A friend of mine would like me to scan some very old family photographs. The photos date from the late 1800s and early 1900s. Some of the photos are starting to degrade, and the chemicals on some of the prints seems to be dissolving or leeching out of the photo.
Will the light from using a scanner cause any additional harm to the photos? My friend plans to also have the pics professionally duplicated, but would like to get quick scans for a family tree project.
Any help is appreciated.
I would highly doubt it, but I wouldn’t stake my life on it. What I can say is that it will do no more harm than holding a flourescent light directly over it, since that’s what provides the light for scanners anyway. (generally speaking)
Jman
I have no experience with this, but I’d guess the light won’t be a problem. However, when you use a flatbed scanner, the photo comes in physical contact with the glass surface. I don’t think that would be very good for the photo - why take chances?
What I’d do is use a digital camera instead of a scanner. Don’t use flash, as it will cause glare. This way you don’t subject the photo to any physical contact or unusual light. Resolution will be worse than scanners, but I think it’ll be good enough for your purpose.
I pulled up a site that has all kinds of information on scanning and scanners and it said the following (note the link is dead):
I have seen many very old pictures scanned on the internet, most people have shown the before and after they manipulated the picture via Paint Shop Pro.
If you hunt it down, I bet this place will get your answer for sure:
http://www.i-us.com/ an excellent resource for all digital art.
Thanks very much all for the responses.
techchick, the site you suggested looks great. I appreciate it.
Some of the photo programs I have, have tools for retouching old photographs. So it must be okay otherwise they wouldn’t have that feature.
Plus, not all scanners use the same light type, so it’s a guess which one yours has.