CVO 1K 2 Million

I understand there are specialized scanners for scanning 35mm slides for conversion to digital format...but have never seen one in a big electronics store like Fry's or similar...can anyone name a good one or give me a link. I have over 5000 slides in old Kodak Carousel trays...I'm afraid the projector may bit the dust one of these days. Also suspect I could recover some closet space.

someotherguy

They're called "film scanners." This'll get you started. http://www.scantips.com/basic13f.html
You probably want to get one with an infrared channel for automated dust removal.

Most of the digital photography sites have reviews. Here's one
http://www.imaging-resource.com/SCAN1.HTM

It's probably easiest to buy them online from the big electronics and photo dealers.

It's worth checking out Vuescan: http://www.hamrick.com/vsm.html

percussionking

I went to a community college that had 35mm scanners on their computers and they worked great. Now all I can find are photo scanners with an extra tray for negatives. I hate to recommend something I haven't used and can't find reviews about, but nobody else has posted anything yet so maybe this will get you started. You're looking at $189.99 for the Epson.

go to www.pricewatch.com
under "peripherals," click "scanners"
in the center, column click "negative scanners"

Flyingmama

I use a Minolta Dimage Scan Dual IV film and slide scanner, and it works great. You can even color correct and crop before saving the image to the hard drive. I don't remember what I paid for it, but it was quite reasonable - otherwise I wouldn't have bought it (on sale) from the Ritz Camera site.

cordelli

Do you currently have a scanner? There is a chance if it's a recent one, that there is already an adapter for it available. Check the manfg's website.

TRRed

I looked at slide scanners a while back. I have about 1,500-2,000 slides, but have moved to digital. Consumer Reports has a report on photo scanners within the last few years that you might want to look at. As I wanted a scanner with a pretty good resolution (4000 dpi or better), Nikon seemed to have the best product which also had a slide feeder, so that you could load 50 slides to be scanned, rather than one (or sometimes 3) at a time with most scanners. However, the price was pretty high (you can find them on Amazon, as well as other sites). I found the business represented by site below, which would scan all of my slides for significantly less than what it would cost me buy a scanner with feeder. It would also avoid the time required for me to scan all of the pics. I have not tried them yet, hoping for some feedback from someone who has used them.

http://www.digmypics.com/

CVO 1K 2 Million

Don't have an existing scanner so that's not an option.
The service is very interesting....comments would be welcome on that or any other similar service

wsbombers

My dad projected his slides onto a screen and took pictures of them with his digital camera. I'm sure the quality is not as good as a direct conversion, but it wasn't horrible, and it's definitely cheaper.

TRRed

Basically a bump.

Still interested if anyone has used the service below and, if so, their impressions.


http://www.digmypics.com/

UAL_Rulez

I have not tried that service but maybe it's worthwhile for you to send them a couple dozen slides and see if you like the results. The "camera store" scans I have gotten - i.e. develop & print film + scan images to CD have all been totally useless - big dirt specks, uncorrectable color problems (I suspect they were scanned in 8- or 12-bit color, not the 24-32 bits you need to capture high quality color rendition).

I have an Epson flatbed 2400dpi scanner that produces very, very good results from negatives and slides. The problem, as you point out, is that it can scan only a small handful of images at a time. It's also slow and tedious. The Nikon auto-load slide scanner would definitely be faster but they're not cheap.

Given you have a finite number of images to scan and how tedious it is to do, I'd be very inclined to use a service like the one in the link -- if the results are good and the price fair -- rather than buying an expensive scanner and doing it myself.

CVO 1K 2 Million

Another bump...for this or any other service that someone can recommend (or avoid)..

mesadler

Check this site out: http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/scanrex.htm

TRRed

I did as UAL_Rulez suggested and sent them a set of slides as a test. I was pleased with results and plan to send them more.

TRRed

jimbo99

If doing it yourself, I would urge caution before buying a film scanner. These can give great results, but they can take a while to scan each slide (or neg - they can do those as well).

I used to sell scanners, and it was the classic enquiry "I've got X thousand slides/photos" blah blah blah. If you max out the resolution, then you could be looking at a minute per slide depending on the speed of your PC. That's before you've got into cropping, improving the pic etc.

Even with a fairly sensible resolution, the process can be rather slow.

If you have a good digital camera and an adapter is available, I would consider that. Else as an earlier poster said, project on to a screen. Then photograph that (put the camera onto a tripod as close as possible to the projector). If your camera has a remote control, its so simple. Projector remote in one hand, camera remote in the other and away you go - as fast as your camera can go until you run out of memory. Then upload and continue. I got best results by setting my camera to manual and experimenting a bit first.

My projector was a rather poor one. Although not immediately noticeable on the screen, it was clear afterwards that the pics were brighter in the centre than in the corners. Since this was a systematic error, I was able to create a filter in Photoshop and apply to each in turn.