I’ve finally begun to scan my old photos. I’ll show you the hardware and software I decided on. I wanted something fast and easy.
The Scanner
I choose the Epson Perfection V600 Photo Scanner (currently $220-$230).
It’s a “best seller” at Amazon. It is very fast and has “6400 x 9600 dpi for enlargements up to 17 Inches x 22 Inches”. I’m very happy with it.
Picture Quality
This whole topic is way more info than you or I need.
Photo prints are generally 300 DPI I scanned mine in at 600 DPI so that I was sure to have max info to work with. I let the scanner software take care of the rest.
Info if you want it.
99designs – PPI vs. DPI: what’s the difference?
PCWorld – Preserve all your precious images (the right way)
UPT – What is a Pixel?
DPS – How to Understand Pixels, Resolution, and Resize Your Images in Photoshop Correctly
All About Digital Photos – The Myth of DPI
The Scanner Software
The scan quality of the pictures were great. The rest I’m not happy with.
– One of the selling points was the ability to scan multiple photos at once and have it automatically separate them into individual pictures. It failed miserably at this task:
6 pictures on scanner. It picked up 4.
Changed pic positions. It picked up 4.
Changed pic positions. Removed 1 pic (now 5). It picked up 5 but combined 2 for a total of 4 pics.
Changed pic positions. It picked up 5 but combined 2 for a total of 4 pics.
Changed pic positions. Removed 1 pic (now 4). It picked up 4 but combined 2 for a total of 3 pics.
Changed pic positions. Scanned 4 pics as a single pic.
Changed pic positions. It picked up 4 but combined 2 for a total of 3 pics.
Changed pic positions. It picked up 4 but combined them for a total of 2 pics.
Removed on pic for a total of 3. It picked up 3 but combined them into 2.
Changed pic positions. It picked up 3 but combined them into 1.
Re-positioned the 3 pics. Used advanced mode and used preview to mark each pic. This is the only method that seems to work perfectly.
– “Digital ICE Technology can remove dust or scratch marks without affecting the image composition.”
Uh-huh. Here is a photo scanned with it:
Photoshop Elements 2020
$100 Full Version, $80 Upgrade ( I had bought Elements 11 some years ago).
I tried many suggested alternatives. They were powerful too but required interaction that took too long. I wanted a click or two and be done with it.
Photoshop Elements 2020 was exactly what I was looking for.
Tips:
Download it from here not anywhere else: https://helpx.adobe.com/download-install/kb/photoshop-elements-downloads.html
Set the following services to manual:
Adobe Genuine Monitor Service
Adobe Genuine Software Integrity Service
If the program installed the Bonjour app then uninstall that crap from Add/Remove Programs.
Resizing Images
IrfanView FTW. Batch resized and added text overlay.
Here is the first batch of pics I scanned in. Resized to fit the picture slider thingy. Yes, I’m in most of the pics.
(this was probably 1970 or 71)
Awesome photos Eric, Man you and your friends drank a lot of Coors beer lol, did you guys drink other brands as well? My favorite is Budweiser and Coors. Other then that its always cool to see old photos. Scanner software always seems poor, even if it sounds really good on the box. I did like how adobe handled the photos. 😀 So do you have a large pile left? Also are you storing the photos in the cloud?
Haven’t had a Bud or Brown Bomber (or Silver Bullet) in years: https://www.tweakhound.com/2018/03/03/cicerone-certified-beer-server/
Lots of pics left to do.
I have backups of backups including the cloud.
Eric,love the pics photo quality looks very good,I know for you it brings back many memories I have at least 15 photo albums that need to be upgrated a task for the future
And by the way go NATS, the bats are going in for the kill in game 3
Oh, I understand, I had also forgotten about your craft beer taste. Craft beer is very good. Where I am from Craft Beer is only a stone throw away. ? It’s great ?. Hope you have fun with your project ?
Your scanning tools were very interesting, because since 2003 I have used same type of tools: I have scanned about 13 000 negatives using Epson Perfection 3200 Photo, and about 3000 paper pictures. I have repaired the images using Photoshop Elements starting with version 2 (nowadays PSE 2020). The old Epson is still in good order and I use it for new negative slides which occasionally pop up from somewhere, and also for paper images. I have made for myself a database app where I keep all information about the photos. Keeping the digitized images, the originals and all data related to them in good order and safe is most important.
😎