Best Ways to Digitize Old Photos
Dan Gelfond • August 25, 2022
Best ways to digitize old photos

There are many reasons why you might want to digitize your old photos. Maybe you want to create a digital archive of your family's history or perhaps you're looking for a way to share your old photos with relatives and friends who live far away. Whatever your reason, there are a few different ways you can go about it. In this blog post, we will cover the best ways to digitize photos. But first, let’s discuss some of the reasons people choose to do it.

Benefits of digitizing old photos

  • Preserve your memories: Digitizing old photos is a great way to preserve your memories. With digital files, you can make copies and store them in different places, so it’s impossible for them to be destroyed. 
  • Share photos more easily: Digitizing old photos also makes it easier to share them with family and friends. You can email digital files or post them online and anyone with an internet connection can view them. This is a great way to stay connected with loved ones who live farther away.
  • Create backups: Backing up your photos is always a good idea and digitizing them is an easy way to do it. That way, if your originals are ever lost or damaged, you’ll still have the digital copies. You can also keep a backup on a cloud storage service like Dropbox or Google Drive.
  • Edit and enhance photos: With digital photos, you can easily edit and enhance them. For example, you can crop or rotate them, adjust the brightness or contrast, and even remove red eyes. This can be helpful if you want to improve the quality of an old photo.
  • Save space: If you have a lot of old photos, digitizing them can save a lot of space. Once they’re digital, you can either get rid of the originals or store them away in a photo album. That way, you’ll free up some storage. 

 

Now that you know why photo digitization is useful, let’s talk about some of the best ways to do it:

1. Use a scanner and printer

If you have a scanner at home, this is one way you can digitize photos. Simply scan the photo and save it as a digital file on your computer. You can then print out the photo if you want or share it online with family and friends. This is a relatively simple process and it's one that you can do on your own without having to hire anyone.


However, certain scanners can be pricey. Specifically high-quality ones. Therefore, if you don’t have one or are not willing to make that investment, then this may not be an ideal method for you.

Use a scanner and printer

2. Use a digital camera

If you don't have a scanner, you can use a digital camera to take photos of your old photos. This method is a bit more time-consuming, but it's still fairly easy to do.


It’s also a great alternative if the photos are too large or delicate to scan, or if you don’t have access to a quality scanner.

Digital Camera

3. Smartphone scan

If you don't have a scanner, you can use your smartphone to scan your old photos. There are a number of apps available that will allow you to do this, such as GooglePhotoScan. Simply hold your phone up to the photo and let the app do its job.

It’s important to note that taking photos from your phone’s camera app can leave unwanted shadows, distortions, and glares. On the contrary, using an app gets rid of these issues, allowing for a smooth scanning process. That’s why it’s best to avoid using your camera app if you want high-quality photos.

Smartphone scan

4. Photo Digitizing Service

There are a number of companies, like Keepsake Family Tree Video, that offer photo digitizing services. All you need to do is provide them with your photos and they'll take care of the rest.

These companies will scan your old photos and then send you the digital files, which you can then use to print out copies or share electronically. This is probably the easiest and best way to digitize old photos, especially if you don’t have the time or equipment to do it yourself.

Keepsake Family Tree Video can help you digitize old photos

Whichever method you choose, digitizing your old photos is the only way to preserve them for future generations.


However, we personally recommend hiring a photo digitizing service. If you have old photos that you’d like to digitize, Keepsake Family Tree Video can help. They are a full-service videography company with over 20 years of experience in the business. They use the latest technology and equipment to provide their customers with high-quality scans of their precious photos.


To learn more about photo digitization and Keepsake Family Tree Video, visit our website.


847-940-9999

Dan “The Video Man”

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