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Digital photography & design software: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help
- 12/19/08 10:08 AM
Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help
by Lee Koo (ADMIN) - 12/19/08 10:08 AM
Question:
I want to buy a digital photo frame for my mom. My dad passed away three years ago and she misses him terribly, so I want to fill a digital frame with many of the wonderful photos they took during their nearly 70 years together as they traveled all over the world. The problem is none of the photos was shot with a digital camera. I will need to scan, crop, and clean up traditional photos and upload them, something that seems, according to most online reviews, to send digital frames into paralysis. I have a good scanner and am reasonably adept at Photoshop. I'm willing to spend whatever it takes to get a digital frame that won't get cramps when it's filled with Photoshopped pictures. Any ideas? Recommendations?
I'd really like to give my mom the benefit of the latest technology rather than make traditional enlargements and put them into a collage in a standard frame to hang on the wall. I want her to be able to hold the frame in her lap and enjoy the memories as the photos scroll by. Can you help? Which frames should I consider? How should I save the photos to maximize compatibility?
--Submitted by Barbara C.
Here are some featured member answers to get you started, but
please read up on all the advice and suggestions that our
members have contributed to this member's question.
Saving for digital frame in Photoshop --Submitted by dbrad
http://forums.cnet.com/5208-7809_102-0.html?forumID=75&threadID=320105&messageID=2929031#2929031
Digital photo frame... --Submitted by Watzman
http://forums.cnet.com/5208-7809_102-0.html?forumID=75&threadID=320105&messageID=2926935#2926935
Digital Picture Frame Considerations --Submitted by Roger Deal
http://forums.cnet.com/5208-7809_102-0.html?forumID=75&threadID=320105&messageID=2927643#2927643
If you have any addition solution or recommendation for Barbara, please click on the reply link and submit your answer for her. Please be as detailed as possible in your submission. Thanks!
Digital photo frame .....
by Watzman - 12/12/08 7:13 PM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Your question raises two separate issues, those being the frame itself and, in your case, conversion of the images from traditional photography (prints, slides and/or negatives) to digital images. As an aside, I'd add that it is WAY too late to be doing this as a gift for this Christmas, at least one that will be completed.
Lets discuss the frame first.
First comment, I'd simply rule out, out of hand, any frame that has a "widescreen shape". I can't understand where the manufacturer's heads are at on this issue (well, I kind of do know where ....) but photographs simply are not taken in "widescreen" mode.
Second, I'd go for a fairly large frame, 8" (absolute minimum, and preferably 10" ... as a MINIMUM) to 15". A 15" frame will cost $200 to $250, so size definitely gets pricy.
Not all frames are created equal, by a longshot. Some of them are, well, just plain crappy. Issues include viewing angle (some are TERRIBLE), contrast/brightness/color rendition, how the frame deals with images that don't fit the screen (God help you if it "stretches" ("distorts" would be a better word) images to force a fit), how the frame deals with portrait vs. landscape orientation, etc. Features are big factor ... some frames will play videos with sound, or music to accompany a slide show. Some frames come with a remote control. Some frames have internal memory only, some have no internal memory and use card slots for everything, and some have both internal memory and card slots. Some frames have other functions, like "clock", for example.
I don't want to recommend specific brands or models, but the best way to evaluate a frame is to take your own memory card in and see how your pictures look on the frame. But this isn't always possible or permitted.
Other factors include the type, size and weight of the power supply, the thickness of the frame, it's aesthetics, etc. Again, you have to do some evaluation of frames, because, as I said at the outset, they are NOT all created equal.
Now, as to the photos:
First, If you have the original film (negatives or slides), the conversion should ideally be done from those rather than from prints. There are two options there, doing it yourself or having it done. This subject has been discussed before on this web site, and I would refer you back to finding those. When a large number of photos are involved, there is no way to do this that is cheap, fast and low-risk (the "risk" here is sending your photot to a service that sends them to some 3rd world country for processing and they are never seen or heard from again .... it happens). If you do it yourself, you will spend hundreds to possibly over a thousand dollars on equipment that can do it well, and probably hundreds of hours doing the scans. If you have it done you will spend anywere from 15-cents to $1.49 per image, the media will be out of your posession for weeks (sometimes months), there is risk of loss, and the quality may or may not be good. Just one note, if you are doing it yourself, the only equipment that really does this (scanning film) well are film scanners made by Nikon and also some Epson flatbed scanners. Lots of other scanners (most of them, probably) can, nominally scan film, but none of them do a job comparable to the Nikon and Epson products. But all of these solutions are $300 to over $1,000 for the hardware.
