Digitizing prints/negs/slides for extra income: insights?

Oops, sorry, did not mean to post here

I have quite a lot of (non commercial) experience with scanning film and I think the equipment you’ve identified is too low end., and similar to wha5 people may already have. Tbh I wouldn’t even think about offering that sort of service commercially unless I was using a Epson V850 for negative scanning, just because of the extra resolution and the ability to scan 18 frames at a time. If you were to limit yourself to just 35mm then a second hand, serviced Nikon CoolScan V or 5000 would allow you to offer a higher quality of scan. In either case you’re looking at £500 - £1000 including software.

Lettermanian said:

I have been thinking of offering services (locally only) to create digital files of older photos, photo albums, scrapbooks, negs and slides.

I am going to start out small, probably an Epson Perfection V39ii scanner

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The V39 does not scan negatives or slides. I am guessing (having never actually used one) that it will do a competent job on the prints.

--
George

Just some quick thoughts --

If you will be doing things like albums and scrapbooks a high-MP camera on a copy stand might be more efficient than a flat bed scanner.

A friend who is digitizing his own slide collection constantly complains about how much time he spends cleaning up dust, lint and the like - both physically before scanning and in the computer after the scan. How much of this work do you plan on? Or how little will your customers accept?

Off the top of my head - check this with an attorney or further research - any photo or art made in the US since 1979 is automatically copyright by the maker or their employer. So there is possible legal jeopardy. Earlier photos are probably safe so long as they do not show a copyright mark. There might also be ethical issues to think about.

One other thing you will probably need to address is insurance - for example ripping or damaging someone’s photos, losing them, infecting the clients computer with a virus etc etc. Although Ts&Cs might save you somewhat you could still be exposed in some circumstances.

Lettermanian said:

If anyone has experience in doing the same, I'd appreciate any insights into the pros and cons of offering such a service.

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I scanned my own collection of prints, 35mm, 6x6 and 6x4.5 slides, 35mm, 120, and 220 film negatives. About 10,000 images. It took forever and after a while became extremely boring.

Prints were relatively easy but transparent material ultradifficult. Not just technical things such as contrast and exposure but also unfiling the transparencies, dealing with dust, hair, détritus and other blemishes then refiling them.

I can't see that this would be worth your while. Sorry.

Lettermanian said:

I am in the process of purchasing the necessary equipment (flatbed scanner mainly), and will try this out first on my own photos/negs/slides etc before offering services to customers ... I am going to start out small, probably an Epson Perfection V39ii scanner to pair with my M2 Mac mini and the built-in software or the Silverfast software. For negs and slides a stand-alone unit (Kodak?). The more expensive Epson V600 scanner also has holders for 135mm negs and slides. I know what local companies are charging for their services so I would base my pricing on that but slightly lower, after ensuring I can produce good file quality.

Click to expand...

Before you think about pricing, or anything else that was mentioned, digitize a few dozen or a few hundred of your own prints, negatives and slides. See what kind of gear and what expenditure of time it takes to get results that satisfy you. Then you can consider how to generate income from it.

You need to calibrate the scanner for color accuracy of output files.

What colop space will the output files be in; sRGB, Adobe RGB etc.?

Lettermanian said:

*Edit: I meant to post this in Open Talk, not here. Can a mod move this to Open Talk? Thanks

As with many people and families these days, money is tight, so I am researching ways to earn some extra income, and in the process give my kids some experience in "small business". I have been thinking of offering services (locally only) to create digital files of older photos, photo albums, scrapbooks, negs and slides. I am in the process of purchasing the necessary equipment (flatbed scanner mainly), and will try this out first on my own photos/negs/slides etc before offering services to customers. I'll probably ask a couple of friends/neighbours if they're interested in having me digitize some of their photos for free as a test run, so to speak. I can also create digital files from VHS videos, audio cassettes, etc, so there are other services possible. I should be clear that I'm not looking to grow this into a large business; it's meant only to be a source of supplemental income.

If anyone has experience in doing the same, I'd appreciate any insights into the pros and cons of offering such a service. I would write up a basic Terms and Conditions/Agreement, which would include the following:

- Privacy. I was thinking of offering files on a usb stick and keeping copies of the files for a week or two to ensure the customer can acres all of the files on their computer, then deleting them. I would not scan any photos that contain nudity or other offensive material. Is this a can of worms though? As the service provider I assume I can state my own terms of service.

