# Scanning the images from those old plastic 'slide viewers' **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 25, 2023, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scanning-the-images-from-those-old-plastic-slide-viewers/995133 "2023-12-25T20:45:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2023, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scanning-the-images-from-those-old-plastic-slide-viewers/995133/1 "2023-12-25T20:45:09Z")
During some recent cleaning, I found some of those little, single-pic, ‘slide viewers’. (I think that’s what they’re called. Googling that term turns up mostly larger systems that can be loaded with multiple slides which are mounted in cardboard frames.) The things I found are little (2 to 3 inch-long) plastic tubes each holding a single photographic slide at the wider end. They’re sealed–they’re not designed for the slides to be swapped out. You look through the narrow end and hold it up to a light to view the image. The images are my family, my friends, and myself, taken at vacation spots. I’d like to get digital scans of the images. Does anyone have experience at this? Could a Staples or Office Depot handle it? Or would it require a more specialized print shop? TIA. ---
**Author:** ![pjd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pjd/32/3009_2.png) [@pjd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pjd)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2023, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scanning-the-images-from-those-old-plastic-slide-viewers/995133/2 "2023-12-25T20:48:24Z")
Do you mean a Stanhope ? > **[Stanhope (optical bijou)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanhope_(optical_bijou))** > > A stanhope or stanho-scope is an optical device that enables the viewing of microphotographs without using a microscope. They were invented by René Dagron in 1857. Dagron bypassed the need for an expensive microscope to view the microscopic photographs by attaching the microphotograph at the end of a modified Stanhope lens. He called the devices bijoux photo-microscopiques or microscopic photo-jewelry. > In 1851 John Benjamin Dancer invented microphotographs using a collodion process and a micros... ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2023, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scanning-the-images-from-those-old-plastic-slide-viewers/995133/3 "2023-12-25T21:18:11Z")
Sounds like a keychain photo viewer to me. Something like this? [![Google Photos](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw/ABLVV84T4tgoRb0smBU583Xo3ay81VevgesToxdvvDysfUcAf4NH1uYbPivS0s95nEc2TS3WxkwjHBUfJuiulTHj_evseBtC-zXhb9YiWnxOcvJUFhlcmuRx=w600-h315-p-k "New item by Dave Carter") ](https://photos.app.goo.gl/C9S8K2XmbWewCoos8) On the ones that I have, the front piece does snap off and you can lift the slide out and scan it. If it’s truly sealed, you could probably get a semi-acceptable image (well, mediocre, anyway) with your cellphone by holding it up to the lens. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2023, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scanning-the-images-from-those-old-plastic-slide-viewers/995133/4 "2023-12-26T04:05:19Z")
> [@blondebear](#): > > On the ones that I have, the front piece does snap off and you can lift the slide out and scan it. If it’s truly sealed, you could probably get a semi-acceptable image (well, mediocre, anyway) with your cellphone by holding it up to the lens. This is it, thank you. And I doubt the ones I have are truly sealed, because the company that made them would approach potential customers (e.g., on the beach in Ocean City, MD, or Hershey Park) and take _lots_ of pictures, develop the slides, and create the viewers. The customer would then come by the company’s premises later to look at the images and decide which ones they wanted to buy. If a customer chose not to buy a particular viewer, I would assume that the company could pop the viewer open to reuse it. Otherwise, they would waste a _lot_ of viewers. ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2023, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scanning-the-images-from-those-old-plastic-slide-viewers/995133/5 "2023-12-26T04:18:52Z")
I would say almost certainly openable. We got one decades ago at Sea World. They would take your picture, then you would go to a booth later in the day to view it. The keychain viewer was the viewing mechanism. If you liked the picture they would make prints for you, or you could just buy the viewer. This was years before scanners, so they must have removed the slide from the viewer to make the prints.