Recommendations Sought for 35mm Slide Scanning Service

[warringtonbankquay]

I have a couple of hundred transport related 35mm Kodak colour slides and I want to have them scanned and saved to a DVD or USB.

Google gives me several results for companies which undertake slide scanning (including ASDA !!) but I am at a loss as to how to select one.

Does anybody have experience of any and can make a recommendation please?

I have read the various threads on here about slide scanners but I would rather have them scanned professionally rather than buy a scanner.

Cost is not the primary objective but quality of scanned output is.

 

Many thanks.

[stewartingram]

I scanned all mine - must have been over 6000 - myself. I bought a used scanner (Epson V370 Photo) from ebay, to replace the earlier Epson Photo I had but had faults. The new one included a plastic insert to hold 4 slides at once (as indeed the old one did too). Epson software has a useful interface that can be "tuned" to my requirements, I always use the "proffesional" mode rather that the simpler ones. Most of my slides were 35mm but I had a lot of square 126 slides. Thesefit the plastic frame, and can be resized in the preview mode before scanning. After saved to the hard drive, they can easily be transferred to DVD. I use Nero software, easily available and cheap. I believe Win10 also has a burner but I've not even looked to see if it has!

I reckon you could get a good photo scanner for under £100 which would be cheaper than taking the slides elsewhere, and some of us on here could guide you if you had problems. A scanner is a very useful tool - and above all - very easy to use.

In use case, 200 slides is only 50 scans!

 

Stewart

[N10]

I scanned 10000 slides and 5000 negatives, looked at a Nikon Coolscan 5000 but only available secondhand at a high price. So I purchased a Canon 9000 scanner, and have had great results. The Canon 9000 will do negative films and square format . A tip if you are scanning a lot of negatives its worth buying an extra negative holder, so you can load it as the scanner is scanning.

[Jeff Smith]

Years ago I used a digital camera with a slide holder made from styrene attached to the lens.  This actually gave better results than a dedicated slide scanner I acquired several years later.  

[Damo666]

24 minutes ago, Jeff Smith said:

Years ago I used a digital camera with a slide holder made from styrene attached to the lens.  This actually gave better results than a dedicated slide scanner I acquired several years later.  

Can be a really good option, as long as you are able to have a consistent and even light source. Light colour and edge dimming can be problems.

 

Realising the OP is a few months old, here's my offering on the subject. After some mediocre results from an (IIRC) Epson Perfection 1670, I got a Epson V850 a few years ago and the results have been excellent. Can scan up to 12 slides in one pass. It'll be an excessive solution if you only have a couple of hundred of slides, but I note this here for anyone else who wants to digitally archive their slide collection.

[NCB]

A modern moderately high resolution digital camera with a slide scanning attachment and an appropriate lens is probably what I'd use these days. In the past I've used an Epson 3170 Photo scanner, which I still use for scanning prints, at which it is excellent. Wasn't so happy with slides, but that may be my slides.

 

Drum scanning used to be at the high end of commercial scanning; suspect it still is. Maybe send a few off to a selected outlet and see how they turn out.

 

[ColinK]

I tried a proper flatbed scanner but it was very slow, so slow that I would never get my 20,000 slides scanned.

 

After a recommendation from a friend, I bought a Kodak Scanza machine.  It’s really a camera and a light, but it scans slides in a few seconds rather than a few minutes.  The quality isn’t as high as a flatbed scanner, but the speed means I will actually get my slides digitised.

[stewartingram]

I used an Epson V370 scanner, secondhand from ebay, to scan my thousands of slides (and afterwards, prints, negatives, and now magazines back to 1949!). An excellent investment, good quality.

 

Stewart

[Izzy]

The main issue with scanning is that it scans the material placed on the screen. So in the case of slides/negs the downside is the granularity is there because the image captured just comes along for the ride so to speak. 
 

Taking a photo of the neg/slide using a DSLR camera and suitable lens - a common practice in pre-digital days and known as slide/neg duplication because it was of course onto film stock of choice - only captures the image, and thus generally produces a better result.

 

As the older type slide duplication equipment isn’t really around these days, often combined with/as a macro stand (because using a flat field macro lens is best), years ago I made my own out of mount board after getting fed up with the Acer and Epson film scanners output along with the very slow conversion rate.

 

Using a DSLR digital camera for capture gave digital ready files very quickly, useful for the upwards of 20,000 plus slides/negs I then had. Colour & BW negs need reversing of course. But camera capture is something to consider if speed and quality of output is needed.

[Jeff Smith]

I mentioned earlier that I had used this method.  At the time I only had a 2 MP camera but this, when trimmed (due to some curving distortion at the edges) still ended with reasonably sized pictures.  Also, with some colour and contrast adjustment, produced reasonable pictures.  Once set up it was a fairly quick process with a slide every 10 seconds or so......

[warringtonbankquay]

Just to update this thread, I eventually sent my slides to a company which came up on Google.

 

There was no science involved in making the selection, just pot luck and I am pleased to report that the end results were fine and I felt the costs were reasonable.

 

Link is here:  https://www.filmscanuk.co.uk/

 

I have no connection with the company other than as a satisfied user.

[Stephenwolsten]

I have used filmscanuk too and was happy with the results.

 

[Simon Lathlane]

I use an Epson Perfection V700 Photo scanner which was expensive when I purchased it but on Ebay they are going from anything £150 upwards. It is fantastic for 35mm slides, medium format negatives and glass negatives and after a little practise they come out superb. They just require some extra work in PS cleaning up etc.

 

https://simonlathlanecollection.zenfolio.com/