2020
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How to Digitize Your Old Photo Collection in Bulk Written by: Brandon Harris, Smooth Photo Scanning Services
If you’ve stumbled upon your massive photo collection, the initial excitement was probably followed by concerns about what to do with so many photos.
On one hand, they contain some of the most precious memories of your family. But on the other, they take up a lot of space and will inevitably deteriorate, making digital photo restoration and retouching more difficult.
But one of the biggest concerns about digitizing your photos is the time it would take. If you have hundreds or even thousands of pictures, digitizing them without using a bulk photo scanning service can seem impossible.
So, to help you get started, let’s look at how you can make the project a success.
Sort Your Photos
Whether you’re planning on doing everything yourself or want to use a bulk photo scanning service, reducing the number of photos that will need to be scanned should be one of your top priorities.
If you plan on doing everything yourself, this can significantly reduce the time it takes to complete the job. And even if you plan on using a service, having fewer photos to scan will help reduce the cost of the project.
First, look at any photographs that are duplicates, keeping only the best one for scanning. Then, look for photos that might not contain anything interesting. You may find that you will make the entire project much more manageable by adding this one simple step to your process.
Use a Top-Feeder Scanner
No matter how you look at it, scanning large quantities of photos using a traditional scanner is simply not feasible. The manual labor involved would take so much time that you’d likely spend days going through it until you’d finally give up out of frustration.
Therefore, if you really want to do it on your own, you should at least get the right equipment, and a top-feeder photo scanner is the best tool for the job.
With the help of this type of scanner, you can simply stack a bunch of photos and allow the scanner to go through them one by one, providing a massive productivity boost to your efforts.
Use a Professional Service
Even though digitizing your extensive photo collection yourself is possible, that doesn’t mean that it’s the best choice. When you consider the numerous benefits that a photo scanning service can offer, it becomes hard to consider any alternatives.
For one thing, a bulk photo scanning service has cutting-edge scanning equipment, which is much more powerful than any consumer-grade photo scanner you could buy.
What’s more, after the photos are scanned, you will have skilled professionals doing photo restoration and retouching, which will help make your photos look as good as possible.
A professional service will also have no problem handling even the largest orders, providing you with consistent results quickly.
Finally, you will also not have to worry about sorting the photos, as they will be neatly categorized according to your preferences. This will allow you to easily find what you’re looking for, share the images with friends and family, and not worry about losing them ever again by taking advantage of cloud storage solutions.
My father has been in the document scanning industry for as long as I can remember. I worked for his company Smooth Solutions, Inc. during summer breaks growing up and for a couple years after college. Wanting to venture off on my own, I gained experience in several careers including wholesale seafood sales as well as owning and operating a bakery for several years. When my father approached me with the opportunity to expand upon his already successful business by providing high quality, professional scanning services to the general public, I jumped on board. From personal experience, I recognize how important it is for most people to have their family memorabilia preserved for future generations and I want to be a part of helping others do that.