OHc/edit Got any ideas of a different way of doing it, or improving them? I know this isn't what it actually looks like. Because i put it into the projecter it looks WAY better.

 

[vintagesnaps]

Looks like that scanner is low mp so I suppose the copies it makes may not be very sharp. I don't know if you could sharpen the digital copies to improve the quality or not.

Other options could be whether to see about getting a different scanner or doing some pricing on having them scanned. Seems like plenty of places will do a shoebox full, maybe if you go that route you'd need to do a box at a time to spread out the cost. Of course buying a scanner might be more cost effective, but then it's time consuming to scan them yourself and after these are done if she wouldn't need a scanner it might not be worth buying one.

 

[Derrel]

That device has utter rubbish specifications, and is designed more a s away to ingest and "catalog" one's slides by making low-resolution, 5-megapixel facsimilies of color slides and negatives...s a woefully under-capable device. And yes, 35mm slides, even from a pedestrian lens made in the 1950's look AWESOME when projected on a good glass beaded screen! I've seen hundreds of 1950's slides shot on the lowly Kodak Pony 135-B, on a 1950's era projector and screen,and let me say, they look NICE!

I dunno' what to tell you. Slide scanning is a somewhat tedious chore. A GOOD dedicated film and slide scanner makes good scans, well worth having. But most good scanners scan slowly, and making a pre-scan, adjusting exposure, then making the scan can take 5 minutes PER image, especially on tricky underexposed slides. Somewhat easier and faster might be flatbed scanners with transparency adapter capablity, and a multi-frame slide holder, like one of the Canon or Epson flatbed scanners; make SURE they have a "transparency adapter" or "illuminated lid" or somesuch thing.

If Scancafe is still in business, and I think they are, that would probably be the fastest, easiest, and BEST way to get GOOD scans, made by people who work cheaply and do this for their living. When making good scans that look great, it is not just hardware that's needed--it's experience and know-how.

 

[The_Traveler]

Scancafe is a fast, relatively cheap way to get this done.
I've had a good deal of work (about 3000 slides and films) done by them and was well satisfied.

 

[bighatphotography]

An idea i had. Was using a nice camera on a tripod, and then projecting them on a screen/wall and taking pictures of them... Would i just end up with different issues, that will lead to crappy images again? Because I don't mind sitting there sending them through the machine, but all im getting is crap, which is just a waste of my time.

 

[Msteelio91]

You're going to have a whole 'nother set of issues with that. I recommend you do what Lew said, it's not too expensive, done once and right and that's it.

 

[bighatphotography]

Okay. Well I will look into it! Thanks for the speedy replies/help.

 

[vintagesnaps]

I knew that slide duplicators used to be made for copying slides although I've never used one. You wouldn't project the image, instead you'd attach the slide dupe and photograph the slides directly.

I looked quick and see that they're still made, B&H has some. Depending on what camera/lens mount you have, you might find a used one but probably would have to make sure it'd work with what equipment you have.