How "safe" would you want to be?

[davidedric]

I have just (re) started scanning my old slides. Once I've scanned them as the best quality TIFF 's, they go into my "straight out of camers" folder, and then follow my usual copy/back up regime. So the digital images are as (in) secure as the rest of them. Yet I have a probably sentimental yen to keep the slides. What would you do?

As a follow up, why on earth am I keeping my slide projector? Answers on a postcard please, to..........

Dave

[Daisy Mae]

....because, that is how they were meant to be seen. It was the technology available at the time and so it is an authentic experience.

Dave, I am clearing my Dad's house and all the wonderful slides of my parents (and me as a chubby wee greetin' faced bairn) will be safely transfered BUT...the wee hand held viewer will ALWAYS be my favourite way of looking at them.

[Shadowman]

So you can show the grandkids how you used to do it in the good old days.

[Benjy]

Sharon.let,s see the chubby wee greetin,face bairn,show us yours ,I,ll show you mine

[Mike Buckley]

I kept all of my slides after digitizing them. Considering the small amount of space required to store them, it's not worth getting rid of them.

Now the real reason I kept them: If my wife ever discovered that I got rid of them, I'd be divorced.

[Daisy Mae]

Sharon.let,s see the chubby wee greetin,face bairn,show us yours ,I,ll show you mine

Yer on!

[Benjy]

OK.....Ladies first....is this a Bonny Baby comp.?

[Daisy Mae]

OK.....Ladies first....is this a Bonny Baby comp.?

Well we shall see Benjy....once the evidernce is in!

[Donald]

Yet I have a probably sentimental yen to keep the slides. What would you do?

It took me while to get started. The biggest decision was, 'Yes, the slides and the projector go'.

So, once I completed the scan and were backed up, I'm afraid they went. It had to be a clear and irreversible decision. If I'd stopped to ponder, I'd have changed my mind.

[Benjy]

Well I,m good to go.....Bonhill Handsomes we are here

[Daisy Mae]

It took me while to get started. The biggest decision was, 'Yes, the slides and the projector go'.

So, once I completed the scan and were backed up, I'm afraid they went. It had to be a clear and irreversible decision. If I'd stopped to ponder, I'd have changed my mind.

I can understand your decision but the sheer beauty of holding that wee viewfinder up to the light and seeing the past, illuminated , and in a sense a 'private viewing' .It's so special.

[Daisy Mae]

Well I,m good to go.....Bonhill Handsomes we are here

Hud yer wheesht...I'll get there..honest.

[davidedric]

and me as a chubby wee greetin' faced bairn

I may have one or two offerings (b&w, of course), but to be fair, shouldn't we have a "then and now" thread. Must be late, why did I say that?

Dave

[loosecanon]

10 years ago there was a big push to digitise collections do museums and libraries could put material online. Often large grants were given for this work. Often files about 3 to 5 megapixels were the largest, and often smaller. Scans often failed to get all the detail from a positive print. Now we would be talking about 24megapixels, at least 16bit files etc. etc.
The analogue slide or print can provide a lot more detail than early digital archiving.

That said where does one deposit a photographic archive for posterity.

[bambleweeney]

As a follow up, why on earth am I keeping my slide projector? Answers on a postcard please, to..........

Dave

The same reasons I'm hanging on to mine I guess.
1) I'd forgotten all about it until you brought it up
2) ... now the thought of throwing it away seems kind of horrifying,
3) ... and the thought just occurs that in a studio projecting a bright light - or even a slide on to the subject might be kind of interesting and gives me a (semi) good reason to hang on to it after all.

[benm]

I would keep the slides. Two reasons:
- as technology improves you might be able to rescan a few of the really great slides and get more detail out of them.
- slides are as near archival as possible. Can't say the same for digital (media deterioration, software incompatibilities, hardware obsolescence, ...)

[jcuknz]

That said where does one deposit a photographic archive for posterity.

It is extreme conceit in imaging anything one takes will be of interest to anybody except possibily ones own immediate family after one passes on.

[Donald]

It is extreme conceit in imaging anything one takes will be of interest to anybody except possibily ones own immediate family after one passes on.

Is that not a tad unfair? If we're to get anywhere in improving photographic knowledge and skill, surely we have to strive to reach standards whereby our creations will be of interest to a wider audience.

In fact, ones own family are usually the least interested!

[Bobobird]

In fact, ones own family are usually the least interested!

Except wifey who gets pretty excited with "THE" shots (probably because they happen so infrequently), the others just give a polite nice if that.

[loosecanon]

I can assure you I have many thousands of unique images in negative and slide format, and even digital. For over 40 years I have recorded industrial buildings and contents, most of which have now gone. Only last year I heard of a business closing down, took images for 20mins whilst owner distracted, before we could arrange to go back the building was stripped. Later this year the images taken, or rather a selection, will be published in a Journal. Two years ago I supplied over 200 images for an exhibition about a street. Included were two sets of working factories taken in one case a week before closure was announced, and the second where no other images of parts of the process are know to exist apart from bland publicity images of shining copper vessels.