If you are going to work from actual print photographs, most good scanners can do this, the quality varies with the quality of the scanner and, to be honest about it, very few people really know how to use a scanner .... how to use things like histograms to set things like brightness, contrast and gamma to really get the best quality out of an image (this applies to all scanners including film scanners). Also, it's not fast ... if you do this well, it's going to take at least a couple (and probably an average of 5) minutes per image. That doesn't sound like much if you only have a few to do, but if you have thosands of images (and just 50 rolls of film turns into thousands of images), it becomes a big deal.
One point also worth mentioning is that if you are doing this only for the digital photo frame, you really are after, surprisingly, a low-resolution image. Most rectangular frames are 800x600 or 1024x768, and both of those resolutions are well under one megapixel. But if you are doing it as part of a general archiving of your family photos, then you want to create 6 to 10 megapixel images of the entire film image, which will also not be the same shape as the photo frame. What I did in a situation similar to yours was take the archived high resolution images and "resample" an 800x600 "crop" from the 6 to 10 megapixel image. These cropped images "fit" the frame perfectly (e.g. the photo was now exactly the same shape as the digital photo frame), and it also took up relatively little storage (30 of the full size images would have filled the frame's internal memory, but by doing this the frame would hold over 1,000 images in the same memory). But, again, it was a lot of work.
If you are going to use a service for scanning film, the one I would probably recommend is scancafe. I don't have a specific recommendation on print scanning services. Ideally I'd get the image conversions done first so that you can put the digital images on a card that you use to test frames that you are looking at, but at this point that all but rules out having this in time for this Christmas.
not entirely true...
by porsche10x - 12/20/08 8:22 AM In reply to: Digital photo frame ..... by WatzmanVery informative and well-thought-out post! I would take issue with two things, however. First, regarding the risk of loss by sending out your pictures or film to someone else for scanning. Yes, the risk is real, but you take the same risk when you get your film developed in the first place, don't you? Of course, you usually only send out one or a few rolls at a time. You would be risking your entire picture collection at once if you send them all out for scanning. I suggest you inquire about how your stuff is handled before you send it anywhere. I'm sure you can find a respectable local processor that will do it "in-house" with lower risk of loss (and probably pay more, just like you would for premium developing).
Next, regarding widescreen frames, it's perfectly understandable why widescreen frames are available. People DO take widescreen photographs. Remember, the original question is about scanning non-digital pictures. This means ALL of her pictures are widescreen. A 4x6 or 3x5 picture has almost the same aspect ratio as a 16x9 frame. Some frames are available with a 16x10 aspect ratio, even better. So, for the most accurate rendition with a minimum of cropping of scanned photographs or film, not only is using a widescreen frame understandable, it is REQUIRED. By the way, while most point-and-shoot digital cameras have a 4x3 aspect ratio for better display on a computer monitor (before the advent of widescreen monitors), the more expensive digital SLRs all have native 3x2, which is, you guessed it, widescreen. Even if you take 4x3 digital pictures, when you get them printed at a store, they come back cropped, usually to 4x6, so nearly ALL photographs end up widescreen.
Also note, with a widescreen frame, the picture quality is better when the picture size doesn't match. For example, if you show an 800x480 picture on a 640x480 frame, and you don't want to crop, you end up with black bars on top and bottom, like letterbox on your TV. You also lose resolution; as the picture is compressed to fit, you lose lines. On the other hand, if you show a 640x480 picture on an 800x480 widescreen frame, you do get black bars on the side instead, but there's no compression and no loss in image quality.
If you take panoramic pictures, then it's even more important to use a widescreen frame for best image quality.
Digital Photo Frames
by thesilvercygnet - 12/12/08 7:39 PM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Make a great gift. I would look for one that reads a standard memory card such as a SD card. I would save photos from my computer to the SD Card and insert it into the digital photo frame for the gift recipient. I would then make updates to the photos stored on the memory card. That way the gift receipient can enjoy the photos without having to do the technical duties.
Great Digital Frame - Also with MMS
by dgmiter - 12/20/08 9:47 PM In reply to: Digital Photo Frames by thesilvercygnetI agree that having a frame with the SD option is great, but there is one frame out there that is even better. It adds USB and the ability to send pictures to the frame via MMS. So the concept is you give this frame to a relative and when you take a picture from your cell phone you can send it as a Multi Media Message to the frame. The other option is to send it via email to the frame. Its currently available from T-Mobile and its called the Cameo Frame. You do have to sign up for a T-Mobile account with a data plan, but the rates are cheaper than regular cell account.
