Has anyone ever had slides scanned onto a cd? My dad has probably 400 of them and my brother and I are thinking about this for Xmas (he's not a 'stuff' kind of guy).

I don't think I'd be comfortable mailing them so I'm hoping to find a place close to San Diego. I found a place online in Mesa, AZ but I have no idea of the quality or any other issues there might be.

Thanks for any help!

Slides - no, but the regular paper photos - yes. In Walgreens.

I brought the film for developing, and asked if they can do it on a disk. They said yes, they first make paper photos, then scan them on a CD.

Not all pharmacies have this machine to do that, so call ahead. Maybe they can help you with the slides?

If you have a scanner and a good photo printer you can get a filter that will let you do it yourself. Office Depot or something similiar should have it perhaps even Frye electronics.

Generally flat-bed scanners do a poor job of scanning slides. I have a dedicated slide scanner that I bought on ebay for $100 or so that does a much better job of it, but it's a bit tedious. Last time I checked (a couple of years ago) the commercial services wanted an arm and a leg for slide scanning, but maybe they've come down since.

I've had 35mm negatives scanned here in Portland at a local lab. Please, DO NOT go to a place like Walgreens to have it done!!! The place I have used in Portland scans them for about $1 per image I recall + about $3 for a CD. This is for a 6MP image (3000x2000 pixels). Please note that this important. Low-res scans are useless for prints; this 6MP size is about minimum for any serious work. Some places will scan at much lower resolution. I say, don't bother.

You can try to get a slide scanner or even rent one. For 400 slides, you might consider buying one, using it to do all the scanning, then selling it unless your Dad wants to keep it. But you'll find that scanning slides with a cheapie scanner (or a flatbed) is not worth it. One big problem is dust on the slide. The profesionally labs have infared scanners that will filter out the dust on a scan! Not sure if the "prosumer" scanners have that kind of thing yet but I consider it essential. A little dust on a scan can ruin it.

Otherwise, look up "photography" in your yellow pages and start calling. What do they charge to scan 35mm slides? At what resolution? If it's the same $1 per frame I mentioned above, that of course could get pricey. Does your Dad really want all 400 scanned? What about just the best 50 or 100?

A former officer from the destroyer I was on just had it done and sent me a copy. It certainly brought back memories of the bleakness of the snow covered North Korean coastline and the enjoyment of the rest of our around the world 1953 cruise. I had hoped to show it at our September reunion, but the hotel wanted $300.00 for equiptment rental.

Yes - my father had lots of 35mm slides that I sorted through when he died and then took them to Ritz Camera who did it for me. It cost approximately $35 for over 80 slides. Not bad at all I thought. Well worth the memories!

Any decent photo shop can do this. (And no - the drugstore places are not equipped.) I had a bunch done and there was a flat fee for the CD plus $1 per slide.

But be aware that you're losing a lot of the quality of the photos by doing this. You can then make small prints from them - but if you try to do large prints the quality won't be great.

Thanks all.

Andrew - So far, the place I've found that seems the best is in AZ. Not overly excited to drive 4 hours each way but not willing to risk mail loss either. Could you translate this for me? I'm wondering if it's the quality you are talking about?

"Our standard pricing includes cleaning with compressed air to remove surface dust, scanning at 2000dpi (higher dpi's are available, too), Digital ICE dust and scratch removal when appropriate, rotating each image to the correct orientation, cropping to the edge of the image, and image enhancement including color balance, color restoration, and lightening/darkening each image on an image by image basis. We do not do batch auto-enhancement like ROC and GEM."

Thanks!

Hi Alice. 2000dpi = about 6Megapixel because slides are 1" x 1.5", so their images would be 2000 x 3000 pixels like the ones I get. And they make nice enlargements. 16"x24" look fine in my experience.

The rest sounds pretty standard - ICE is probably what my lab uses too to scan, for dust, scratches, etc.

What they are offering sounds like a pretty standard service, one I have no doubt is available in San Diego (Los Angeles for sure - that's got to be closer for you than Mesa, right?). I'd just keep looking. There are some photo-specific websites like dpreview.com and the Craigslist photography forum - try posting there and asking some of the locals for referrals for local labs. Or call some of the professional camera stores in San Diego and just ask them who they know who can scan slides. That $1 price sounds pretty standard.

(And if you drive to Mesa, realize 400 slides won't be done the same day, most likely!!!)

Thank you so much - that is exactly the feedback I needed! I swear, I can explain the most complicated SEC filing but these sites have me stumped with the technical language.

I have locatd a co in LA but they are significantly more $$ ($.59 per slide vs $1.55 per slide). That makes a difference with 400 slides, even when you factor in gas for the delivery and pick up trips. Also, I know it's a bit ridiculous to transfer all 400 slides but it's a surprise and he was really into photography back then so I have no idea what he wants or doesn't. It will just be easier this way, then he can lose the slides and have digital images to do with as he pleases. I have contacted a couple of professional stores in SD though so hopefully we'll find something a bit closer!

Hi Alice, Your is doing what I have wanted to do for years but the technology and price were too high. Recent developments have brought it down to affordable and I've been having a ball. Now just have to find the rest of them. I bought a CanoScan 9950f scanner that will do various slides, negatives and prints (as well as regular documents, etc). I use Adobe Photo Elements 4 as the import vehicle/editor and do correct lighting, and some cropping to get rid of the rough edges. These are very old slides (over 40 years) and am amazed at the wonderful output. I'm only scanning to 6oo dpi since I just want digital records and some prints not to exceed 5x7 inches and this seems fine and the file are 'only' just over 1 mega bite. This does require a good computer with lots of memory (RAM) and hard disk space but the results are sure worth it. There is no one better to decide on changes in exposure and cropping that the person who tool them in the first place. Some were old Ektachrome and did now 'age' as well as the Kodachrome. Some had mold damage but the results are pretty amazing. Enjoy. PS: The scanner runs about $350 (online) and Photo Elements 4 about $80.