[brickcam]

Hi all,

I've been reading extensively on this site and others about how to go about this project, and I welcome your input.

I'm going to scan family albums and individual photos. I have a metadata scheme worked out (.xml) so that I can have structured data. The main area I'm hesitant about is the actual scanning and subsequent software manipulation.

The reason I have to scan some albums intact is that the photos were glued onto the page, and I can't destroy the albums. No consumer-priced scanners appear to be able to handle more than 8.5 x 14 in, give or take, and unfortunately that's not big enough. So I assume I have to take two scans of each page and then stitch them together.

So, my questions:

1) I'm using an iBook G4 1.33GHz with 1.25GB RAM: is that sufficient horsepower for a large-scale project?

2) Is there any non-Photoshop mac software (e.g. not expensive) that will stitch together the album scans? I think I can use GraphicConverter to carve up the album pages into individual photos.

3) At what resolution/settings should I run the scanner? The pictures are 35mm.

4) I assume any mac-compatible scanner will do, if it can run at the settings recommended in 3) above? Some are quite cheap.

5) Do you have any advice about the logistics of this process? I've never done any quality-sensitive scanning before, or stitching together.

Thank you. I hope that wasn't too many questions. I appreciate your help.

[red rocket]

Originally Posted by brickcam

No consumer-priced scanners appear to be able to handle more than 8.5 x 14 in, give or take, and unfortunately that's not big enough. So I assume I have to take two scans of each page and then stitch them together.

Have you thought about buying a cheap second‑hand SCSI‑based Mac and large scale scanner just for this purpose? You should be able to get a combo like that off eBay for under $100.

Stitching photos together is going to be a nightmare in terms of alignment. If one half of a photo is just slightly skewed, you'll never get it to match up with the other.

An alternative would be to photograph the pages, instead. You might get acceptable results, as long as you use a decent camera, tripod, and lighting setup.

[shifuimam]

There are plenty of consumer scanners that have removable lids - my Visioneer OneTouch 8900, for example. It takes excellent quality scans at very high resolution (up to 4800dpi). You can remove the lid and easily scan books or other things.

You shouldn't need to stitch anything together. For instance, if you have a page with four 4x6 or 5x7 photos glued to it, just scan each portion of the page and crop around the photo itself. For 4x6 and smaller photos, you can scan multiple photos at once and then cut out each image.

The software that came with my scanner allows me to select areas to scan, and it will scan over one image multiple times, saving me the trouble of cropping the image in Photoshop or another application later.

Remember that even at very high-resolution scans, you're not going to be able to resize images much larger than their original size without losing image quality. You can't take a 1200dpi scan of a 4x6 photo and print it at 8x12. It's just not going to look very good. If you just want to scan this stuff in for archival purposes, 300dpi should be plenty. You'll be able to print quality 4x6 replacements at that resolution.

If you have negatives of these pictures, I'd really suggest taking them somewhere and having them converted to digital for you. I started scanning old photos a few years ago, but it was so tedious and time-consuming that I finally just gave up, threw out the photos, and have all the negatives and cartridges (from an APS camera)...which I will eventually take to a photo place to have converted to digital and burned onto a CD for me.

Good luck on your project.

[brickcam]

Originally Posted by red rocket 

Have you thought about buying a cheap second‑hand SCSI‑based Mac and large scale scanner just for this purpose? You should be able to get a combo like that off eBay for under $100.

An alternative would be to photograph the pages, instead. You might get acceptable results, as long as you use a decent camera, tripod, and lighting setup.

Thanks for the ideas. I hadn't considered the SCSI approach. I did think about doing it with an analog camera and then having those scanned in... I think the quality would be sufficient, but the hassle significant. I'm musing on it.

[brickcam]

Originally Posted by shifuimam 

There are plenty of consumer scanners that have removable lids - my Visioneer OneTouch 8900, for example. It takes excellent quality scans at very high resolution (up to 4800dpi). You can remove the lid and easily scan books or other things.

You shouldn't need to stitch anything together. For instance, if you have a page with four 4x6 or 5x7 photos glued to it, just scan each portion of the page and crop around the photo itself. For 4x6 and smaller photos, you can scan multiple photos at once and then cut out each image.

The software that came with my scanner allows me to select areas to scan, and it will scan over one image multiple times, saving me the trouble of cropping the image in Photoshop or another application later.

Remember that even at very high-resolution scans, you're not going to be able to resize images much larger than their original size without losing image quality. You can't take a 1200dpi scan of a 4x6 photo and print it at 8x12. It's just not going to look very good. If you just want to scan this stuff in for archival purposes, 300dpi should be plenty. You'll be able to print quality 4x6 replacements at that resolution.

If you have negatives of these pictures, I'd really suggest taking them somewhere and having them converted to digital for you. I started scanning old photos a few years ago, but it was so tedious and time-consuming that I finally just gave up, threw out the photos, and have all the negatives and cartridges (from an APS camera)...which I will eventually take to a photo place to have converted to digital and burned onto a CD for me.

Good luck on your project.

Why a removable lid? I'm not sure why that's relevant... I'm probably just confused.

Good idea on avoiding stitching: sounds like that wouldn't have been a good approach.

Thanks for the comment on quality, and re: negatives, I'll just say this: I wish I had them!

[shifuimam]

Originally Posted by brickcam 

Why a removable lid? I'm not sure why that's relevant... I'm probably just confused.

Oops..sorry about that.

I'm thinking along the lines of if you need to scan either a page that's in a photo album, or you need to scan a page that is unusually large - removing the lid allows you position something large over the scanner's glass in any way you need, since the hinges won't get in the way or anything.

[brickcam]

Originally Posted by shifuimam 

Oops..sorry about that.

I'm thinking along the lines of if you need to scan either a page that's in a photo album, or you need to scan a page that is unusually large - removing the lid allows you position something large over the scanner's glass in any way you need, since the hinges won't get in the way or anything.

Ah, that makes sense. Thanks.