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Archive 2021 · Seeking guidance with old family negatives

  
 
EverLearning
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p.2 #1 · p.2 #1 · Seeking guidance with old family negatives


Apologies for not replying before now to all this great responses (bathroom reno). I really appreciate all the contributions!

I can see I omitted two important points: a) some of the negatives are black and white and b) there are no slides.

Phil, I am probably missing something obvious here, but with regards to your 4th option, how do I get scans of the most valuable negatives if I don't know what is on the negatives (and holding them up to a light doesn't work very well)?

"Wow, that must be equal parts exciting and daunting." Msalvetti, you sure nailed it in one simple sentence. I was a little emotionally drained from being the executor and now going through about 10 cubic feet of photos is additionally draining. Dealing with the negatives will feel like the third marathon but I can't bring myself not to do something with these negatives.

Dave, that is quite the process. Thanks for documenting it so thoroughly. One challenge may be the negative preservers. I have at least four, but I think five, different sized negatives; some being from the 30s. I can probably get contact sheets for some of the sizes and then figure out a way to improvise for the other(s). A lot to digest in your post Dave!

tcphoto, I'm beginning to think some kind of two step process may be required. The first step would be something that lets me know what each negative is, even if it isn't a representation of the highest quality. There are many, many negatives and most will be of things not too important or will be unusable (my mom had a special talent for cutting heads off, putting a thumb over part of the lens or having the people be really small in the image because she also liked the background, ). Experimenting with the two flatbed scanners I have access to could be a good starting point.

My last paragraph speaks to how few negatives I will want to have high quality representations of. Perhaps it is like mining for gold - I will go through tons of rock to get ounces of gold. Even with the "gold", it is unlikely that I will print much of it. I have a small family but they are scattered all over the place. I am more likely to share electronic images than physical prints, so at least that is one thing I won't have to worry about (printing, black ink waste, etc)!

John Wheeler, I am going to look at the digital conversion service as an option, but I will restrict myself to the local market as I just wouldn't be comfortable sending such treasures somewhere by mail, especially with mail service problems being exasperated by Covid.

Taperwing, the more I think about this, the more I tend to agree that a two step approach will be required. First, identify the "rocks" with gold in them through some quick/easy/cheap approach. Second, get high quality representations of the negatives that are "gold", by whatever means appropriate.

Allen, I get what you mean by no Nat Geo images, . I don't expect any either. But if there are photos (with heads intact!) of my military uncle, my grandparents, great uncles, my parents as youngins, etc that are "good", they would be emotionally priceless to me.

Again, thanks to all that replied. This has been very informative and helpful!




Dec 02, 2021 at 09:08 PM
PhilPDX
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p.2 #2 · p.2 #2 · Seeking guidance with old family negatives


EverLearning wrote:
Phil, I am probably missing something obvious here, but with regards to your 4th option, how do I get scans of the most valuable negatives if I don't know what is on the negatives (and holding them up to a light doesn't work very well)?


Just scan the negatives on a flatbed scanner. The quality won't be top notch, but should be good enough to decide which ones you want to send to a professional service. In the end you will have to decide which negatives are the most valuable. Are the images rare in a historical sense? Are there photos which have sentimental value for you? Are the negatives valuable for genealogical purposes? Just to name a few.

-Phil




Dec 03, 2021 at 11:43 AM
Alan321
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p.2 #3 · p.2 #3 · Seeking guidance with old family negatives


You will need to develop a system of numbering and labeling the many boxes and/or envelopes of negatives and prints. And then also for the actual negatives and prints.
Why? Because once they are separated they could relatively hard to marry up again. Scanning inherently involves physical separation. An interruption or distraction here and there may result in you being uncertain about what came from where.

You have read suggestions about doing preliminary scans to help you find the gems and then doing better scans of those gems. Those rough scans will temporarily result in a filing mess, or at least a temporary separation of negatives from prints and containers. Your scan files will also not be with the originals simply because they are physically incompatible, so you need a way to link them up again too. For example, scan or photograph the already-labelled envelope and box when you are scanning or photographing the film and prints that were in that envelope or box. Doing this may not help you get the originals back where they belong, but it will help you to keep the copies of the originals better organized on your computer.

Organize yourself well and plan on processing small quantities of original media at a time. Plan for interruptions, and try to have a workspace that is not required for other activities. Keep in mind that there may be a significant delay between the scanning and the editing, for any number of reasons.

In my experience, making good scans took on average about 10 minutes each including the editing and filing. You may find that doing a fairly decent job the first time is still quicker overall than relocating the originals and repeating the task later on. I recommend you avoid too-low-quality scans that offer too little detail and too much noise to allow accurate assessment. They are practically useless and mostly a waste of time.

Finally, I'll mention that identifying the subject(s) and context of the original photos can also take a long time, unless they were already meticulously catalogued - which would be a miracle in itself. You may well need input from other family members or friends, including extended family. And to make things even more complicated, there may be disagreement about the identification. Recollections are rarely perfectly accurate decades after the event.

Good luck with the project.



Dec 04, 2021 at 10:50 AM
nugeny
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p.2 #4 · p.2 #4 · Seeking guidance with old family negatives


I may have missed it, but not knowing what you really want to do, it is hard to organize the project. Any way here was what I did last year with all my images: I digitalized all of them and put them all in a Sandisk USB 256 GB, categorized by dates and subjects: family, travel, children, grand children....
I just plugged it in HDMI of my big screen TV and voila; I have access to my pictures, found any one of them so easily. I made a copy of that Sandisk USB and print any thing I want. I can find any picture among millions instantly. Good luck for your project.



Dec 10, 2021 at 12:54 PM
loughtonsmith
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p.2 #5 · p.2 #5 · Seeking guidance with old family negatives


My dad died a few years ago and I was in a similar situation. He was a professional photographer throughout the 60s, 70s, and 80s, so over 20000 negatives in his file…and poorly organized. I’ve used an app called FilmLab ($50/year) to make low res scans on a light table. Then, I cull out the good, bad, and repetitive. The good ones are set aside for later high res scanning when the budget allows for the expense.


Jan 02, 2022 at 12:25 PM
EverLearning
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p.2 #6 · p.2 #6 · Seeking guidance with old family negatives


Thanks for the info loughtonsmith.


Jan 02, 2022 at 12:56 PM
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