The Ultimate Guide to Digitising Photos

If you’ve lost track of the actual printed photos or if they have signs of wear and tear such as scratches, dirt, or rips that you’d rather not replicate in the digital versions, consider investing in a negative film scanner. These handy photography accessories allow you to scan in your negative strips and convert them into digital files that can be reprinted, edited, and shared.

By using a negative scanner, you’ll be able to recreate the signature grain and “feel” of film photography with all the benefits of modern digital images. Using a dedicated negative scanner also means that you won’t have to invert the colours into “positive” images after scanning - your scanner’s in-built software will do that for you!

Top Tip: Try scanning in old negatives and cropping them artfully for fun, fresh #throwbackthursday social media posts.

If your photos are in good condition and you have a standard flatbed scanner, we’ve got good news: You can use this to digitise your old photos! Rather than fiddling with your negative strips and a negative film scanner, flatbed scanners allow you to simply lay photos on the scanner bed and scan them straight onto your computer. You can even scan multiple photos at once, making this the obvious choice in terms of speed and convenience.

For best results, look for a high-end flatbed scanner, which will give you better image quality and colour accuracy. You can even scan photo negatives on a flatbed scanner - just remember that you’ll need to use your favourite photo editing software to convert the colours into “positive” images afterward if your scanner’s software doesn’t do it for you.

Top Tip: If you are planning to scan both negatives and photos, do your research and try to find a flatbed scanner with negative-scanning capabilities.

• Clean your media before scanning. Dust and hair are really obvious on scans, so do your best to clean these off before you scan. Use a blower brush and be gentle to avoid damaging the surface of your photo or negative.
• Experiment with auto-correction features. In some cases, using the “Autocorrect” setting on your scanner does a world of good, while in others it can overdo the edits and ruin the charm of the picture. We suggest making a copy with “Autocorrect” turned on, inspecting your results, and rescanning without corrections if necessary.
• Take advantage of digital editing. Curves, levels, and saturation are simple edits that can do wonders to the look of a photograph when used correctly. Scanning film and photographs allow you to harness this digital editing with your analogue images, which shouldn’t be ignored.
• Don’t crop too hard. Remember that you can always crop your photo down during the editing stage, so aim to scan in as much of your image as possible.
• Scan at a high resolution. Always leave the door open for resizing your image in future by scanning at a high resolution. It’s easy to downsize an image, but increasing its size requires a re-scan.

One of the best things about saving old photos to digital devices is the freedom it gives you to share and present them as you please. Publishing photos online or emailing them to loved ones is a far more convenient way to share them than popping prints in the post, and is a fantastic opportunity to step back in time and reminisce. 

If you’re feeling creative, you can also turn your digital photos into poster-sized prints or canvases by taking them to a modern photo lab. Alternatively, you can preserve them in the pages of a DIY photobook, which you can embellish and arrange to tell a particular story in a fun, engaging way.