And a WOYWW picture from my sweet Sissy Dunnit - oooh and ahh; digital and everyday sewing, digital and drawn fabric designing and california sunshine - all in one photo. I tell you, whatever day of the week, this WOYW is just the biz for me, am so enjoying the legitimate scrutiny!!I visited Eadaoin's blog earlier, I was going to leave a facetious comment about muffins, but her current post made me think a bit harder, because of course, it ended with the immortal words 'what do you think?' so I told her. And then I thought, dear interweb, that you may like to know what I think too. I'm absolutely sure you have an opinion, even more sure that anyone with an ounce of computer skill and a good scanner will have a very firm opinion! See, this lovely gal has been lucky enough to find a shed load of black and white photos in the attic which will tell hundreds of stories. Most exciting and inspiring for sure; the possibilities almost motivate me! However, Eadaoin thinks that she should copy the photos for scrapping and 'keep the originals safe'. I don't. I think she should avoid cropping them at all costs, wherever they are annotated on the reverse she should copy/scan that, and then do the scrapbooker's thing with the originals. I don't think they could be stored anywhere safer than an acid free album; the invitation to enjoy the pictures and their stories is implied by them being in an album. Safely storing them in an attic (however carefully archived) sort of belies the reason the photos were taken in the first place. In my opinion. Of course, I'm the first to admit that my massive collection of photos will not entirely end up in albums -I'm selective about the ones I scrap because of the quality, story or blahdy blah, and of course, I like to talk about doing this stuff much more than I actually do this stuff - I will always have archive photos to go in the attic for sure. But they won't be originals that are faithfully reproduced in albums. No ma'am, they will be the ones that don't tell the story but I don't want to throw away. Like the fifteen pictures of sheep that Miss Dunnit took from too far away and in less than ideal conditions. Some of them have told the story in an album, the rest are in my 21st century shoebox (the hard disk, actually).
So how do you do it? Forget about the digital luxury - what would you do in Eadaion's position? Lordy, I can hear some of you clapping your hands with glee at the scrapping opportunity this would offer. Grab one of those fresh muffins and a cuppa and let us know. The floor - or rather the worktable - is yours. (Blogger allowing. I think the bugs have gone..if you see a late comment from me, you'll know I've been allowed back into the ether!!)
i do think you are right that the safest place to store these precious pics is in an album, uncropped and in an acid free environment. I have no original copies of old photos, my parents and aunts and uncles have all the originals, so i have scrapped copies. The big advantage to using a copy is that you can reproduce it in a different size.No doubt, one day i will get some of the orignals (not for a while i hope)... then i'll need to make that decision. Maybe i'll do what i do now with the bits of memorabelia (sp??), and that is to store them behind any pages i have made within the page protector, safe and sound.
ReplyDeleteI have to say I have always scanned and scrapped the copies. this way saving the orignals and notes/dates/names writen on the back. they are as ever stored in an old shoe box in the back of the cupboard waiting for the next generation to "discover" and look through in years to come.
ReplyDeleteAn original scrapper here too I am afraid. I do scan them when I get them, but this is really for my own benefit, sometimes I use copies, for mini books, or second LO's, but the "main" LO's are always done with the originals.
ReplyDeleteInteresting question. I have used originals of my own photos - but do they count as originals anymore as I store them on my 'puter? I answered Eadaoin's question by saying I would take scans personally but only so that I then have the option to do more than one page of the same photo (if that makes sense?)
ReplyDeleteI have yet to use original 'old' photos, I do have some of my Mum but haven't used any yet - this is mainly because they are put away for now because I still find it hard to look at them. I will have to decide on that one in the future - probably would scan, again so I could use the picture more than once.
I am the inheritee (is that such a word?) of several shoeboxes of photos dating back to the 30's. I would say fire up the scanner and get scanning.
ReplyDeleteI use copies as much because I like to resize/crop/recolour/reuse photos as because I want to preserve my originals.
I think I read a comment on Eadaoin's blog about keeping the shoeboxes for another generation to find, and I think thats such a nice idea. I remember how excited I was to find mine.
:-)
Oh... California Sunshine. Sigh.
ReplyDeleteInteresting question about the photographs. The first thing I ever scrapped were original family photos from the 40s and 50s. Then I felt terrible upon learning the "received wisdom" that I was supposed to have used copies. I recently re-did that album, and have scanned the photos so that they are "safe" on the hard drive, but I did use the originals, along with some copies. I guess I felt that they weren't really "mine" to stick down. My photos though (anything that I feel really belongs to me) - are all originals. I agree that they are probably safer in my albums than they were in the horrid old box, thrown in, kept in the loft. I am fanatical though about backing up photos - they are all on the laptop, and I periodically copy everything to hard drive. I also have a flickr account which gets everything uploaded about once a month, just as a backup backup. I would HATE to lose my photos!
I have really mixed feeling about this subject ... I have to say that most post 1940's used, are originals(scanned first) and the earlier ones used, are copies.
ReplyDeleteI like to feel free to resize and crop to suit the LO. Although I do agree that the safest place for the originals is in the acid free environment, I have to agree also with Ladybug,re 'Discovery' for future generations.
Talking about safest ..... a while back, a glass of coke was knocked over and ended up seeping into a full scrapbook. About six of the LO's, including photos, were ruined but luckily they were quite recent pics of a friends children and there were many others in the comp that could be used in their place BUT what if it had been heritage picture?
Yes I would have the scanned back-ups but the actual photo with information scribbled on the back ... or photographers details printed on them, would have been lost for ever.
Wow! What a mention! *Thanks!*
ReplyDeleteAll the advice above here will certainly be taken into account, really appreciate it!
Great blog too, looking forward to following it! :)xo
I have no problem answering this - I would never, ever, use an original old (pre-digital) photograph on any piece of work I do - always a copy. What would I feel like if anything happened to it? I have all my digital photographs copied in several place and in the process of scanning all the old photos, also copied and saved. I have a lovely stamp that says "A memory is a photograph taken by the heart" and I truly believe that. BUT - that memory may exactly be that - MY memory, I want my children and (being careful what I wish for!) my grandchildren to "see" that memory too. Plus, having 2 children, they can have a copy of all the family photographs each and take as many copies as they like. It's not so much the original itself for me, but the loss of what's on it for ever.
ReplyDelete