If you have been photographing for years, you likely have many photos that are not in digital format. Whether you have negatives or actual images, these photos have a limited life span. The only true way to preserve a photograph is to have it digitized. A CD is going to last much longer than a photo that can fade and lose color contrast with time. If you need to turn convert photos to digital formats, you have two basic options.

Scanning Them at Home

The most obvious option to get a digital copy of your image is to scan it at home using convert photo digital equipment. A flatbed scanner and the right scanning software can make a digital copy of a print fairly easily. This copy can then be transferred to a CD or memory card.

One downside of this option is the fact that you will lose image quality. The flatbed scanner that you have at home simply is not capable of producing high resolution scans. The image will likely look great on screen and might even print well at a 4 by 6 size or smaller, but if you need to enlarge the image at some point, you will notice a loss in quality. Also, unless you have specialized equipment, you will not be able to use a home scanner to scan negatives.

Another downside to scanning your photographs yourself is that it takes a tremendous amount of time. If you have hundreds of pictures, you will spend weeks scanning each one individually. This option really only works well if you have just a few pictures.

Having Someone Else Scan Them

Since scanning a picture is the only way to turn it into a digital file, but scanning it at home is not the best option, a better option is to have someone else scan your photo collection for you. You can hire an outside company that has a high-resolution scanner designed for this use and have them scan the photographs or negatives and convert them into a digital format. There is a cost involved in this, but when you consider the amount of time you would invest in scanning them yourself, having them scanned becomes more cost effective.

Not only that, but the companies that offer convert photo digital services have high resolution scanning equipment that produces a clean, sharp replica of the image you have. Some systems even allow for color correction if the image has faded with time. The file you receive when you have your images professionally scanned is a high quality image file that you can enlarge, post online, or otherwise use without any concerns for the quality of the image. Also, by doing this you can scan directly from the negative, if you have it, producing an image that is even closer to the quality of the original image, since negatives do not fade as quickly as printed pictures.

If you have printed pictures or negatives that you need converted to a digital format, you have two basic options. Because of the limitations of doing it yourself, hiring a professional scanning lab to do it for you is the best option. Be sure the lab will give you a finished product in the format you need, and get started converting those old pictures to a modern digital format.