Archival film Scanning for Museums, colleges, corporations, and other historical institutions

Many Museums, colleges, corporations and historically institutions face the same problem. What to do with their large collections of aging film originals? Most accept that the only real solution involves digitizing or scanning the film and then going on from there where they can digitally retouch, preserve, and output an image as needed. Where many seen a daunting and costly task; others have found new opportunities to capitalize off of analog film collections and/or to raise awareness for their cause or institution. This may include selling prints, merchandise, distribution of images for stock photo purposes, creating new exhibits from source files, offering images for online viewing (could be part of an article) with sponsors or paid advertising, and creating source images for distribution to the press. Please view “How to capitalize off your image collection”.

No matter what you do you cannot fully stop your analog films from deteriorating. It’s important to obtain quality digital backups of your image. You don’t want to have the films scanned twice; you want it done right the first time. That’s why it is important to have your images scanned by someone with the right equipment who also understands the principals of color management, image preservation, and scan optimization. We have worked with many high end scanners and have an advanced level of understand of multiple approaches to film scanning.We offer a quality service for professionals that is also affordable to general consumers.
Our services are aimed toward both consumer and professional needs. Our equipment was designed to satisfy the needs of the most demanding professionals. We use a high end lab scanning system known as the Kodak HR-500+. The scanner uses the highest quality sensors and optics available as well as the most sophisticated scan automation options. Different options allow us to scan single frames of film, or entire uncut rolls, the slide attachment works like a slide carousel and are equally safe for your slides. The entire system weighs almost 200lbs and is built to last.
Many you have already heard about the HR-500 scanner, it is widely accredited and has already earned great esteem for being the best scanner for professionals with archival needs. The HR-500 is a prime example from the top tier of professional high end CCD scanners. The HR-500 is a prime example from the top tier of professional high end CCD scanners. HR-500 scans are also well respected among professional photographers in the know. The scanner uses a large Kodak Tri-linear sensor, the same type of sensor used by BetterLight for their Tri-linear sensor, and all other members of the top tier of professional high end CCD scanners including some non-Kodak scanners. The sensor is renowned for its pure data, low noise, and high dynamic range, great sharpness due to a larger array length and pixel size which increases the number of pixels without pushing the pixel density past the resolvability of the lens.

We can produce quality, archival grade, scans from your collection at a price that is realistic.

If you have hundreds of thousands of images chances are that you cannot afford to spend up to $100 per image for a high end CCD scan. Among the public CCD scanners tend to be judged and grouped in terms of quality and retail cost. The difference between this scanner and other “top tier” CCD scanners is that the other members of top tier group of CCD scanners were designed for printing press and other costly reproduction work, while the HR-500 was designed to efficiently digitize very large and important historical archives. In terms of productivity no scanner can come close to the HR-500. It is the only one of the top tier CCD scanners with integrated infrared dust removal (digital ice 4) removing the costly spotting phase of a scan job, it also has sophisticated automated handling options for most film types. This means we are able to charge up to 100 times less then what one might pay for the same scan on one of the other top CCD scanners.

We are able to offer scans in a variety of resolutions to suit any need.

Smaller resolutions are created by physically combining the electrical signals from groups of pixels causing them to act as one. This allows for greater speeds to be archived at the expense of File size. For archival purposes we recommend the maximum file size which is around 4000 pixels per inch for 35mm which should give you everything the film has to offer. However if most of the slides are out of focus or aren’t sharp to begin with then the maximum resolution may not offer much of a benefit over the medium resolution. The medium option is slightly larger than “full HD” a common standard today. You can also have most of your slides scanned at the medium setting then have a few scanned on the maximum setting. A good image on the highest setting is quite remarkable. It will give you the detail you may need to make larger prints, to zoom in or crop to smaller sections of the image, and give you the peace of mind knowing that you have a high resolution digital backup of your vulnerable analog media.

The medium resolution option of our service meets the standards for an “alternative minimum” in the National Archives and Records Administration guidelines.in that we provide obtain roughly 18 MB 24-bit Tiff files with a pixel dimension of approximately 2000×3000 pixels (see http://www.archives.gov/preservation/technical/guidelines.pdf)
We also offer drum scanning for the most critical of needs… The drum scan process requires film to be removed from the mount and the cost is substantially higher due to increased labor and materials. We use a very good drum scanner and the quality surpasses CCD technology, our pricing is for this is competitive, but it is still closer to what you would pay for a scan done on one of the less efficient high end CCD scanners. Our drum scanner can scan at resolutions up to 11,000 DPI; See our drum scanning page for more information.