Types of scanning
We provide three types of hand scanning, Economy (for printing at original size, sharing online, or Facebook), Archival (for high quality archiving and editing), and Advanced Archival (an extremely high detailed scan for very small images and enlarging). To illustrate the differences between the different resolutions we have taken the below picture and scanned it in at 300 dpi, 600 dpi, and 1200 dpi. We then zoomed in on the woman’s eye. As you can see, the higher the resolution you choose the more detail you will have in the picture.
Economy Hand Scanning (300 dpi resolution)
For sharing online, Facebook, or printing at original size
Proper orientation
Archival Hand Scanning (600 dpi resolution)
For high quality archiving and editing
Proper orientation
Minor color and exposure adjustment
Advanced Archival Hand Scanning (1200 dpi resolution)
Extremely high detailed scan excellent for very small images and enlarging
Proper orientation
Minor color and exposure adjustment
Minor Color and Exposure Adjustment
With the Archival and Advanced Archival scanning you will also receive minor color and exposure adjustment to each one of your photos.
With Out Adjustment
With Adjustment
Hand Scanning
At Digital Heirlooms we only hand scan your images. What does that mean? We take each of your photos and place them by hand into our scanners. This allows us to make sure that each of your images is handled with the utmost care and provides the best possible image quality. Hand scanning also allows us to scan oddly shaped, non standard size, bent, or curled photos. We use the Canon CanoScan 8000F. During processing we wear white cotton cloth gloves.
Please note: When scanning your photo, by default we will scan your entire photo, not just the image. This means the entire frame and border (which often contains dates) unless you specify otherwise.
Files Types
What file type should you choose? The question you need to ask is what do you want to do with your images once you have them scanned now and in the future? With the Economy option you will receive JPG files only on your DVD. With the Archival and Advanced Archival option you have the choice of two different types of file formats, JPG and TIFF. What’s the difference you ask? A JPG file is the most common file type in use for images. The advantage to a JPG file is that it gives you a smaller file size allowing you to save more images to a DVD. The disadvantage is that each time the file is changed and saved the file looses information and quality. You can just view the JPG files without loosing quality. In most cases a JPG will be adequate for what you will need as it is perfect for preserving, viewing, sharing, and printing.
A TIFF file is not as common as a JPG file. The advantage of a TIFF file is that it gives you an extremely high quality image for Archival or editing purposes. The disadvantage is that a TIFF file is four times the size of a JPG which only allows you to save a quarter of the amount of files per DVD. The advantage of a TIFF file is that when you make changes to the file and save it, it does not loose any information or quality. A TIFF file is great for high quality archiving and editing.
Back of Photos
Do you want to preserve the important historical information on the back of your photos? The information on the back often contains the who, what, when, and where of the photo and without it the photo just becomes a picture of a person you might be related to. We understand the importance of this information and can scan the backs of your photos so you can keep that information with the photo.
Newspaper clippings and children’s artwork
Often our collections of precious memories contain newspaper clippings of our relatives such as marriage announcements, obituaries, articles of something great they achieved, sports they participated in, birth announcements, and even your child’s first scribbles. Those items become just as precious as the photos. We can scan all those items in for you so that you can preserve them together.
Sharing with Family and Friends
Have you been looking for a way to store all of your memories digitally in one place to organize, preserve, or share with family and friends? Digital Heirlooms provides you with a safe and efficient way to preserve those memories to digital media for you and your family to enjoy for generations to come. Having all of your images scanned and stored digitally allows you to:
- Archive them for the next generation
- Keep copies in more than one place
- Organize and share online
- Make beautiful, unique, one of a kind gifts
- Enhance your genealogy or scrapbooks
The single most important thing about getting all of your images scanned digitally is having them preserved before they can’t be. The biggest advantage for saving your memories this way is that everyone can have a copy of everything! No more dividing the pictures up or having to pick and choose who gets what. By having them preserved digitally you are saving your memories for the next generation of each family and sharing them online has become so easy. An added benefit is that you now have multiple copies in more than one place should any unforeseen disaster occur that damages the originals. Just let us know how many copies you would like and add that to your order. The DVD’s alone make excellent gifts just by themselves but the amount of beautiful and unique one of a kind gifts you can make with your images is endless.
Genealogy and scrapbooking is another great way to utilize your digitally scanned images. You can add pictures or newspaper clippings without having to use the originals and you can make as many copies as you want! A new trend in scrapbooking is digital scrapbooking. All the design and layout is done on the computer and then the pages are printed out. You can then embellish the pages with your favorite buttons and ribbons. Whether you are a traditional scrapbooker or someone who chooses the digital route, having all of your images digitally scanned and preserved makes scrapbooking a breeze!
Organizing your images
We highly recommend organizing your images (as much as possible) based on what order you want to view them after they have been preserved. Organizing your items before they are digitized as computer files is much easier than renaming and moving them around in folders on your computer. We recommend that you organize and label your items in containers or bags exactly how you want them scanned in as we will scan your items in the order in which they are received.
Tips on organizing and labeling
Are you finding it difficult even knowing where to begin sorting your images. You’re not alone! So many photos are not labeled or put in any kind of order and the people who knew who the individuals were are gone or may not live close by. If you have several decades of photos, try sorting them by year and then by decade. A few tricks to do this is by looking at the factory processing dates on the sides or back (especially older photos), the type of photo (sepia tone, black and white, first attempts at hand colorization, Polaroid etc…), or type of paper or processing lab such as Kodak or Fuji. You can also sort by looking at the progressive age of children or people in the photos, those good old hair styles, or the types of clothes they are wearing (bell bottoms, need we say more). Put each decade in a bag and label them.
If you are so lucky as to have someone near by who knows who the people in your photos are, take some time to sit down with them and have them tell you who everyone is in the photo, where it took place, and when. We can then scan that information along with the picture so the image and the history are preserved together. However, a word of caution. Do not write on the back of the photo, use a sticky and write the information down and then stick it to the back of the photograph. Writing on the back of the photograph can do a lot of damage. If you have to press even a little to write the information down the writing will show through on the front of the photo. Also if you do not have an acid free pen the ink will deteriorate the paper over time and eat away at the image.