Ready, Set, Scrap

Club Scrap Artifacts digital kit, using quick drop page.

Hey, y'all. I promised what seems like a lifetime ago to get working on my tips for scrapbooking your heritage photos. Instead I went off and played with glass and paper and genealogy and left my friends to figure out what I meant by my 5 steps.

The first step is easy to describe, but may be daunting to do. That step is

SCAN, Scan, scan

 

Get a quality flatbed scanner and start scanning your old photos. Practice first, though, and get to know how your scanner works and how to work with the images. Learn about descreen for newspaper photos. Know how big your scanned files will be. There are plenty of web resources on how to scan. The important thing is to do it.

If you don't have a scanner and need to buy one, first think about how you will use it. Does it need to tag along on the plane to family reunions? Do you have slides or negatives to scan? My grandmother was a professional photographer in Kingman, AZ, in the 1930s, so I had to buy a scanner that was capable of backlighting and scanning very large negatives. I also needed a small one for travel. It's embarrassing to admit, but I have 6 scanners and not every image is scanned yet. Some of my early scans are also not up to my current standards, but at least I have them. As we say in scrapbooking, sometimes done is done.

The best practice is to scan any heritage photo before you scrapbook it. Ah-ha. Next question.

 What's a heritage photo?

Only you can decide. My personal definition is any photo that is black and white, or taken before about 1960. In general, it needs to have a person in it. A landscape photo or a unique photo taken after 1960 may also qualify. You decide what fits for you.

Club Scrap Bridges paper kit

On the left of this layout is a heritage photo with no one in it -- a view of Hoover Dam while it was being built.