35mm slides - any experts here?

[nekkidfish]

Hi all!

I have hundreds and hundreds (maybe a thousand) 35mm slides that my Dad took when we were kids.

I am going to buy this slide converter thing, which will let me convert them to digital format.

I'll be working on this all year, and then giving it to my sisters and Mom as a Christmas gift next year.

But, I need to go through them all to pick and choose which slides I want to convert. So, I need some sort of slide viewer ... but don't have a clue what I need.

I looked on eBay, but there are a bunch of different ones, and a lot of them say 'vintage' in the description. I don't think I want vintage ... I want something that works.

So ... if you are a photography buff ... can you please point me in the direction as to what or where I can buy a 35mm slide viewer?

Thanks and HUGz! Jules

 

[Big Mike]

Welcome to the forum.

You could use a light table...and maybe a loupe.
There are plenty of cheap 'slide viewers' that are just small projectors. http://www.shopping.com/xDN-photographic_accessories-35mm_slide_viewer

 

[airgunr]

I would suggest a light table as you can spread the slides out and get a decent look at them. The drawback is that they are small and harder to see.

If you look for a Slide Projector I would see if you can pick up a Kokak 5600 (I think is the series number). They are of a more recent vintage so you can still get bulbs and parts.

They are available on Ebay but I would first look at B&H, Adorama, KEH, Cameta Camera, etc. and see if you can find one used from them. Ebay scares me on that kind of stuff.

I would also consider a dedicated film scanner like the Nikon Coolscan V ED or better the 5000 ED. The later has an attachement availble that allows you to load a whole tray of slides and batch scan them. You will get much better results and although relatively expensive it will pay for itself in the long run with superior quality.

 

[Alex_B]

Welcome to the forum

Me? an expert? well at least I scanned about 6000 slides so far, maybe more

As mentioned, a small light table and a magnifying glass will help select. you could use a normal table with a glass plate and install some light source beneath it if you don not want to spend money.

As a projector, it depends which country you are in .. if you are in Europe, a Leitz/Leica projector is a very nice choice. I use one and I like it

As for the scanning itself, the Nikon 5000 ED would be my first choice. however keep in mind, to get good quality is quite some effort, and my advice would be to postprocess the scans later to reduce in particular colour noise. I use NeatImage, by far better than any noise/grain reduction which comes with the scanner. I actually switched the scanner feature for this off.

Some of my scanned slides can be seen here:

http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=103377

This is fuji velvia scanned with the 5000 ED. Resolution is strongly reduced for posting here of course.

Hi all!

I have hundreds and hundreds (maybe a thousand) 35mm slides that my Dad took when we were kids.

I am going to buy this slide converter thing, which will let me convert them to digital format.

I'll be working on this all year, and then giving it to my sisters and Mom as a Christmas gift next year.

But, I need to go through them all to pick and choose which slides I want to convert. So, I need some sort of slide viewer ... but don't have a clue what I need.

I looked on eBay, but there are a bunch of different ones, and a lot of them say 'vintage' in the description. I don't think I want vintage ... I want something that works.

So ... if you are a photography buff ... can you please point me in the direction as to what or where I can buy a 35mm slide viewer?

Thanks and HUGz! Jules

 

[Happy Hour]

I had to do this for work when I hurt my back. I used a scanner for slides. You pop the slide in hit scan it pops up on your screen as a 4 x 6 pic in seconds and if its one you want hit save. simple as that.

 

[jwkwd]

Or, if you don't want to spring for a slide viewer kind of thing, you can just open "Word" and leave the screen black. They would still be small, but you would have even light.

 

[Alex_B]

I had to do this for work when I hurt my back. I used a scanner for slides. You pop the slide in hit scan it pops up on your screen as a 4 x 6 pic in seconds and if its one you want hit save. simple as that.

it was never that simple for me. strange. on a high end computer and the not that slow ED 5000 it still took at least 40 seconds per scan. You would fiddle with parameters, and so on. Even scanning fine grain velvia was some effort, although easier to get decent results than normal consumer grade slide or negative film.

 

[Helen B]

What sort of quality are you looking for in the final scan? How much Kodachrome is there among those 1000 slides? What is your budget?

Microtek have just released the M1. You could do batch scans with that. If you had two film holders (as with the Pro option) you could be loading one holder while the other was being scanned.

A Nikon 5000 will do a better job, but you might not need the quality of the 5000. The batch slide feeder accessory would be a good way of doing basic-quality scans easily, but the slide feeder isn't cheap. The Nikon has the advantage of ICE for dust and fungus removal with colour film, which could be a big time saver when you have a lot of old slides.

I don't use an optical viewer for sorting, I just use a very small light box or the same method that jwkwd uses, but with a good Rodenstock 6x loupe that permits me to see the whole slide at once, and aso allows an accurate assessment of the quality.

Best,
Helen

Dirty Kodachrome, Nikon 5000, Nikonscan, ICE and no ICE:

 

[Alex_B]

ICE does a great job, that is true, but things like GEM (reduction of grain and such) are better done in post processing.

One more thought about getting a more expensive scanner. You could consider getting an ED 5000 with a slide feeder, scn your slides, and sell it again on eBay. At least in central Europe you would not lose much money then, in particular if you sold it again after say one year when there is still another year of warranty left. This is like renting the scanning equipment for a year but spending only very little money for it.

 

[MissMia]

Thanks for this thread!

I have thousands of slides that I want to preserve. My grandfather took them during WWII when he was a tank commander. I also have his war diary and letters home that correspond with the slides. My husband says I should donate them to a museum, but I need to go thru them first.

 

[Happy Hour]

Thanks for this thread!

I have thousands of slides that I want to preserve. My grandfather took them during WWII when he was a tank commander. I also have his war diary and letters home that correspond with the slides. My husband says I should donate them to a museum, but I need to go thru them first.

wow. i hope you put them up somewhere for public viewing? My grandfather fought in Normandy. I am facinated by WWII stories. good luck with all your scans! It's time consuming and frustrating at times. I gave up for a while on mine. because it takes so much time, not 2 mention it's boring!!:thumbup:

 

[Alpha]

I second the Nikon w/ the batch slide feeder if you can afford it.

 

[probe1957]

Wow. You have a hell of a project ahead of you.

 

[bhop]

wow. i hope you put them up somewhere for public viewing?

I agree! I'm a wwII history nerd and would love to see them.

 

[MissMia]

bhop & happy hour: Here is one of the slides I tried to scan. It's the only one I have on my laptop. This is just after the war, when he was still stationed in the pacific.