Amadeus Loc: New York

I spent months scanning old slides with an Epson 550 scanner. About 4,000 slides. They’re from 1969 into the 80’s. The slides themselves are in terrible shape. They have a purple cast over most of them. Oxidation and age I’m guessing. Basically they’re useless. The scanner made them decent. The plan was to toss them when I was done. That was about a year ago. But I can’t do it. I feel like they’re a piece of me. Anyone experience this?

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

My wife was an archivist and always advised anyone to PRESERVE THE ORIGINAL!

Technology advances, and there may be in the future better ways to mitigate problems with the original source. If you have the space to store the old slides (4000 slides should fit in a cubic foot or less), do it.

Amadeus Loc: New York

Interesting. I got the same advice from my daughter and a 16 year old grandson.

BebuLamar

Yes I would save the slides. Destroying the slides is the same as destroying the images.

Grump's Photos Loc: Dunedin FL

You can ALWAYS throw them away, but once they're gone, that's it. I've got a bunch of slides from 68-69 in Vietnam, and would never think about trashing them, even after I've scanned all of them, and made prints of some. Just a viewpoint from an old codger...........
Andy
P.S. Dirt Farmer, I like your wife's point of view!

SteveR Loc: Michigan

You never know what AI might recover from them.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

And one never knows if the next generation will be interested in them.

srt101fan

Destroying the slides is not the same as destroying the images. With proper scanning and editing you can get a better image that lasts longer with more options for viewing.

To the OP: Think of who might want the slides in the future and what they would do with them. Think of the slides deteriorating further over time and viewing options becoming more and more difficult.

Save the real meaningful ones and toss the rest if you have good scans. Been there, done that……

Don, the 2nd son Loc: Crowded Florida

I still have em. Maybe when my PP skills improve I will redo them with my improved macro setup.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Most of my slides were not of "historical" value, so I ditched them after scanning. I don't have that high a reverence for ALL photographic images. I did hang on to the old family prints from the 1950s and earlier after scanning them though. (Nostalgia?) My old pictures of family will become historical some day, but the scans of them are good.
Many believe that their descendants will have the same level of reverence for <the> pictures that they have.
Not necessarily true.
...in the majority of the cases.

maxlieberman Loc: 19027

Absolutely.

jimvanells Loc: Augusta, GA

I found that when I scan old slides, I have to adjust the white balance.

Amadeus Loc: New York

I will probably keep them. Like I said it’s been a year since completing it. Haven’t tossed them yet. Everything I have is on 3 external drives. I’ll entrust those to family members. I’m sure the slides will be tossed eventually. But the responses were interesting. More people than not keep them.

PhotogHobbyist Loc: Bradford, PA

I have a large number of old slides and negatives along with many, many feet of old 8mm movie film. Most of the slides and negatives were taken by me with some having been taken by family members. The largest portion of the movies were taken by my father (he died in 1966) and document things from the late 1940s to the mid 1960s. The remainder of the movies were taken by me from the late '60s to around the early '80s. I have transferred a portion of the movies to digital but should redo them with better color correction and framing. I have yet to digitize the negatives and slides.

Because the movies were taken by my late father, I am reluctant to destroy them. I did have to trash a couple hundred feet of the films due to age and improper storage resulting in the film drying out and becoming fragile to the point that they could not be recovered or digitized. Of course that broke my heart because I could not recover the images and I could not even determine what images were there.

If and when I complete the task, I cannot be sure what I will do with the old images. Discarding or destroying them does not feel right.

radiojohn

Digital technology changes. Storage media quickly becomes obsolete. Online storage goes out of business.
I have on my shelf a gold-infused "100 Year CD" disk. Kind of like having an Edison cylinder. 100 years from now? Give me a break!

Think of something else to throw out that will take up the same space.