UKC

I'm looking on some recommendations on the best way to scan slides to archive them, it total there are about 1000 slides and wanted to know what would be the most time and cost efficient way to scan and archive them.

Thanks for any advice
Andrew

In reply to Andrew W:
I ended buying at great expense, a Nikon 4000LS with an auto feeder. It produces very good results.
They are often on ebay, but rarely come up with the auto feeder as well.
I figured that I can do all my slides, then sell it on and still get a very good price for it. A sound investment.
I may even offer to scan slides for others and make a bit of money that way.
The auto feeder doesn't work well with old cardboard slides but is quite efficient with plastic mounts. Card ones need to be scanned individually.
The scanner will also do negatives.
Don't be tempted into one of the lesser Nikon scanners as there may be connectivity issues … non USB / non Firewire etc.
The Nikpn software is also an issue with modern PC / Mac. I bought Vuescan and it does the job excellently.
Good luck!

In reply to Tim Sparrow:

Thanks I'll have a look at that.

Does anyone have any experience of sending slides off to be scanned as a number of companies appear online that offer the service.

In reply to Andrew W:

Chris Craggs (of this parish) used to offer a scanning service. - Worth contacting him.

In reply to Andrew W:
I use Mr Scan http://www.mr-scan.co.uk/ having been recommended it on UKC. Very happy with the service and quality at about 40p per slide (some examples in my gallery on here). I think you would need a very good and expensive scanner to get similar results. people I know who have scanned their own slides on releatively cheap scanners tend to have very mediocre results for much investment of time!

A bit scary putting all your best slides in the post though...... but nice once you have electronic backups.

In reply to Andrew W:

What computer & operating system are you using?

I've a Plustek OpticFilm 7600 that produces good results. The main problem I've had with it is down to no drivers for the later versions of Mac OS X (Lion and later).

Depending on how valuable the shots are to you, I wouldn't rush the job - messing around in Photoshop or whatever is easier if you've a decent image to start with.

ALC

In reply to a lakeland climber: I'm running Windows 7 64 bit with and have access to XP as well.

In reply to Robert Durran:

Good to know that they are a legitimate service as they seem reasonably priced for larger number of slides.

In reply to Mark Kemball:


I will also endorse Chris Craggs, I always found his work excellent, reasonably priced and speedy.

In reply to Al and Mark:

Thanks for the kind words.

Unfortunately (!) I'm not at home much now so the scanning service is in abeyance for the time being.


Chris

In reply to Andrew W:

I have a Canon CanoScan 4000US that I'm probably going sell and I'm open to sensible offers. Does a great job.

In reply to David Simmonite:

I might be interested how much would you be looking for.

In reply to Andrew W:

send me your contact details by PM and we can talk about it.