- Copyright material. I will not copy VHS movies or audio cassettes other than home video/audio recordings. However, I'm unsure about old photos that were shot by a professional portrait photographers, such as old (keeping in mind old means pre-digital only) wedding or school photos, etc. In most cases there would be no way for the customer to get in touch with the original photographer in order to obtain digital files of such photos. I also would not be using the images at all myself, they remain in the customer's possession. What would be acceptable practise about these types of photos?

- Equipment. I am going to start out small, probably an Epson Perfection V39ii scanner to pair with my M2 Mac mini and the built-in software or the Silverfast software. For negs and slides a stand-alone unit (Kodak?). The more expensive Epson V600 scanner also has holders for 135mm negs and slides. I know what local companies are charging for their services so I would base my pricing on that but slightly lower, after ensuring I can produce good file quality.

I know there are many other aspects to doing something like this, but the first two issues in particular are where I have questions. I understand tax issues and other such things; years ago I ran a small business in lawn and yard care.

Thanks for any helpful replies, especially on issues I may not have thought about

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^There are a good few motives expressed, so to generalise on the income aspect, I don't see how you could use it as a positive business venture. This is simply because of how you would have to value and charge for your time - assuming you have all the required skills, which are considerable, and which does not seem to be guaranteed in your description.

As some others have suggested. try doing some for yourself first. If you find that it is onerous, then you will be on the right track. It is certainly not as simple as have scanner, will easily digitise.

atom14.

atom14.

I think if you already have a successful business shooting portraits, real estate., products or whatever, you could probably add a bit of income now and then by copying or digitizing photos. I can't see it as a major thing.

Don

Lettermanian said:

- Privacy…

- Copyright material…

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For these two, just find a small business lawyer, especially one that deals in intellectual property issues. Have them help you set your policies and practices to avoid the biggest potential problems that they have probably seen a hundred times already.

Lettermanian said:

- Equipment. I am going to start out small, probably an Epson Perfection V39ii scanner to pair with my M2 Mac mini and the built-in software or the Silverfast software. For negs and slides a stand-alone unit (Kodak?). The more expensive Epson V600 scanner also has holders for 135mm negs and slides. I know what local companies are charging for their services so I would base my pricing on that but slightly lower, after ensuring I can produce good file quality.

Click to expand...

So the trick here is not “extra income” but “actual profit that makes the whole thing worth it.” Once you do your test runs, you are going to find that it is an extremely time-intensive and labor-intensive process. Time and labor are always prime drainers of profit. For this to be profitable enough to be worth doing, you are going to have to work out a very efficient production process, and as automated as you can possible manage, that smooths out all the places that can cost you lots of time.

It’s not hard to load up a bunch of film into holders, close the lid, and press Scan. But what can take up a disproportionate amount of your time is maintaining consistency, and handling or retouching individual difficult originals with different problems.

Consistency means are you going to be able to hand the clients 1000 images that look uniformly great, even if…the exposures of originals varied widely, some were dirty or scratched, some are faded or alarmingly color-shifted due to age…how much will you promise to fix defects, and can you do that quickly? Just a few hours of unanticipated extra handling will kill all your profit for a job, unless your rates are appropriately high.

If you fall into the low-margin trap of wanting to compete on price, then you will, like most businesses, experience unrelenting pressure to deliver good enough results in a short enough amount of time in order to not lose money at a low price point, and that may be difficult, if the labs in your area worked out very efficient bulk scan workflows a long time ago and you are just getting started and your process requires too much manual labor.

You will be spending hundreds, or maybe thousands, of hours in your room with your scanner and computer, and what you charge had better make it worth it for not being able to spend those thousands of hours at summer baseball games, playing with the kids, fishing at the lake, or quality time with your spouse. The time demands of scanning are unbelieveable.

If instead you compete on value and results instead of low price, you should be able to charge a higher margin to cover the extra time needed to handle the outliers, and justify the higher price by delivering a product that is better than the competition. But then you must also market that difference to show potential clients why you cost a little more.

