Archiving Slides, Negatives and PCD: What Format?
Feb 1, 2014 23:49:34 #
What am I to do with my film negatives, slides - and Kodak PCD images?
What FORMAT to use for archival: TIFF or the new JPEG standard or something else?
I've been into photography since the early 80's and switched to digital around 2002. Most of my work was done on slides, but I have a few thousand slides & negatives from Seattle Filmworks & Dale Labs that I need to scan/convert/archive in a "standard" digital format (one that will still be around in 20 years).
Back in the late 90's I spent the extra coin to have all my (new) photographs professionally processed to PCD format which was state-of-the-art at the time - NOW, you can't hardly find any software to deal with PCD. I have about 40 CDs of PCD images as well.
I need advice about storage formats appropriate for post processing, so I'd be looking to send my originals to a pro service. I have a couple of scanners and a slide scanner but the image quality isn't as good as I'd like and the time constraints for doing it myself are too cumbersome.
Thanks for your input!
What FORMAT to use for archival: TIFF or the new JPEG standard or something else?
I've been into photography since the early 80's and switched to digital around 2002. Most of my work was done on slides, but I have a few thousand slides & negatives from Seattle Filmworks & Dale Labs that I need to scan/convert/archive in a "standard" digital format (one that will still be around in 20 years).
Back in the late 90's I spent the extra coin to have all my (new) photographs professionally processed to PCD format which was state-of-the-art at the time - NOW, you can't hardly find any software to deal with PCD. I have about 40 CDs of PCD images as well.
I need advice about storage formats appropriate for post processing, so I'd be looking to send my originals to a pro service. I have a couple of scanners and a slide scanner but the image quality isn't as good as I'd like and the time constraints for doing it myself are too cumbersome.
Thanks for your input!
Feb 1, 2014 23:59:24 #
amehta
Loc: Boston
It seems that the best "lossless" standard is TIFF. Many other formats are derived from that. If the service you chose uses DNG (Adobe's digital negative), that would be good too. I wouldn't even think of the new JPEG spec at this time. There have been previous attempts to update JPEG, which have generally not caught on.
Feb 2, 2014 08:23:35 #
amehta wrote:
It seems that the best "lossless" standard is TIFF. Many other formats are derived from that. If the service you chose uses DNG (Adobe's digital negative), that would be good too. I wouldn't even think of the new JPEG spec at this time. There have been previous attempts to update JPEG, which have generally not caught on.
This UHH topic http://www.uglyhedgehog.com/t-181877-1.html prompted my question at this time. I had no idea that new jpeg standards come and go, but my thinking on DNG is that in 20 years I could be in the same boat as I am now with PCD.
Thanks for your input!
Feb 2, 2014 08:44:29 #
amehta
Loc: Boston
joealdrich wrote:
This UHH topic http://www.uglyhedgehog.com/t-181877-1.html prompted my question at this time. I had no idea that new jpeg standards come and go, but my thinking on DNG is that in 20 years I could be in the same boat as I am now with PCD.
Thanks for your input!
Thanks for your input!
While Adobe created DNG, they did it as an "open" format, which means both the specs of the format as well as the code for libraries to handle it are publicly available. This means that, 20 years from now, programs will still be available to at least read the format and convert it to another format, because someone will decide it's worth compiling the available sources code.
PCD, NEF, CR2, etc, on the other hand, are proprietary formats, so we depend on the particular manufacturer (Kodak, Nikon, Canon, etc) to provide programs to handle the files.
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