converting slides

[Millervideo]

I have had people asking me to scan their old slides and put them on DVD or CD. I have a slide scanner but it is very basic and slow going. Anybody have any advice about what I might be able to purchase without busting the bank? I want the pictures to look nice and the scanning to be faster, but I don’t want to spend the money on something ultra professional.

[Anonymous]

Miller Video,

I have had a lot of success digitizing slide film by using a very inexpensive holder and a home made light box. What you really need to do is have an even light source, put your digital camera on a tripod, and make or buy a very inexpensive slide holder.

You can make one out of the center of aluminum foil center carboard tube with a cutout for the slide and face it toward a very steady light source to keep digitizing. Or get the $59 professional version, which does the same thing. You supply your own bright light source and your own digital camera. Take the highest resolution you need for your presentation or max out your resolution for archival purposes. No matter how high your digital camera goes, you can’t improve on the slides, as photo film resolution is measured in terms of individual molecules. But what you give up in pure resolution, you can gain in being able to modify the image, improve on it, and archive for future generations.


Digicam ----------- Slide Holder -----------Light Source
     |                        |
     |                        |
     |                        |
   Tripod                  Slides


This allows you to speed up the process, test a few pieces to finalize your setup, then create your assembly line.

Ebay sells this listed as Slide Adapter, it currently looks like 47th street video is exclusively selling this on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Opteka-Slide-Copier-Nikon-D70s/dp/B000FA76JS

This FLICKR section shows someone who did the OPTEKA version and there looks like some good discussion going on about the method and process:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/judyboy/285244496

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[Millervideo]

Thanks for the advice.

[Dotneck]

depends on the quality required and why you actually want from slides on a DVD. If they are going to be put into a slide show to watch on a TV then they just need to be screen resolution. For that look into the slide copier described above.

I also use an Elmo TRV-35H which is a modified slide projector with an LCD capture device in it. they were about $2500 new but you can find them on ebay from $100-500 used. It has an S-video out and I run that into my editing system. Quick fast cheap. Works well…quality okay. No individual files…just a DVD stream to watch the slides…cut to music….etc

But many of my customers also want files of each slide and for those I use a Nikon scnner. Slow, big files, and a pretty fair learning curve (including learning Photoshop if need be). But beautiful results with lots of flexibility. You can print the files, e-mail them, or put them into a show to watch on TV.

I get about 75 cents per slide for the cheap method and about $3 per slide for the scans.

BTW…I’ve got a Nikon Coolscan 4000 I’ll sell…I upgraded to a 5000.

[birdcat]

Based on this thread I picked up one the Opteka converters. You’ll need a good negative/slide/lens brush but other than that the quality is pretty good. I have a 6 megapixel consumer digital camera (Olympus SP500-UZ) and that worked pretty well (not perfect but more than acceptable). I think the biggest factor in using it is the light source.

Thanks for the tip – This will save me lots of time with a film scanner.

[Millervideo]

Back again…. Anybody with experience using a Nikon Coolscan?

[Author]

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