You are going to have to test and refine to get your workflow down. For example, you get advice here that it would be far faster to use a camera stand than a scanner. And yes that can be true. But there is a tradeoff. Another reply complained about the amount of dust and scratches to be cleaned up. Well, if you use a scanner, features like Digital ICE do a great job of reducing dust and scratches and color shifts that you save hundreds of hours of retouching. So which would save your more time, a camera stand that digitizes fast but you have to clean up every image later by hand, or a scanner that takes longer to do each frame but the scanner hardware supports Digital ICE so you save hundreds of hours retouching? You’re going to have to test which one is really faster for you.

Another question is if you intend to deliver pixels, or value. Pixels means the client just gets 1000 files that they will never have time to organize and they do not even know where to start with tagging them, so the digital files will be the same as the disorganized boxes of random prints and film except now in digital form…their real problem was never really solved. If you intend to deliver value, then you are offering to work with them to organize and tag their photos with keywords, locations, and names that are significant for that family. Of course this is more work, but it also has the potential for additional services with the opportunity of additional profit, if you are charging properly. Some of the mom-and-pop digitization services in my area have wisely gone down that path.

I have digitized thousands of my family’s images with a nice scanner and yet, I absolutely do not want to go into business doing it. Because as someone else posted, scanning thousands of images is a largely boring, repetitive, numbing chore. I can barely motivate myself to do it for photos our family will love and cherish, I do not have the patience to go through this grind for anyone else. They would have to offer an unusually large check for me to even consider doing it for them.

You say you want your kids to have experience in small business, but I read this as you exploiting them as if you had them work 50 hours a week in a family run pizza parlor.

This work is extremely tedious and kids have short attention spans. I doubt the time spent training them would be a good ROI for you. At worse, they would be sitting at a computer (which is not good for the body) when they should be active with friends - things that will help their development. Doing dad's work may lead to resentment..

I also wonder why you are no longer doing the lawn and yard care. That's better for kids as they can generally sweep and rake safely, and get some physical activity.

At minimum, figure out why you gave up the lawn business to understand problems you may encounter with any new venture.

I never recommend these mass digitizing projects. As others have said they are tedious and my time is too valuable.

I've scanned about 10% of my film images and that's enough. Viewing also takes time.

[No message]

Gato Amarillo said:

Just some quick thoughts --

If you will be doing things like albums and scrapbooks a high-MP camera on a copy stand might be more efficient than a flat bed scanner.

Click to expand...

I have considered this possibility; there are large-format flatbed scanners that could handle scrapbook size, but are quite costly. This being a casual, sporadic venture, I would probably look at the camera route, as I already have camera gear that may suffice.

Gato Amarillo said:

A friend who is digitizing his own slide collection constantly complains about how much time he spends cleaning up dust, lint and the like - both physically before scanning and in the computer after the scan. How much of this work do you plan on? Or how little will your customers accept?

Click to expand...

My goal is to provide a very basic service, as there are professional companies nearby that offer digital restoration services. I know that the software that comes with the scanner (i.e. the Epson V600) has some "clean-up" features, but it remains to be seen how effective that would be. Good questions, lots for for me to consider.

Gato Amarillo said:

Off the top of my head - check this with an attorney or further research - any photo or art made in the US since 1979 is automatically copyright by the maker or their employer. So there is possible legal jeopardy. Earlier photos are probably safe so long as they do not show a copyright mark. There might also be ethical issues to think about.

Click to expand...

I have since looked up Canada's laws on copyright for photographic images, and they are quite strict as well, though mostly deal with the use of a copyright image; they aren't as clear on the specific case here, that of creating digital copies of analog images for the same customer. However, it's probably just easiest for me to provide the service for personal photos/images only.

Overrank said:

One other thing you will probably need to address is insurance - for example ripping or damaging someone’s photos, losing them, infecting the clients computer with a virus etc etc. Although Ts&Cs might save you somewhat you could still be exposed in some circumstances.

Click to expand...

