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Get Those Slides out of the Closet!

This is the first in a three part series on how to get those slides into a DVD player!

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Remember those boxes of old slides you stored away? Well it’s time to get them out and share them before those memories are lost forever. Recent changes in technology have made it easier and more cost effective than ever to get those slides out of the closet and make VCDs or DVDs of your slides and provide copies for the whole family.

First: Do No Harm
This part of the hippocratic oath applies to the handling of slides as well as the practice of medicine.

Be careful while handling the slides.  You don’t want to touch the film surface with your fingers - this will leave an oily residue that may show up on the scans.  A lot of professionals (the author included) wear white cotton gloves while handling slides. If you will be numbering the slides, take care not to write on the film surface by accident!

It’s important the the slides all be in the same orientation with the screen or emulsion side facing the same way.  This will save time later so you may as well make sure you do this at the same time as you are sorting and grouping.

How to Group the Slides
The first thing is to decide how to organize the slides the way you want them to be viewed. There are two basic ways to do this: thematically or chronologically. (You can also mix and match these two basic methods.) No matter which method you choose, you will still likely want to group your slides into batches just to make the images easier to find later.  An example of a chronological batch would be: "1963 Familiy Slides."  A thematic batch might be: "European Vacations."

How to Sequence the Slides
Once you know the groupings you want, decide if you can live with a few slides being out of sequence.  If so, once the group is in the order you would like, label one end "START" and the other end "FINISH."  If you can't live with the thought of your slides being out of sequence at all, then you should number each slide individually (including the group number) for example: G000N the "G" would be the group number and the "N" would be the slide number.  Use a fine felt tip permanent marker.

A third alternative is to wait until the slides have been scanned and then sort and organize them electronically.  This has advantages and disadvantages.  You will have to decide which is best for you.

Advantage of Sorting Later

• Easier to see what is on the slides.
• Less handling and less opportunity for damaging the slides (fingerprints, writing on them). This makes it very simple to accidentally undo a lot of your hard work sorting the slides.
• You have complete control over the conversion to DVD or VCD.

Disadvantage of Sorting Later

• File names will not reflect any grouping this makes it easier to misplace the slide in your file folders on your computer.
• Hard to keep in order, lots of operating systems and other software will try and sort your files by file name or create date.
• You cannot have someone else do the whole job for you.

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Brian Simard is a Soldier in the Salvation Army who owns a scanning and conversion business in Ottawa, Ontario. He provides discounts for Christian organizations and current or former missionaries.
Click here to visit his website: Memory Lane Media.

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