Here is the link to the information about it on T-Mobile's website.
http://search.t-mobile.com/inquiraapp/ui.jsp?ui_mode=question&question_box=cameo
Good Luck!
Memory Card
by x4stjohn4x - 12/12/08 8:07 PM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Most cameras have a small memory card about 1 gig in size. I don't know too much about digital frames, but my family just got one. I know that the one we have can read that memory card just like a flash drive. It is great and easy. You just put all the pictures you want onto a card like this and sync it up.
Here is a link to an image of the card I am talking about.
http://www.letsgodigital.org/images/producten/1501/testrapport/nikon-coolpix-p5000_5A.jpg
Get One With a Battery
by retexan599 - 12/12/08 8:16 PM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
The disadvantage of many digital photo frames (to me) is that most need to be plugged in to an electrical outlet to operate. I bought the Philips 7FFIM4 which is the only brand (to my knowledge) that has a rechargeable battery. With the battery I can use the viewer for about one hour continuously before it needs recharging. This lets me use it in settings where it is not possible or inconvenient to have to find an electrical receptacle. Of course it will work continuously plugged in. Displays from either an inserted memory card or from internal memory to which you have downloaded photos. Reasonably priced from Amazon.
Saving great memories to a digital photo frame
by susrexrode - 12/12/08 8:16 PM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I bought my husband a digital frame Last year for Christmas it was one that consumer reports said was good. It was a Smart Parts frame. It had software with it that you could scan your pictures to your computer then drag and drop to a sd/mmc/ms/xd or cf(compactflash) cards. I've also, this christmas picked out pictures through the years of the kids at Christmas and put them on a usb flashdrive. All I did was scan the pictures and draged and droped and they came out the size needed for the fram of course none of the pictures were over the regular size you get at the store and some were smaller but they all turned out good on the frame.
Scan, Fix and Resize
by RandiS - 12/12/08 8:17 PM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Well, you certainly have your work cut out for you, scanning a large number of either prints, slides or negatives. But since you indicate that you're pretty comfortable with Photoshop, let me point out that you should be able to do all this and save the 'masters' as TIFF or PSD files. Then, set your crop options to correspond to the size of the digital frame (many seem to be 800x600 pixels, for example), and crop the photo to that size, make sure it's flattened, perhaps change the profile to sRGB (if you're not using that as your default profile) and save it as a JPEG. Those jpeg files should be acceptable to any digital frame, and since you've already cropped them to the correct size, the digital frame won't have to do it for you.
As to which frame to get .. well, I've been trying to determine that myself. I'm leaning to the Viewsonic models, since I've read that their color rendition is excellent. But I also read that their controls are rudimentary. That may be just fine for what you want.
Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help
by oobe2u - 12/12/08 8:28 PM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
You don't need the photos to be particularly hi res for the photo frame, for them to look good. Experiment with a few until you get the right combination of image quality and file size and you should be able to put a great collection together that will perform very well, especially with a quality photo frame. Save them as progessive jpegs.
I used to use a Photoshop plug in called ProJpeg (I think), that produced excellent results very easily and impressively small file sizes. I'm sure there are others that work as well. At that time Photoshop didn't perform as well as it does today on shrinking file size while maintaining image quality.
I have a middle of the road scanner (an Epson Perfection 1670) which is several years old but produces good results for the type of work you want it to do.
Good luck - and on behalf of your Mom, thanks for being a great kid.
photo frame photo card
by itchybutt - 12/12/08 8:51 PM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
load them on a picture card which most frames accept
Start With Clean Photographs and Clean Scanner!
by DeistDennis - 12/12/08 10:25 PM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
I’ve never owned a digital photo frame, but I do know a rule of thumb is to never buy one with resolution less than 640 x 480 pixels, regardless of price. And I know many models are out there that store the images on a digital camera memory card and my HP desktop has slots for 9 different brands of memory cards (as do some digital photo frames) so finding one compatible with your camera and/or computer is the first step.
I do know a bit more about scanning old photos and cropping and cleaning them up in Photoshop. I don’t see where Photoshopping images would “send digital frames into paralysis” because once they are stored on the memory card, they are just images. Just like images that have not been Photoshopped. It’s getting the photos to the Photoshop that’s your biggest challenge in the chore of scanning your photographs.
