How do you digitize film negatives and photos today?

Windows 10 has tags for images

If you click on an image file like 1.jpg, then go to properties and details tab you can edit tags.

If you have Windows 7 be sure to change all info such as names, locations, etc., to tags before going to Windows 10 to avoid losing all of your data

My flatbed scanner has a slide/negative fixture built into the lid. It will scan two images at a time. The same scanner can scan photos. So it is possible to use one device for both photos and slides/negatives.

Our Epson Scanner comes with both a slide holder and a negative holder and we have used both with excellent results. Our old Cannon scanner had both as well, but it was a little more finicky to use. Our scanner was not very expensive either.

I've owned an Epson Perfection 4490 Photo Flatbed Scanner for quite a while. It came with a holder for slides and negatives and will scan slides, negatives, photos, magazines, documents. These scanners are not expensive. You can scan multiple negatives, multiple slides, or multiple photos at the same time and the software will automatically separate the images into separate files. Everyone should own one of these devices. They are not expensive either.

For a quick scan of photos and printed articles, I use the IOS app ScannerPro from Readle. It automatically fixes the keystone distortion you almost inevitably get when using an iPad camera, and allows you to do most of the things a PC scanning program does: go monochrome or greyscale, do limited colour correction, lighten/darken etc.

We use our Epson Perfection v370 Scanner and it came with a negative carrier and a slide carrier that does 4 or 5 at a time (I think, my husband does most of the scanning). We then import them into Photoshop Elements and can correct many things, but if the slide/negative/photo was not very good to begin with, you can only improve it so much.

I use a similar technique on antique negatives. To prevent negatives curling, put a piece of plastic on top to flatten it out. These can be bought at Hobby Lobby. Although it soon gets scratched up, the scratches don't show in the photographed image.

I don't use a tripod. Instead I put the light box on the seat of a chair and put my arms on the chair back to steady the hand-held camera.

I don't use the 'negative' feature of a scanner. The scanner bar creeps slowly and the quality isn't that great, and my scanner doesn't do large negatives well.

There are directions on making a light reflector for a scanner, which reflects light from one side of the scanner to the other, increasing the light supply, so that the regular scanner mode can scan negatives. I haven't tried this yet, though I expect it'll be slower than using a camera.

Thanks,
Really appreciate the input.
I am not a Photo Shop expert/even rookie, but i do work with PS Elements with beginner success, hope that does the same thing..Will try. Assume you are doing a negative proceedure of the negative to give you the positive B&W. Anyone with Elements who knows how to do this, I would appreciate input.

There may be a solution to the curling heat of the light box. I happen to have a small edge lit acrylic backlit that is used for backlighting color transparencies. It is powered with low voltage LED, so i don't think there will be any heat.
Have not tried yet the negatives..hope to soon. but appreciate the idea.
(my Adobe Photoshop Elements is version 14)

I suggest that you look into PaintShop Pro Ultimate (PSP) from Corel as an alternative to Photoshop Elements (PE). Each has it strengths and weaknesses, but most people find PSP a bit easier to work with for dealing with photos.

PSP comes in 2 versions: basic PSP and Ultimate. The PSP program of each is the same. The Ultimate versions include third-party programs such as Perfect Effects from On1 or FaceFilter from Reallusion, and "Creative Content" add-ons such as artistic effects.

PSP has reached the stage of development where you don't need the latest version--the differences from one version to the next are minor. For non-advanced users and general photo retouching, any version from around X5 through the current X9 will work pretty much the same and can do all the same things. If you check on-line you can find non-current versions for around $35-50.

All the Ultimate add-ons are specific to that particular version. In other words, X5 might include Perfect Effects but not FaceFilter and X6 might include FaceFilter but not Perfect Effects. Generally (but not always) the add-on installer will only work if that PSP version is already installed.

However, once the installer has run, the PSP version doesn't need to still be on the computer. So, for instance, you install X5 and add-ons A, B and C. Then you get X7 that comes with A, D and E. Most of the add-ons install as plug-ins, meaning they can run from within PSP. You can copy the plug-ins from one version's plug-ins folder to another and they will work in the target folder. So that means that to use add-ons from X3, X4, X5, etc., in X7 you don't need to keep every version installed. Many PSP users put all their plug-ins in a separate folder and just point to that folder in Preferences > File Locations.

Regarding third-party software that installs as standalone programs rather than plug-ins (e.g., FaceFilter), once their installer is run the PSP version can be uninstalled.

