Best places to send photos, negatives, and film to be digitized?

[csziggy]

My cousin died a few weeks back. He was the last in his family and my older sister is in charge of his estate. He'd left his mother's house untouched since she died several years ago. My sister found boxes and boxes of snapshots, negatives, and a number of rolls of 8mm film. She dumped them on me since I have been scanning family photos and expects me to scan all of these.

I simply don't have time to do this. I am still working on organizing and putting the family photos - many going back to the mid-1800s - so I can put them online for the extended family to see.

So I want to send this stuff to a service that can digitize all of it. My sister still expects me to organize the most interesting pictures and get them online, which will take a lot of time. But if a scanning service can do it, it will save me years of scanning.

Any suggestions?

[imaginary girl]

1. Costco?

I don't know how it compares with others, so I hope you get a few other responses. I do know they offer it for a reasonable cost. Good luck!

[tanyev]

2. Marking to find later. I have a lot of old slides I should do something with.

Hope you get some good answers.

[Old Crank]

3. I have, probably

1,500 transparencies that could use a cull before scanning.
I found a couple of places on the web that were about 50-67 cents per image for larger numbers of
transparencies. Those were in and around the SF Bay area. When I was back where the pictures were in September I ran out of time.

Cost also varied with the pixel count you wanted. If most are going to be online huge resolution isn't that big of a requirement.

[Raven123]

4. I have fewer photos, but decided against any mail in digitizing service

My concern is losing the photos in transport, especially after seeing stories of drivers dumping packages. It does happen. I know this doesn’t help, but if you have the option, you might want to see if you can find a place locally where you can walk them in. I am tediously scanning them myself. It’s time consuming, but I am in no rush. It has been fun as some of them have interesting comments on the back.

[csziggy]

6. I have the technology to scan them, and I do the ones important to me

The 100 year old + family photos, the ones from my own family, have all mostly been digitized. But these are mostly from trips my aunt and uncle took with their son. Yes, we want to preserve them, but I am just not interested in spending the time scanning what are hundreds of slides, photos, and negatives - plus I don't have the technology to scan the 8mm film.

If these got lost in the mail, there is no on alive who would remember these pictures or really even care. My sisters and the other cousins would like to see them to remember that part of the family that is now completely gone, but there aren't that many of us left.

[usonian]

5. I found a review site. Just passing along.

https://www.toptenreviews.com/best-photo-scanning-services

The quality of a digital image can vary dramatically. We looked at the minimum and maximum resolution images that each provider creates - from 72 dpi through to 600 dpi. We also considered how good the enhancement is on older or faded images.

But that's not in the "at a glance" table. You have to read through.

Having an estimate helps people understand what your time is worth.

HTH. I have not sent out any scanning.

YET

In the past, I set up a stand to hold up an iPad and illuminate photos for bulk scanning. Not the "best" setup, but that giant screen, like what view cameras should have been since the 1800's, is easy on the eyes.

[csziggy]

7. Yes, I read that review of the top services

I'm trending towards EverPresent.com - they seem to have the best reviews and their service can do what I need.

[ManiacJoe]

8. The two places I have bookmarked are

https://digmypics.com/
https://www.scancafe.com/

I have not yet used either one. Both are old bookmarks. Been a while since I did any research on them.