A little help from the Experts here at RFF

[childers-jk]

Just a short story for background. I was talking to my mother last night on the phone, and it seems as though the family house (the home of my grandparents) may be up for sale. My grandfather and grandmother have both passed. My grandmother was quite the shutter bug, and spent a lot of time clicking away with an old Leica, and using b/w slide film. I don't know why, but almost all of the old family photographs are on b/w slide. I have now offered to be the keeper of all of this family history which includes 6-7 boxes (around 3'x4'x3' in size) of slides, negs and prints. Many of these pictures are over 60 years old, and the prints are going quickly. However, I still have the original negatives and all of the slides. My idea is to create albums with all of the slides and negs with test strips and slide strips for identification.

I am looking for any information on the making prints from b/w slides. Also, I am interested in any special considerations I need to make in preserving the negs and the slides? Please post any information, not matter how trivial. Most of the old family items have been scattered to the four winds, and this collection of pictures is the only whole thing left of our family history

Any help you could offer would be greatly appreciated, and I will post some of the pics when I get the chance.

Thanks, and sorry for the long post.

Jeff C.

 

[FrankS]

Hi Jeff, you have quite a responsibility there! I don't have all the answers (I'm not an expert, I only play one on internet forums) but I would advise digitally scanning the negs and prints that you have as a way of sharing them with other family members.

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

I second Frank's suggestion; it may be "cheaper" and overall more manageable. Individual prints from slides are not cheap (compared to reprints from negatives).

Scanning of course conjures other "issues" if you don't have the equipment, software, experience, etc. If you have the money, however, you may have a lab scan them for you; it's a thought.

It's quite a responsibility, indeed!

 

[childers-jk]

Hi Jeff, you have quite a responsibility there! I don't have all the answers (I'm not an expert, I only play one on internet forums) but I would advise digitally scanning the negs and prints that you have as a way of sharing them with other family members.

Frank,

You and gabrielma are correct in the responsibility I have. I am probably the only one in my family that is willing to take this project on. I understand scanning, and I have seen a lot of threads on scanners. I will definately look into this as well.

I am still curious if there is anything I should do to preserve the original negs and the slides. I am afriad that many of them will be in poor shape and I want to know if there is any type of preservative or something that will protect the original image.

Any thoughts on this would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Jeff C.

 

[ch1]

Criminy - I can't offer a page worth of advice like the above - reminds me of a former poster here.

First off, since you are in High Desert and so, presumably, are the negs too - you've "won" the first battle. Humidity is bad, dry is good (to a point).

As to scanning. I agree, totally. And as one who has been struggling to just keep even with catching up to my own prior plus current production - it will take an enormous investment of time to scan all of your images. Not necessarily a problem - but time is money - which is why it becomes your decision, based on your finances, whether you want to DIY or pay a "king's ransom" to have someone else do it.

As to cataloging - check with your local library, or, if need be, go all the way tp LA and learn some of the basic cataloging techniques (i.e. picture data basing). The free on line Picasa (which I have yet to learn) is a good basic database program for images.

Good luck - post pictures.

 

[ErnestoJL]

I second Frank´s, Gabriel and RJ- opinions about your problem.

I have a similar one because after many years of picture taking by my father, me and other relatives I have inherited four or five shoeboxes of prints of any size and its negs, lots of negatives yet unprinted (mostly 6x4.5 and 6x9) and, another bunch of prints without negs, all of them I´m willing to preserve as they are the only records my small family has (me and my sister).

I started scanning the prints and classifying them in groups, but having no film scanner I´m forced to look for a lab to do the job with the negs, so their time would come soon.
Besides there are about 1200 35 mm clour slides (Agfa CT 18 with a delicious violet dominant!) and 200 colour slides of 6x6; 6x4.5 and 6x9 cm. All of them will also go to the lab for scanning (anyway it´s cheaper than buying a film sacanner).

35 mm slides both colour or B&W are a simple task because I have a slide duplicator which is an item not too expensive (mine is a Soligor with a fixed focus and aperture of f8). I use mine with any M42 mount SLR and the results were really good. I payed it secondhand USD 18.
Probably you´ll find one at e*ay for the same price. Mount is T2 and adapters won´t be quite expensive and relativey easy to find.

I have cleaned the 35 mm slides thoroughly with low pressure compressed air and hopefully they wouldn´t be severely damaged so the copies/prints would be acceptable (fortunately they were decently stored).

I´m in serious doubt about giving the negs a cleaning bath because many of them are very old (about 1910/20) and some seem to be not adequately developed or fixed (the silver is becoming bright). I admit not being too confident about the response of the base material or the emulsion to any solvent so I prefer to leave them as they are. As it´s impossible for me to know which brand of film was used, I´m afraid that any attempt to clean them may lead to a loss, and this is something I´ll avoid by any means.