Yes I agree, and is definitely a significant issue to consider when dealing with others' property.

sybersitizen said:

Lettermanian said:

I am in the process of purchasing the necessary equipment (flatbed scanner mainly), and will try this out first on my own photos/negs/slides etc before offering services to customers ... I am going to start out small, probably an Epson Perfection V39ii scanner to pair with my M2 Mac mini and the built-in software or the Silverfast software. For negs and slides a stand-alone unit (Kodak?). The more expensive Epson V600 scanner also has holders for 135mm negs and slides. I know what local companies are charging for their services so I would base my pricing on that but slightly lower, after ensuring I can produce good file quality.

Click to expand...

Before you think about pricing, or anything else that was mentioned, digitize a few dozen or a few hundred of your own prints, negatives and slides. See what kind of gear and what expenditure of time it takes to get results that satisfy you. Then you can consider how to generate income from it.

Click to expand...

Yes, that is exactly the plan as indicated in my post.

Not too old to learn said:

You need to calibrate the scanner for color accuracy of output files.

What colop space will the output files be in; sRGB, Adobe RGB etc.?

Click to expand...

sRGB, and I would use my own old pics and negs/slides to tweak my settings before deciding if I will go ahead with others' images.

atom14 said:

Lettermanian said:

*Edit: I meant to post this in Open Talk, not here. Can a mod move this to Open Talk? Thanks

As with many people and families these days, money is tight, so I am researching ways to earn some extra income, and in the process give my kids some experience in "small business". I have been thinking of offering services (locally only) to create digital files of older photos, photo albums, scrapbooks, negs and slides. I am in the process of purchasing the necessary equipment (flatbed scanner mainly), and will try this out first on my own photos/negs/slides etc before offering services to customers. I'll probably ask a couple of friends/neighbours if they're interested in having me digitize some of their photos for free as a test run, so to speak. I can also create digital files from VHS videos, audio cassettes, etc, so there are other services possible. I should be clear that I'm not looking to grow this into a large business; it's meant only to be a source of supplemental income.

If anyone has experience in doing the same, I'd appreciate any insights into the pros and cons of offering such a service. I would write up a basic Terms and Conditions/Agreement, which would include the following:

- Privacy. I was thinking of offering files on a usb stick and keeping copies of the files for a week or two to ensure the customer can acres all of the files on their computer, then deleting them. I would not scan any photos that contain nudity or other offensive material. Is this a can of worms though? As the service provider I assume I can state my own terms of service.

- Copyright material. I will not copy VHS movies or audio cassettes other than home video/audio recordings. However, I'm unsure about old photos that were shot by a professional portrait photographers, such as old (keeping in mind old means pre-digital only) wedding or school photos, etc. In most cases there would be no way for the customer to get in touch with the original photographer in order to obtain digital files of such photos. I also would not be using the images at all myself, they remain in the customer's possession. What would be acceptable practise about these types of photos?

- Equipment. I am going to start out small, probably an Epson Perfection V39ii scanner to pair with my M2 Mac mini and the built-in software or the Silverfast software. For negs and slides a stand-alone unit (Kodak?). The more expensive Epson V600 scanner also has holders for 135mm negs and slides. I know what local companies are charging for their services so I would base my pricing on that but slightly lower, after ensuring I can produce good file quality.

I know there are many other aspects to doing something like this, but the first two issues in particular are where I have questions. I understand tax issues and other such things; years ago I ran a small business in lawn and yard care.

Thanks for any helpful replies, especially on issues I may not have thought about

Click to expand...

^There are a good few motives expressed, so to generalise on the income aspect, I don't see how you could use it as a positive business venture. This is simply because of how you would have to value and charge for your time - assuming you have all the required skills, which are considerable, and which does not seem to be guaranteed in your description.

As some others have suggested. try doing some for yourself first. If you find that it is onerous, then you will be on the right track. It is certainly not as simple as have scanner, will easily digitise.

atom14.

atom14.

Click to expand...

Thank you, that is all understood, which is why I'm asking questions about it before venturing further.

D Cox said:

I think if you already have a successful business shooting portraits, real estate., products or whatever, you could probably add a bit of income now and then by copying or digitizing photos. I can't see it as a major thing.

Don

Click to expand...

I'm just a hobbyist photographer, but yes it is meant to be a casual/sporadic thing for family, friends and neighbours, not a high-volume commercial venture. At this stage it is an idea only.