In terms of our history, nothing really tells the story as good as a photo. Unfortunately, the vast majority of the world’s photo collection is sitting in a dark place somewhere gathering dust. The slow process of degradation has already taken a significant toll. Roots Family History™ believes that saving these photographs, through digitization, is a duty our generation owes the next.
We can scan slides of any dimension. The vast majority that we see in our shop are 1.5 inches wide and an inch tall. The film is suspended in a cardboard frame which is a 2 by 2 inch square.
Our most popular service and not surprisingly the most popular film type since the first 35mm cameras went into production in the early 1900s. We typically see 35mm negatives separated into strips with 4 or 6 frames per strip.
We perform bulk and piece scanning of printed photos. We are not constrained by photograph dimensions as we can scan even the smallest photo and massive photos about the size of a quilt.
First gracing us with its presence in 1972 thanks to Kodak, 110 negatives were basically a mini-version of the more popular 126 film format. Each frame is less than half the size of 35mm, measuring just 13 mm × 17 mm.
Remember Advantix, Nexia, Futura, or Centuria in the late 90s? They were all a still film format developed by Kodak and widely used all over the world. We call them APS or Advanced Photo System negatives. APS negatives hold decent levels of detail measuring in at 24mm wide.
Introduced in the early 60s by Kodak, 126 film and negatives were widely used in low end point and shoot cameras. The film itself is a 28mm square, or 26mm after processing. If your family had an Instamatic camera, you have 126 film.
This film is considered by many a national treasure, niche photographs still have the ability to purchase new rolls and get it processed. It’s been around since 1912 thanks to Kodak and measures 4 cm by 4 cm.
Any piece of film larger than 35mm film (24x36mm) but smaller than large format film (4″x5″) is typically referred to as medium format film. Many people think of medium format film when they hear the terms 120 or 220 film.
Most large format film measure 4″ x 5″ or larger. That means it carries almost 16 times the resolution of standard 35mm frames. If your family possesses this film type you should feel lucky because you likely have some extremely high quality images from your lineage.
And that’s not all. We also make your pictures accessible to the entire family by saving each image to thumb drives, and DVDs. It’s what high definition photo scanning is all about.
*did you know that a single thumb drive can fit every high resolution photo, document, and journal your family possesses on it? It’s a pretty neat thought, and a fantastic way to archive and preserve your entire collection of photos and docs.
If you have a question that is not answered, please contact us and ask! We will immediately include the answer on this page 🙂
How much does it cost to scan my entire collection of slides, negatives, and photos?
We have published all of our standard and bulk scanning rates here.
What resolution do you perform photo scanning at?
Paper items like photographs and documents are scanned at 600 dpi while film items such as negatives and slides are scanned between 1,500 dpi and 3,000 dpi depending on your target output. Don’t worry, even if you don’t tell us to, we’ll always scan your items in high resolution. Roots Family History™ is a company founded on archival principles, as such all of our scans exceed industry standards for resolution and quality.
Can you scan my photo if it’s larger than 8″x 10″?
Yes, the cost for photos larger than 8″x10″ is $0.89 per photo, that price applies to photos all the way up to 11″ x 16″. If your photographs are larger than 11″ x 16″ please refer to our art scanning price list.
Can you scan old convex ‘bubbled’ oval photos?
We see these photos come to our store quite often and we just love them. Convex photos cannot be scanned on a flat bed scanner, instead we use our proprietary Heritage Scanner™ which works very well to diffuse light and handles curved photos flawlessly. Your cost will be $5 for a raw scan.
How do you scan 35mm slides and negatives?
Slides and negatives that are 35mm are the most common image type we see in our shop. We begin our scanning work by making sure they are organized the way you want them before they go digital. Every slide gets cleaned with a dual side high pressure air cleaner. This does a fantastic job of getting your 35mm film ready to be placed on the glass. We scan slides on our Epson V750 Pro scanners, 12 at a time. Each slide is saved as its own unique file with it’s own name. Once scanning is complete, each digital image is adjusted for color, contrast, and saturation. Finally, we deliver your newly digitized slides on a DVD or thumb drive – whichever you choose at the time of drop-off. Roots Family History™ has spent 1000’s of hours developing the best process for scanning 35mm film, negatives, and slides.
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