I use Itoya Portfolio books - they come in all sizes and I have 4 x 6 all the way to 13 x 19 - and I purchase them at my local camera shop: Roberts Photo. I also use three ring binders and plastic sleeves. Light Impressions, University Products, and Gaylord have a lot of options.

I find this to be a difficult task. But the first question I ask myself - Do I have a story to tell? If I can answer that question positively I work from that angle then put in the photos I need to tell the story. If it goes longer than 15 minutes I work until I can stay within that time frame. And I do this only if someone requests it.

I have shot for years with Canon 5D and 5D MkII with a variety of lenses and loved them. I am not a pro; advanced amateur would probably best describe me. And I am not young. This week I sold all of my Canon equipment and went with the Lumix G9 (after looking at and evaluating a variety of systems). The reason? A 47% weight reduction and an even greater space savings. At my age lugging the heavier units around all day, or dragging heavy bags through airports was becoming a burden. It was that simple. Were I younger and stronger I would still be with the Canon DSLR system.

I wound up with not only my photos but those of my parents and some of my in-laws. Step one was to organize by year, if possible, and cull, brutally. You will be amazed at how many photos that you have that are worthless - under/over exposed, blurry, duplicates,replicates, meaningless - and they should be tossed. By replicates I mean several photos of the same thing. For example, there must be 20 photos of me between six months and 1 year of age. I kept two, one being held by my mother, the other, at age 1, being held by my father. I should mention that I have two batches of photos, those that exist in print, only; and those that were shot digitally and are stored on disk. Of course, some of the prints have been scanned and stored and some of the digital images have been printed. Once the first step is completed I try to establish who, what, where, when for each photo, an often tricky situation. The computer storage is fairly easy because I use Lightroom, store by date, and use the keyword function, which I think is fantastic.

Now what? I have two projects for the photos - a genealogy for the family using all of the old material up to my birth, and a photo narrative of my life and the life of my family which includes my three children up to the point of their marriage. After that they have to take care of theirs. This will be my photographic legacy.

What about all of those other projects that are meaningful to me, only; the antique tractors, club photo excursions, club projects, and competition images? Unless someone finds a print stunning and wants to hang it they are destined for the trash. I do not want to burden my progeny with boxes and disks of photos.

Good luck.

I was looking at friends photos last night and noted that there was a fine white outline on the subject in two of his photos. I have seen this before on one of my photos and was told it can be corrected. What causes it and how can it be corrected. I call it fringing, maybe there is another word for it.

I mentioned this some time ago in a previous post. When shooting I use special photographer frames made by Hoodman with bifocal lenses. The lens flips up so I can shoot with my eye through the diopter adjusted eyepiece (Canon). With my bare eye I can see the focus and the settings in the view finder. To check the lcd, or settings on the screen on top of the camera (5D MkII) I just flip the lens back in place. I have light darkening lenses because I do a lot of outdoor shooting.

Eizo 22 inch screen: FlexScan SX2262W. Calibrated on a regular basis (every two weeks).

Same make for backup? Yes. I started my slr life with Canon and followed up my dslr life with Canon and my back up is Canon. Two basic reasons: Lenses and knowledge of the functions. I work too hard at getting the image I want to have to worry where all the functions are; I want to be able to act instinctively. I would never go on a major shoot without a backup.

Step One: Cull, cull, cull, and cull some more. Once you know the number of slides you want to scan ask folks on this site again.

I would think any good camera store in your area would do it. I live in the Indianapolis area and use Roberts Photo Shop. I have given them all sorts of old black and white negatives of different sizes and they have done an excellent job.

Have traveled and stayed along Michigan's western shore many times over the years and have found countless photographic opportunities - more than one can handle. Brad and Todd Reed of Ludington, MI have made a career out of photographing between Big Sable and Little Sable Lighthouses. Charge up your batteries and have fun. And remember to swim in Lake Michigan as often as you can, I love that lake.

Use a quality monitor (that usually meant $1000+ Eizo or LaCie), and a good printer; I am familiar with and happy with the Canon pro printers. Calibrate the monitor and calibrate the printer using the paper you are going to use for printing. If you use more than one paper you must calibrate with each paper. Even with all of this you will never get an exact match because what you see on the screen is produced by an entirely different method than what you see on paper. I will not go into details. But you should get very satisfactory, and pleasing results. And, if necessary, after all of the calibration you may have to tweak the system slightly to get what you want.

Wow! Where did Louis come from? I have been involved with the Lewis & Clark Trail Heritage Foundation for over 25 years and I come up with Louis. Isn't that the name of the new prince and pronounced Lew-ie? Maybe I was thinking royally.

My wife and I cull the photos saving the best or most meaningful then mount prints in a photo album and add commentary. Every once in a while we sit down and go over them recalling some good times and good laughs. We do not bore others with them. On rare occasion, if we have something special, I will make an enlargement to hang or share at camera club. My wife made a month long study trip to India and upon return put together a slide show with narrative for educational purposes - pre digital. On another occasion we did a seven week trip along the Louis and Clark Trail and did the same. After a few presentations they languish in storage.

OK, let me nit-pick. Are you showing us a collage or a montage? I think you have shown us a montage.