Digitizing family photos, slides, videos, and 8mm films

[starry night]

This posting is NOT about external sources who will transfer your stock of family memorabilia to digital.
It is about my DIY home project to do this, and control it myself and for FREE!
I am using my iPhone camera to photograph my old family photos and other memorabilia like wedding invitations, newspaper clippings, letters, items from high school yearbooks, etc., then transferring them to my laptop for trimming and editing. I am very pleased with the sharpness and resolution.
Likewise with the slides, we got a small single-slide viewer (not a carousel or projector) from a neighbor who was discarding it, and took a photo from the viewer screen with my iPh.
The same neighbor was donating a 8mm projector (Keystone brand) to Goodwill, so he gave it to us, and we will donate it when our project is completed.
We used this to project our short reels onto a white wall in our house, and recorded the projection with my digital 35mm camera recording function. I am limited to about 30 minutes of tape in the camera memory, so do a set at a time, and transfer to laptop to clear the memory for the next set.
The VHS videos was the hardest to do. We had given up our old component when we moved (kept only our DVD player), so we spent awhile trying to run down replacement equipment. Found one at salvage store (Goodwill) for $5, but it didn’t work. A friend has loaned us theirs (along with the old-school connectors to the back of our TV), so I am playing all the tapes and recording (again with my digital 35mm camera) and copying the clips we want to save. There were hours of Grand Canyon mule ride content taken by DH, the view of my backside (along with the mule’s) swaying along the trail. So, I am able to trim much of the screen-time and copy the good parts.
We copied relevant bits to zip drives to share with family members.
We have really enjoyed re-living these moments, and I’m really pleased and satisfied with our product.
It is not a professional technological masterpiece, but we are satisfied…we did it ourselves….and virtually for free.

I would benefit from hearing your experiences, tips or other ideas on how to manage family materials.

 

[audreyh1]

I’m just getting ready to scan some 50-60 year old color slides that I hand carried back from Dad’s old place. We’re going to use one of those compact fairly inexpensive Kodak slide scanners that save them to an SD memory card. Things have come a long ways since 20 years ago.

 

[RetMD21]

I inherited a Toshiba DVR620 VHS DVD combination machine that I recently used to convert tapes to digital it worked out great. I'm using an Epson Perfection 4400 scanner that to scan 35 mm slides. Although it's good to get them into a modern format I'm not excited about the process.

I also found a lot of content in the home movies that could be cut.

 

[jollystomper]

I always hang on to hardware technology for audio/video tape formats that I have, so digitizing my VHS/8mm/miniDV tapes was relatively easy by connecting them to computers for the conversion. I then use various open source software programs (primarily Avidemux and ShotCut) to edit the tapes for sharing with family.

I have all-in-one printers for scanners for photos, but find that my current Android does a better job if I take a picture of the photo. I need to get an overhead tripod for consistency.

 

[rk911]

I embarked on that very same project several years ago. Must've been at least several hundred old family photos from my side of the family that I scanned using our multi-function printer. I have several hundred color slides that are still waiting to be scanned and hundreds more family snapshots from my late BIL's estate. Those may never get done. I have the scanned photos organized using now orphaned software called Picasa from Google.

 

[The Cosmic Avenger]

When I cleaned out my dad's apartment, I found some 35mm slides, and just holding them up to the light I could see that there were some photos from my early childhood in there. Since he left me a decent amount, I decided to buy a scanner to scan in those old slides. (I found one of us visiting my aunt and uncle, and had a nice photo of them, my cousin, and me to post for her 80th birthday.) I bought the Epson Perfection V600 mostly based on this review. It isn't just a review, it's a professional photographer's guide to setting up and using this scanner, so I bookmarked it. It's nice having these old photos of my childhood friends that I can post or message them.

 

[donheff]

Once you get your videos trimmed and organized you can upload them to YouTube. They will be easy to access and share and Google will maintain them for you.

 

[PaunchyPirate]

I did the project myself during Covid. Many, many hours. I still have the originals in my basement in plastic bins, subdivided into labeled plastic bags. I expect no one will ever do anything with them until my death forces the issue.

I uploaded everything to the internet and sent out info to the entire family on how to access/download their own copies. I doubt any of them did anything about it. I never heard from them on the topic.

I've done my part.

 

[mpeirce]

I uploaded everything to the internet and sent out info to the entire family on how to access/download their own copies. I doubt any of them did anything about it. I never heard from them on the topic.

My experience is that most people don't really care about these things. They might take a slight interest if you show them some old photos, but aren't really interested in doing anything about them.

One approach is to identify someone in the family who is more interested in family history and cultivate them - slowly. Sometimes there isn't anyone who's interested, but keep checking back because sometimes people's interest develop as they mature.

 

[pacergal]

DH is doing something similar, using his iPhone and Mac for editing. It's a big project, will be nice to have when done. I have very old photos from my folks of grandparents and great grandparents.
DS is interested in history and genealogy, so he may be wanting the actual old photos in the future.