2022
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Photo Scanning: DIY vs. Professional Services Written by: Brandon Harris, Smooth Photo Scanning Services
One of the first things you’ll need to determine when you decide to scan your family albums is whether you’ll do it yourself or hire professional photo scanning services.
One option is to do it on your own, but this requires a significant amount of time and financial commitment. There’s always a chance that the final product won’t be up to par. On the other hand, tracking down a reliable photo scanning service may be difficult. You may have to pay more than necessary if you don’t hire the right professionals.
So, which option is best for you? In this blog, we will go over the key differences between the two approaches so you can decide for yourself.
The DIY Approach to Digitize Photos
Let’s start with a high-level understanding of what it would include. Equipment-wise, you’d need a scanner and a place to store the digitized photos. Also, a quality control mechanism to ensure each image is of the same high standard.
For most people, that will involve scanning or taking a picture with a digital camera, storing the digital file on a computer or external storage device, and possibly utilizing image editing software like Photoshop to enhance the quality of the digital file.
Most people have access to a scanner or at least a smartphone camera, a computer, and mental imagery to visualize some modest modifications in editing software. But, the biggest obstacles are generally lack of experience and the amount of time required to perform the work yourself.
Digitizing photos using a smartphone or a cheap home scanner. However, while they may achieve some success, the freshly digitized photographs are unlikely to live up to your standards.
The last problem is hardware. As was previously noted, the quality of findings from a home scanner is low. The fact that most individuals don’t have extensive knowledge using Photoshop or similar photo editing software doesn’t help. Simply purchasing the necessary technology and software to complete the job would be a significant upfront cost.
Hire Professionals to Digitize Your Photos
Scanning old photographs, film negatives, and slides is a fantastic method to ensure that precious memories from your past will stay forever. But it can be difficult for folks who aren’t used to working with scanning technology. Furthermore, photo scanning involves much more than using a scanner.
For example, if you don’t want to constantly be tilting your head or squinting to see a photo that’s facing the wrong way, you’ll want to crop and rotate every photo to the correct position. All this can take a long time, even if you are tech-savvy.
Therefore, hiring a professional photo scanning service is what we recommend to help with the task. Here are some other benefits of using professional photo digitizing services:
- Cost-Effective: Your budgetary constraints may influence your service of choice. The price can be roughly estimated by looking up the service’s fee per scan and multiplying that figure by your best guess for the size of your collection or the number of things you plan to scan. You can use this to get a ballpark estimate of the price. Oftentimes you will find that outsourcing your photo scanning project is less costly than purchasing the equipment and doing it yourself.
- Image Clarity: Depending on the scanned images, commercial scanners may offer resolutions anywhere from 300 dpi (dots per inch) to 3000 dpi. Higher resolutions necessitate more space (on external media, optical, or cloud) because of their greater file sizes. The resolution of your photos is crucial if you plan on sharing, uploading, or printing them.
- Multiple Formats: How do you want your converted files sent to you? Professional photo scanning services can offer various formats. The most common image file types used by these businesses are JPEG (.jpg), TIFF (.tiff) or PDF. However, there are several other formats that you can discuss with your scanning service provider. Also, if you have other media formats besides photos such as 35mm slides, negatives, videotapes, etc. You will have to purchase multiple pieces of equipment and software to handle each, whereas a professional company can do it all at the best quality.
- No Further Damage: Professional scanning experts can restore worn-out, brittle, or broken film and photographs to ensure you get the best quality. On the other hand, damage to your originals is possible with careless handling during the converting process if you decide to scan at home.
- Guaranteed Safety: Reliable scanning companies understand the importance of your family photos. You can ship your collection to the service without any trouble. If this is a problem, consider looking for a local scanning service where you can drop off your photos instead of sending them in the mail.
- Time-Saving: One of the biggest reasons most people prefer to hire professional scanning experts is that it saves you a lot of time. Regardless of the size of your collection, a scanning company will quickly digitize photos ensuring excellent quality. On the other hand, doing it yourself can take you days.
Hire Smooth Photo Scanning for the Best in Terms of Quality, Efficiency, & Money!
Smooth Photo Scanning provides the best value services regardless of the size of your collection. With years of experience in photo scanning and restoration, we know to get the best quality digital images for you. Furthermore, our experts always handle photo collections with care. You can rely on us to get the job done quickly, efficiently, and for the best rate. Contact us today to learn more about our photo scanning services!
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.