Converting slides to digital images takes some time, but it can be done in batches to make it quicker.
Eventually in the digital age, those old slides in the closet will need a new format for viewing. Slide projectors are becoming hard to find when the old one breaks down, and no one really wants to sit in a darkened room any more watching static images of a vacation that took place in the 1960s. So it’s time to digitize those dust gatherers and make them look new again.
Instructions
1. Get a scanner that makes the most sense for what you plan to do. If you have lots of slides to convert to digital, but you do not need them in art gallery quality, the quickest and most efficient way to do it is with a flatbed scanner. If you want very precise control over each image, you will need a slide scanner, one that allows high-quality scans as well as sharp focus. The flatbed scanner needs to have a transparency adapter or a built-in light source in the lid. Low-cost consumer-level flatbeds do not always have these.
2. Clean the slides. They may have dust and debris on them from long-time storage. You need a cleaner that will not damage the slides, hurt the emulsion or change the color quality. Photography stores and online sites sell cleaning cloths as well as specific cleaners for film. Compressed air can help blow away some of the dust and debris as well.
3. Use the slide template that accompanied the flatbed scanner. If the scanner was designed to provide full transparency scanning, it usually comes with plastic templates that allow precise layout of slides for scanning. Usually, the slides--if they are mounted--clip into holes in the template, and you can get up to a dozen slides in some of these. If the slides are unmounted and still exist as strips of film, you can use the template for negatives, which will give you more images per scan.
4. Open the scanning software and set the scanning resolution as high as you can. The greater the resolution, the more visual information the final digital image will have. Most slide film produced better images than negative film, so you want to get as much of the quality into the digital images as possible. The resolution may be 2,400 or 4,800 pixels per inch or higher. This will create very large files, so you will need a lot of hard disc space to store them. If you are scanning a lot of slides, it’s a good idea to have a large-capacity external hard drive to dedicate to the project.
5. Open the photo-editing software once the slides have been scanned and get to work. Scanning may be tedious, but once it is done, you will need to fix up slides, especially old ones. There may be damage to the slides or the colors may have faded or otherwise altered over the years. Always remember to save any altered image file as a copy, so the original scans remain intact.
Tags: will need, flatbed scanner, damage slides, digital images, dust debris
