woodworker2012

My father in law hired me to digitize his collection of 35mm slides (just over 1500 of them). I have a vivitar projector with an individual top viewing port. I rigged up one of my cameras on a tripod and took a snapshot of each one via that port. Those that needed a little touch up were easy to fix in lightroom. All in all they turned out really good and did not have to spend hundreds of dollars to have someone else scan them. He is retired Air Force.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Topic has been covered well, previously. Do a UHH search for "slide copying" or "slide scanning".

Method 1: Epson V-Series scanner with Digital ICE technology (slow, but effective, and Digital ICE removes dust, scratches, etc.)

Method 2: macro photography of the slides, using an optical slide duplicator and digital camera (fast, but you may have more editing to do)

Print the digital images through a lab or using an inkjet printer made for photo printing.

chfrus

The best is an attachment that goes in front of your camera lens. Its cheaper faster and its in your camera. Sorry I just got up and don't have the info in front of me. Google slide copiers.

GrumpyOldBeardGuy

I had some scanned and printed at Costco a few years back. They came out quite good and weren't that expensive. Of course, in volume, it might be too expensive.

StanRP Loc: Ontario Canada

You have slides that have a lot of military historical value. Well worth digitizing. It may be worth contacting your local veterans association for help.

The cost of digitizing and removal of scratches, dust etc. is high many due to the time taken scanning them. and well worth while getting a scanner to digitize them yourself. As, I suspect others will tell you, the EPSON perfection scanners e.g. V600 have what they call ICE technology where the slide is first scanned in IR that only sees the scratches dust dirt etc. and then one or more scans for the picture. The ICE uses the info from the first scan to remove the scratches. It also has correction for faded colours. This does take a lot of time, not only the scanning but the processing time in your computer. There is a holder for scanning several slides at once so you can be doing something else while it does it's thing.

StanRP

Paul Buckhiester Loc: Columbus, GA USA

I use a Canoscan 9000. Scan at or above 4800 dpi (scanner resolution). It's time consuming but hugely rewarding. One of your fellow aviators saved my life 3 Mar 69 near Duc Pho.

fourlocks Loc: Londonderry, NH

I'll second WayneT's suggestion for a good scanner. Like him, I purchased the Epsom V600 and I've spent this winter scanning my '70's and '80's Kodachrome and Ektrachrome slides. For a modestly-policed scanner the V600 does an excellent job and as Wayne noted, it's software allows you to restore the slide to it's original glory. A more expensive scanner might do a marginally better job so check around and see what your wallet can withstand but I'd go no less than the V600.

Picture Taker Loc: Michigan Thumb

I recently went on line and got "OPTEKA" digital slide duplicator--HD2. It was about $50.00 and fits on my camera lens. It holds 3 slides in a bracket. It works fine for me and it is just like working any other pictures I take. I found it was smother to keep my camera on a tripod and aim at a whit wall for simply have consistency oh light.
My slides are Kodak 10 ASA from Libya and then the Alps during the occupation.

pendennis

I went with the Epson Pro V850. It does an amazing job with the slides. I use Adobe Elements 15 to edit, and I'm also working with VueScan. Even some of the slides which faded a bit have been restored to great digital images.

B&H has some scanners which are dedicated to 35mm slides.

You've quite a bit of history. Don't let it die.

catchlight.. Loc: Wisconsin USA- Halden Norway

The 9000F MKII Canon flatbed works great and with Tiff files as an option you can edit with more information. Grain is not any issue.

A price of only $176.99 and impressive file size.

These are small file facebook posts but were from old abused slides that had issues from the early 80's from a Fuji AX1.

ole sarg Loc: south florida

See if the national archieves is collecting photos of Viet Nam. If they are they may want the collection. If they do they usually provide a disc of what you have for your collection.

MtnMan Loc: ID

Costco or online services.

Bob.J Loc: On The Move

I also use an Epson Perfection V500 Photo. There are newer models, but I never saw the need to upgrade.
I have tried many ways to digitize slides, including photographing the slides. The problem is the time and all the steps it takes. If your slide is relatively clean (you should dust them off anyway) the software the scanner came with provides very good results.
I did about 4000 slides going back to the 40's, the scanner is by far the fastest way to do it.
Here are a couple examples.
If you want more info PM me.

Raw and with scanner correction, no photoshop. From about 1950

(Download)

1948 Slide

(Download)

1966 Slide

(Download)

Grandpa Pete Loc: Western Finger Lakes (NY)

Epson V500 or 600 photo scanners (often factory refurbs direct from Epson are available at low cost) are dynamite slide scanners. I've done fifty year old slides and printed them on 8 by 10 photo paper and they were without any visible grain and colors were perfect.

jeep_daddy Loc: Prescott AZ

I had a lot of slides from my father that me and my sister went through together. We spent a couple of nights culling through them and in one weekend we had set aside hundreds. We just used a simply hand held viewer. We had several of them. Some of my fathers slides were the stereo type. About a month later my sister and I got back together and went through them once again, this time we both picked our favorites and put them in a pile. Then we both looked at the favorites once again and weeded out some more. When all was done, we had about 120 slides we liked. Then instead of purchasing a scanner, I decided that it was probably best to have them scanned by a company that scans images and knows what they are doing especially with stereo slides. It cost about $200 and all was well. They only did a bad job on one image and I contacted them and they scanned it over again. I could have purchased a scanner like the Epson V600 but then I really didn't want to take up the space after I was done with it. I already have an all-in-one printer scanner that is ok for minor printing of documents and scanning of important papers, so I didn't need another expensive scanner just taking up space.

Oh, and after I had them scanned, no body in the family was particularly interested in a print to hang on the wall so none of them have been printed. I have edited most of them and put in a shared Dropbox folder for anyone in the family to enjoy. If I want a print I would just take to Costco or use my Canon Pixma Pro 100 to print. So if you know how to edit, then when you are finished scanning them just edit yourself, or you can pay someone to edit and print them.