Because you always seem to pick up “trash” when scanning photographs, the first thing you’ll want to do is make sure the glass of your scanner is thoroughly cleaned with a glass cleaner and soft cotton cloth (never paper!) And your photographs should be gently wiped clean with a lint free anti-static cloth, like the ones used to clean lenses. A final wiping of the scanners glass with the cloth is also a good idea as to keep your photographs from wanting to “float” away on the glass from static.
You’ll probably still have to clean them up but taking your time in Photoshop and working the various enhancements, you can often do wonders in improving the color, contrast, etc. of a photograph and repair physical damage from the orginal. And you’ll want to resize the images to a size no larger than your photo frame will allow before saving them to the memory card, that way you will save space on your card. And you should be able to hold lots of images on even a simple memory card.
So shop around for model with decent resolution, a compatible memory device and battery power capability so your mother can cherish her memories on the wall, in her lap and most of all, in her heart for years to come.
Been There, Done That, Exactly
by Janice H - 12/12/08 10:50 PM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Hi Barbara,
Let me start off by saying, I am so sorry about the loss of your father. In April of 2007, we lost our daughter who had turned 21 just 3 days prior. I have done what you are contemplating doing. As a rule I put together the slide shows for weddings and funerals (and whatever else) at church. As you can imagine, 99.99% of all the photos have been actual photos, not digital. Yes, I have spent many hours at the scanner, scanning them in, touching them up (cracks, spots, age...)and putting them together with transitions.
Naturally, my baby's pictures for her funeral were scanned by someone else--so I have had to do some touch ups to them to make them as perfect as I am able to do. I am a perfectionist for everyone else, why not my own child? Anyway, I bought a Smartparts 7" frame and card to put the pix on for display at my new job. I quickly figured out that with a digital pic it can probably tell it is the wrong orientation for how you have the frame sitting....most of my pix are landscape (horizontal), so as I was saving them to the card, I changed them myself. I have not noticed any freeze ups from my frame. I did notice that until I told it to keep rotating that it would stop and only restart when movement hit it.
I did all of this without benefit of photoshop--I used whatever was available from the scanner install. I now have photoshop on my new computer and it is fun to work with. I use a Canon Scanner (my favorite) and arcsoft for cropping and touch ups. My biggest suggestion is to orientate your photos prior to loading on the card for the frame. I don't have the pix loaded on the frame, just on the card. Works fine that way on the Smartparts. I have thought about putting a frame together for my Mom and my In-laws of our daughter, but, then I don't have pix of the other grandchildren, that wouldn't be fair. My older sister lost her son in January of this year....my mother has lost 2 grandchildren within 9 months of each other. Any siblings you have may want a copy of the slide show as well.
Digital photo frame
by Fatboy71 - 12/13/08 12:05 AM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
Sorry to hear about your father.
You will have probably already thought of this but why not just keep things simple and put the collection of photographs in a nice photo album for your mom?
This would be a lovely gift maybe for your mom as well?
I know a few people who have digital photo frames and all of them complain about them, pictures stop or stick when scrolling, not very good picture quality for the price they paid, and they were not cheap ones I will add.
I think there is nothing has nice has having precious photographs in an album and looking through them, at least when they are in an album you have a hard copy of them!
I do a bit of digital photography, but I still get my pictures that I wouldn't want to lose printed out, I do not trust memory cards or optical media has a reliable backup media.
i don't have a definitive answer, just suggestions
by chriss03 - 12/13/08 5:04 AM In reply to: Saving great memories to a digital photo frame --need help by Lee Koo (ADMIN)
My mom was going from NJ to see a childhood friend in CA. I thought of the same idea. Instead of a photograph album, why not use a digital picture frame? OK. Here is what I found out.
Make sure it runs on batteries as well as AC. When I was looking for the frame, I found only one that used batteries. It was from Sears. And, believe me I looked everywhere in NJ! Obviously, if does not run on batteries, you really can't use as a photograph album and there is the necessity of plugging in the AC cord.
A micro-memory chip slot. This allows you to expand the capacity of the frame. Also, depending on the number of pictures, you could group pictures and store each group on a separate memory chip.
Along with the memory chips, make sure you have a multiport Card Reader for your system; either installed already or an external one. If not, they are relatively inexpensive; around $20.00.
Other options could include a USB port, remote control, and video capabilities. These are nice have.
My mom was extremely pleased with her gift. And it enabled her to share many family memories with her friend. Good luck.
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