If you do get PSP, you'll want to install both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions (assuming you are running 64-bit Windows). Most older plug-ins, e.g., KPT Filters, are only available in 32-bit versions and many newer plug-ins are only available in 64-bit versions.

Also, most plug-ins designed for Photoshop will also run in PSP.

===== CAUTION =====
There is one caution about using both PS/PE and PSP on the same image (because each has its strengths). This does not apply to single-layer images such as GIF, JPG and PNG.

If you get into non-beginner processing, you'll want to learn to use layers. Layers let you work on parts without changing things in other layers. So, for instance, you take a color image and put a grayscale layer on top of it. The end result will look black and white--but the actual color image will be unchanged. (Actually, you would use a "hue/saturation" layer but that's a whole other discussion.)

The only image format that supports layers and which both PS/PE and PSP can process is Adobe's .psd format.

Here's the caution: The Adobe and Corel programs recognize each other's layers but often won't process them. So, using the above example, if you take a color image and add a grayscale layer in PSP, save the image as .psd and open it in PS or PE, the Adobe program will show there is a grayscale layer--but the overall image will still look color. The problem can occur in either direction--sometimes PSP won't process a PS/PE layer. If you're going to go back and forth, don't spend an hour editing in one program and then check it in the other program--you might find out none of those changes will have any effect.

When sending film for processing, I always split my order (part of the film one week, part the next) so that a factory problem did not destroy all the film from an event or trip. Good practice when sending pictures or film for 3rd party scanning. If the order is lost, going or coming, you haven't lost everything.

Does this work for color slides in their holders?

Thank you finding and bringing that up, richteral. 3 years past and there are probably a lot more efficient, new technology, or discovered methods by our member to make this undertaking less painful? You're into photography and digital cameras, right? Have you found new tricks or tips you can offer your fellow members on this topic? If you do, we'd love for you to share them. We'd appreciate it.

-Lee

"...there are probably a lot more efficient, new technology, or discovered methods..."

Not that I would know of. The principles of the process remain the same, which is why they are exactly that - principles; they will remain so until there is a paradigm shift in technology. It will be a watershed event, and everyone will become aware of it in very short order since there is currently nothing like a big box wherein one would dump all the prints, negatives and/or slides, press a button, go to bed, and in the morning, voilà - magick!

As you will know best, the thread above that I have referenced is fairly voluminous and comprehensive. I find it useful to the point that, from time to time, I revisit and check up on the wealth of information provided in those four pages. The current enquirer would be well advised to do likewise, otherwise I would not have bothered providing the link. Frankly, the only thing that would have moved on are the scanner model numbers (my Canon is ca 5 years old, to provide a yardstick on that point).

Waiting for a breakthrough? Sure!

Just in case you haven't already done so please make a backup copy of that Plex server that contains all your photos.

@drbruce2 I, too, used ScanCafe for a very large job that would have taken eons. We had SLIDES, inherited from my husband's father. It took me several weeks just to go through those and glue together dried out cardboard slide frames for scanning. We sent photos and negatives, too. No organization to what we got back on the CDs, but I can do that.

I tried projecting slides onto a wall and taking photos of them. It simply wasn't as good as scanning the slides on a flatbed scanner with a slide slot built into the lid of the scanner.

I spent 3000-5000 hours scanning photos and slides, and creating an ancestry.com family tree to sort out who was in the photo. I also tagged every photo with the names of the people in the photo.

Had i sent the photos out to have them professionally digitized it would have cost a fortune. Doing it myself was a labor of love. The project completed and I've moved on.

Fuggedaboutit! It's better than nothing I suppose, but the resolution will NOT be good enough for decent prints. If you value your slide pictures, either buy a dedicated scanner or send them to a company like ScanCafe. If you look for promos you can get it done at a reasonable cost. Life is too short to spend it all on converting 2000 slides. I do photos myself on a flatbed but leave the slides and negatives to others with the right equipment. ScanCafe claims to do software-based adjustments as part of the service, although it doesn't work perfectly on all slides. You might want to redo the few where you don't like the results yourself. I started out with the projector approach but wasn't satisfied because I wanted the capability of printing selected photos at 8x10 size. If posting pics on Facebook is good enough for you, then anything is OK. Keep in mind your end objective and choose accordingly.

We use our Epson Perfection v370 scanner. Then import them into Photoshop Elements (current version is 15). But the real thing to remember is that if you take a picture with your million megapixel camera it may actually make it look worse, by emphasising all the imperfections. You can correct some things with software, but in the end a not very good picture will not look like a great picture.