I have scanned numerous slides with an Epson V-500 with good results. However, negatives are a different story. If your film is very flat, it works fine. Some of my film, however, is curled side to side, not lengthwise. Even with anti- Newton ring glass taped into the film holder, I couldn't keep it flat enough for a decent scan. I bought a Plustek 7600i-SE and am very pleased with the results. It may be a bit tedious, as it only scans single, 35mm frames and has no auto-advance, but it scans well, and the ladder-like holders keep film flat. Why Epson doesn't make a better holder is anyone's guess. Good luck with your scanning! Attached scans done with Plustek

After several (read many) years of film photography I have amassed a huge volume of color negatives (mostly Verichrome) for which most of the prints have either been lost or given away. I would like to prevail upon the UHH wisdom and experience for the best way to digitize the best pictures from these negs. I will probably keep only about 20% of these pictures but even so the sheer volume of negatives would most likely make commercial processing cost prohibitive. Is there a device that would allow me to review these negatives and save only those pictures I want to keep?

I will assume there are a good portion of family photos in the batch. Whether they have artistic value, or not, is not important. They are documents that future generations would love to see many years from now. If you make the decision to scan these photos it just may be the last time anyone will digitize them and there is always the possibility that someone else will discard your originals in the future. Do the best work you know how to do right from the outset. I have been lucky enough to get a second shot at family photos long after I learned what I really needed to do, so those early 350k sized scans will not be the final word.

Now, I scan prints, slides and negatives as DNG files. I opt for large sized files as I have learned you can see a lot in a good scan of a small print when blown up. (I have a cryptic photo of a deck of a ship with no recognizable family members in it. My large scan enabled me to blow it up and see "Baltic" on a lifeboat, so now I know this was taken by my father when he arrived from Ireland on the Baltic in 1923.)

I also put as much info in the Metadata as I can. I may not be around to explain the circumstances of a photo to a 40 year old grandniece.

The software that comes with a scanner may not offer DNG as an option, but I use Vuescan, which does. Vuescan also offers more facilities for adjusting the scan image. It has the added benefit of working with every scanner and having one learning curve for any scanner you may buy in the future.