For retouching, I will use any photo retouching software.
As RJ- pointed, the size of the negs preclude any manual attempt of retouching/restoring on the neg itself. With the computer you can save the original scan file, and if not satisfied, go back and start over until you get what you wanted. Even if the negs are bigger, I thnk it´s the better way to do.

Good luck with your project!!
Ernesto

 

[RML]

A little thought about preservation. If there's a photo museum or gallery near you, you might want to get talking with the people there. Especially museums have to keep an eye on their collection, make allowances for preservation and restoration of prints, negs, positives, glass plates, etc. They might be able to give you hints and tips, and even be able to inform you whether it will cost you your mortgage and car.

 

[VinceC]

>>family history which includes 6-7 boxes (around 3'x4'x3' in size)<<

My reading of this is that you have six or seven large shipping boxes filled with slides, negatives and prints, each box measuring approximately 1 cubic meter.

Either way, you've got a lot of material. You are, in effect, the curator and editor of this piece of family history, and it's important to go through all those images and pull out the meaningful ones, then put them into a more accessible form. You have, in essence, volunteered your time so that others don't have to wade through that huge mass of raw information to find what's worth keeping and looking at.

I'd say you want to find the keepers ... the 1,000 or so images that convey the most important happenings, events, moments. That's about 10 - 15 old slide carosels and is a manageable amount. I'd then recommend finding a fast scanner that suits your needs and an archival-quality printer such as one of Epson's.

It's very important, once the collection is a manageable size, to print out a representative sample of the images -- even on some kind of cheap draft print -- and show them to older family members who will know who/what is being shown in the photos ... "that's Uncle Irv and Aunt Irma" ... so that, once those with memories of the events have gone, future generations of family members know what's being depicted. That way, someone with your responsibility 75 years from now will know what's worth copying onto a biogenetic crystal or whatever.

 

[VinceC]

Also, creating a Web page of family photos is a nice way to share the images with members of today's far-flung famillies.

 

[Sonnar Brian]

The scanning idea is worth doing. The Epson 3170 and other "better" flat bed scanners offer a mask that allows 4 2" by 2" slides to be handled at once.

Now for my Cheeze-Wiz film-based Solution for getting quick-prints out of a number of old slides. I bought a T-Mount slide-duplicator and loaded the camera with color film. Take 24 slides, drop off for processing. Yours are B&W, you may be using a B&W copy film. Worth the few bucks to try C41 process B&W, but I suspect the contrast will be too high.

Not the best quality, but a fast way to get prints out to family members.

 

[childers-jk]

>>family history which includes 6-7 boxes (around 3'x4'x3' in size)<<

My reading of this is that you have six or seven large shipping boxes filled with slides, negatives and prints, each box measuring approximately 1 cubic meter.

Either way, you've got a lot of material. You are, in effect, the curator and editor of this piece of family history, and it's important to go through all those images and pull out the meaningful ones, then put them into a more accessible form. You have, in essence, volunteered your time so that others don't have to wade through that huge mass of raw information to find what's worth keeping and looking at.

I'd say you want to find the keepers ... the 1,000 or so images that convey the most important happenings, events, moments. That's about 10 - 15 old slide carosels and is a manageable amount. I'd then recommend finding a fast scanner that suits your needs and an archival-quality printer such as one of Epson's.

It's very important, once the collection is a manageable size, to print out a representative sample of the images -- even on some kind of cheap draft print -- and show them to older family members who will know who/what is being shown in the photos ... "that's Uncle Irv and Aunt Irma" ... so that, once those with memories of the events have gone, future generations of family members know what's being depicted. That way, someone with your responsibility 75 years from now will know what's worth copying onto a biogenetic crystal or whatever.

Vince,

Thanks for the great idea!!! I hadn't really thought about selecting a few good ones!

For all of you who suggested scanning, I am seriously considering that option. It will be very easy to share those photos with the family electronically. The option to print also becomes better, and the quality of printing can be decided by those who wish to have the prints!!

As for restoration, I don't know how bad off the items are, but I know that some will require work. There is photography musem in Riverside CA and I will be trying to visit them to ask some questions. (Thanks again for a great idea RML!!)

Well, I have about two years, not that there is a deadline, but the family gets together every 2 years for a reunion, and I would like to have some of the work to show everyone.

I will be searching the threads for discussions on scanners, and hopefully find one in my price range. And the idea of a family web site would be a perfect way to show off the phots.

As for the "experts here at RFF" I feel from the few posts and all of the threads that I have read that ALL the members here are experts in one area or another. Thank you for all your help and I hope this project will be a sucess.

Thanks,
Jeff C.

 

[raid]

I have a similar situation like yours were I received some very old negatives and prints of my family. If you don't know what is on the negatives, either get them scanned low-quality just to know what is actually on those negatives, before asking for high quality scans. if the film format used is not compatible with today's scanners, ask for contact sheets to be made and then you can decide if they are worth it to be scanned or printed.