old photos - what do you do?

[*sara*]

i have literally a few hundred photos from both sides of my family, dating from the early 1900's to the 1960's,  i have started scanning them but i really don't know what to do with them all, they are in boxes at the mo. 

should i put them all in albums?  this itself would be hard as there are so many different sizes.  should i scan them all and make a photo book?  can anyone tell me what they have done and if it has worked.  i need to write who/where and when they all are too so future generations know.  i have got most of the peoples names from parents and grandparents!

sara

[old rowley]

Hi Sara,

Like you I have a lot of photographs of family members taken over different decades which amount to many hundreds, more so now since I obtained a couple of digital camera's. Sometime ago I started to scan all the photographs into the computer that needed doing into different files to be placed on discs. I also have printed off copies of the ones that I feel are important  enough to warrant doing.

Having the photographs scanned and then saved onto discs means that I can copy from there instead of getting the original out each time I want one. All the originals I have placed in either photograph albums (where possible) with indivial sleeves for each photograph, or if too large for that they are stored in acid free covers and stored flat in storage boxes safe and away from any light.

The ones that I have printed out I have in A4 folders (again in plastic sleeves) and I use these for reference and it is these that I take with me when I visit members of the family, that way I do not mind if they are damaged or even mislaid/lost as I still have the originals safely tucked away.

Another thing that I have done is that when I have been given photographs by family members not only have I noted who it is in the photograph but also who I received it from (you never know when you might need another copy and over a period of time one tends to forget where the photographs were sourced from).

One other thing, and this should be common practice, don't forget to do back ups on your computer. Not only will you be saving your information and pictures should the worse happen to the computer but it will save you not only the trouble but the time in having to do them all over again.

old rowley

[*sara*]

i think that keeping the originals tucked away is a good idea!!  i have thought about printing a photobook of all the important ones.  it's just hard to organised so many.

i did have a computer failure once so i do now back up everything

[KathMc]

Another idea is to get the originals into a fireproof box if you can. Better safe than sorry. I hope you will eventually share some of the more interesting pictures with us. I love old pictures. and the people on the photo restoration boards can do some amazing things with some of the old photos.

Kath

[Jane Eden]

Hi

I too have many old photos from the 1950s to present day. Some are headless, footless etc but I still don't like throwing them away!

What acid free products are you using? I have had a quick look but all seems very expensive which is OK for the best but not for the hundreds of not so great snaps.

Maybe you are just so muchmore organised than me. I have great ambitions for the winter to get everything organised but family trees seem to have so many different paths it is hard to know what to concentrate on.

What is a fireproof box? I also have photos from 1890s etc. Where do I get one from? Are there places to store photos on remote servers so that they are safe? What happens when the technology/format changes? Can you imagine if you had everything on betamax video now days? and that is only 20 or so years ago.

Instead of answering your questions I am just asking more!

Jane

[KathMc]

A fire safe box is a metal lock box kind of thing. You can buy them at most Target type stores. One is also supposed to keep their valuable papers in them (deeds, passports, birth and marriage certs -- yours, not your dead relatives  , etc). I have not gotten off my duff and gotten one, so maybe this will motivate me to do it.

Kath

[PrueM]

Hi folks 

Have a look at the links on this topic and see if they are helpful:
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,66915.0.html

Basically, if you are serious about keeping your photos safe, you should store them in archival albums or boxes that have passed the PAT (Photographic Activity Test).  Just because something is called "acid free" doesn't mean that it is archival!  It only means that the product was not acidic when it left the factory!

There are plenty of cheap ways to store your old photos if you are not particularly fussed about presentation.  I used albums from an Australian company called Albox, into which I can put plastic sleeves of various pocket configurations to fit all sorts of different sized photos. 

One more thing, I wouldn't put my faith in a fire-safe box...I have seen the results of photos stored in so-called fire-safe boxes and safes, and it's not pretty...while they protect the contents from the flames, they act like an oven and cook the contents instead 

If you would like any more info just ask 

Prue

[Woodentop50]

I thought I would add a bit.   

If you are backing up your photos and data to a cd or dvd , also do an extra copy and put it 'off-site' , at a relations house or some other location.
Also , for long term , don't forget to re-do them , the discs can deteriorate over time and storage media changes over the years.

You don't get many pc's now with floppy drives ! So think about cd's in ten years time   

                                                                                                                  Jim

[*sara*]

it is so difficult to know what to do, and the thought of losing it all one way or another is awful.  i think the idea of digitising and making multiple copies kept at diffferent locations is a good idea, and also to remake them evry couple of years - my job for the winter then!

thanx everyone for your views!