Digitizing photos

[J Wall]

I am thinking of digitizing some of my family photos from the 19th and early 20th centuries. Some of them are in excellent condition while others are stuck to their glass plates or seem to be fading badly. Ideally, I would like to be able to have digital images of the photos which would allow me to identify the people in the images and sent to other family members.

My father believes that we should be able to use our flatbed scanner to scan the photos which appear to be fine, but I am afraid this might speed up bleaching the photos. What do you all suggest?

For the photos which are fading, bent, etc. I am thinking of turning on several photo-shoot quality lamps and snapping several photos of each hoping that at least one will be "good enough."

As a note, personally I am not not inclined to remove them the ones that are stuck to their glass from behind the glass. I guess that's a bit of a fear of mine.

Thanks for any hits, tips and suggestions.
-John

[old rowley]

Why not use natural light rather than photo- shoot lights? I was told many years ago by a press photographer that when attempting to take a new image of an old photograph to lay the said photograph flat on a surface in doors next to an uncovered window to let as much natural light in on to it or to take it outside and either lay it flat or prop/stand it up to get a new image of it there. I have done this, where possible, when wanting to take copies of oversized family photographs and it can, and does, work, albeit with a bit of patience and trail and error but after a while you can get used to doing it with good results. If you are going to try this method I would suggest that you try it out with an image that you have to hand and which is not that important to you first just to see if it "feels right" and that the end result is what you are after.

OR.