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QUESTION: I am an old artist trying my best to keep up; any help you can give me will be, of course, much appreciated. I have hundreds of 35 mm slides that I need to transfer to digital format for printing to at least 8 1/2 x 11 inches – please give me any information necessary to this end. 

PC Club: This reminds me of when I scanned 14 carousels of slides to free up some closet space that my wife had her eye on. There were a total of 1,200 slides and I spent an average of 5 minutes per slide for a total of 100 hours to perform some color correction and scratch removal on each slide. The amount of time can vary depending on the quality of the slides and how decent you want your prints to be. At the time, it would have cost me roughly $1 per slide or $1,200. It was an easy decision for me to spend $200 for a scanner and do it myself.

For conversion to digital you have several options, you can scan them yourself as I did or use a slide scanning service.  One such service that I’m familiar with, based on referrals, is Scan My Photos which is located in Irvine, California. Their phone number is 949-474-7654 and their web site is scanmyphotos.com (Read an earlier Gadgetress’ review of its photo-scanning service, at “Super photo scanners DO exist!“).

Their typical pricing for slide scanning is $1 per slide for a quantity of 150 or more with higher quantities priced somewhat lower. Each slide is color corrected as required. Slides can be brought to the store or mailed to them and is explained on their web site.

A 2nd service is Scan Digital, their phone number is 888-333-2808 and their web site is at scandigital.com. They are located El Segundo and their advertised price per slide is $0.68. You would have to check with them directly regarding quantity pricing.

For scanning slides yourself, a slide scanner can be used. These are available as a dedicated slide scanner, which only scans transparencies, such as the Plustek OpticFilm 7300 (pictured on right) which retails for $250 to $300. Or there are combination scanners that will scan both transparencies and photos such as the Epson Perfection 4490 Photo, which retails for approximately $120.

Scanning them yourself is less expensive in the long run assuming that you own a computer and have lots of patience and the right software such as Adobe Photoshop Elements or Corel Paintshop. Both of these programs are in the $79 price range. This can develop into a fun hobby, but if you just want to have the slides scanned without going through a learning curve, I’d recommend a service.

You can search the Internet to look for other slide scanning services or slide scanners. I’ve personally used products from both Epson and Plustek for scanning slides and have been very satisfied. To read more about scanning, see Scantips.com’s report, “Scanning thousands of old slides?“ - Ed Schwartz, NOCCC member. View his blog at edwardns.blogspot.com.

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