Taking photos is the best way to remember a trip for years. Just by looking at a picture it can help you remember so much more than what is captured in that single shot. It can help you remember little things such as how the weather was that day, where the picture was taken, what you did that day before and after the picture was taken, why you choose to take this picture or it can even spark your memory about anything else that happened during that trip.

Just from looking at this one photo from a year ago so many memories go through my mind.  I spent two weeks in Hawaii for a study abroad program through my university. This photo was taken that last night of my trip in Kauai.  From looking at this picture I can remember how beautiful of a day it was. The sun was shining all day and temperature was perfect. This picture was taken right around sunset. You can tell this just from looking at the picture because the sun is going behind the clouds and is getting lower.

Looking at this picture it reminds me of that evening when my classmates and I walked down the road from our condo to these lava rocks. We walked on to the lava rocks to throw a lei into the ocean; it is a traditional way to say goodbye to the islands. I remember exactly how I was feeling- I was sad because we were leaving and I was happy because it helped me reflect on all the good times throughout the trip.

Before this picture I remember how hard we were working on our final presentation. Walking down to the lava rocks helped me relax before we had to present. We took a moment of silence to reflect on our trip and I can still remember the sound of the waves crashing against the lava rocks.

This picture gives me a visual memory of my trip that I will have forever. Every time I look at this picture it takes me back to the day that I took it. Behind just this one picture there are many memories, imagine a whole photo album!

 
When we started ScanDigital more than two years ago, part of our fundamental purpose was to not only provide an easy, user-friendly way to have analog materials converted to digital, but also to provide tools to enhance our customers memory keeping experiences and abilities.  We have worked hard to create a wonderful customer experience and I am pleased to extend that even further today with the release of our Canvas Print Console.
 
When we decided to offer canvas prints, I knew that the only way to do this would be to place our brand and name alongside someone who is known for a comparable level of detail and quality.  I spoke with a number of potential canvas print partners before ultimately settling with Harvest Productions.  After looking at numerous sample canvases from a spectrum of sources, I can honestly say that Harvest is the hands down leader in the canvas print industry.

Check out the video below that gives insight into the Harvest process: 

Harvest Productions has traditionally serviced the fine art market by working with world-renowned artists and publishers to reproduce their art in a way that sets them apart from their competitors. As Harvest has begun to branch out into the Commercial and Décor printing markets they have found that these markets share many of the same requirements as the fine art market. And now, due to developments precipitated by the incredible demands of fine art market, ScanDigital is in a unique position to bring Harvest’s technology and quality to the consumer market.
 
Now, I know what you’re thinking…  I admit I was skeptical too and thought to myself: “This sounds great, but it must cost a fortune!”  But that is not the case.  Through a 50,000 square foot facility, Harvest has optimized its workflow, leveraging expertise, capacity, material sourcing, and volume discounts to offer a superior product at a competitive price.  Amazing, really. (For more insights into how they do this, please see the video below)
 
How can this extra quality be free?  Using Iris, Roland, Mimaki, flatbed UV and Vutek technologies, Harvest delivers the highest quality on demand printing available anywhere. The unparalleled quality of the products produced by Harvest Productions is achieved by strict adherence to the their quality standards throughout the digital reproduction process. From image capture to artistic enhancements, no detail is overlooked nor flaw accepted.
 

Creating the ability for our customers to take a photo from its newly digitized form into a physical product and then have that product in their hands in a matter of days, not weeks was also important.  With that in mind we’ve built an incredibly easy system. Simply log into your account, select a photo or series of photos and check out within a couple of minutes. About a week later, an incredible canvas print will arrive at your door.
 
I am truly excited about this product offering and I hope you’ll take advantage of the opportunity to create something new for your home or office from something old.  We continue to be proud of the service and products we offer and this latest integration with Harvest Productions is yet another extension of our core philosophies.
 
Please check out our new console.  As always, our friendly customer service representatives are standing by to help should you need any help.

Hi, I’m Kiley. One of the many hats I wear at work is that of the inventory/check-in person. I’m actually the first person to see your cherished memories when they arrive here. Thousands of ScanDigital orders arrive at our facility in El Segundo, California each year and it’s my job to make sure everything in these boxes are inventoried and accounted for. See below for a detailed peek into our check-in process.

First, check out the video of me checking in an order here:

Step 1- UPS delivers your order to our facility.

Before we get to the actual inventory process, let me explain our shipping process. It starts with our ScanDigital website, which is fully integrated with UPS. When you place your order, a UPS shipping label is generated. You can then print out and use the label when you’re ready to ship. This provides you with a tracking number for the package, which is also cataloged in our system to fully track your package while on route to our facility.

Step 2- Open each package and put in separate sealed containers.

Similarly, the first thing I do when packages arrive is to grab plenty of plastic containers. When I open a package, I instantly empty the contents into a separate container, which ensures each order is properly inventoried separately.

The packages we receive at ScanDigital come in different shapes and sizes. Whether it is a large box, a round tube, or a padded envelope, I always make sure to open it very carefully. I’ve seen photos get stuck in the corner of large manila envelopes and slides jammed under the box flap, so it’s very important to take great care in ensuring the materials remain unharmed and nothing is left behind. Also, if a customer has arranged their photos in a certain way, I am careful to keep that organization when lifting the entire package into the container.

Step 3- Put a name tag on the container for easy tracking.

Then, I put a name tag on the container, allowing for easier tracking within our facility. The name tag includes all the order information including the customer name, the order ID, the date received and the date due.

Once checked in, is trackable on our site. To view the current status of an order, customers can login to their ScanDigital account at anytime. Our EssentialTracker System allows you to see exactly what stage your order is in through all of our 13 steps including check-in, scanning, editing, finalizing, and shipping stages.

Step 4- Inventory the material in each package and enter information into our system.

Once I complete double-checking the box the materials arrived in, I begin the process of entering the order’s details in our system. First, I search by the customer’s last name on the box, or by the order ID provided in the order confirmation sheet included inside the package. Then I fill out the form with the exact count and format of the materials, as well as enter any additional instructions written by the customer. An accurate form is most important, as everyone from the scanners to the editors will use it as a reference while they work.

While customers don’t have to include notes or a set of instructions, they are welcome to in order to make sure we process the order exactly how the customer intended. While checking in each order, I also copy any specific instructions in our system to assure every request is noted.

Step 5- Print order details to include within the container.

The very last step of the process is to print out a hard copy of the form. This will be included in the container with the materials for the scanners to fill out and refer to. As soon as the container is properly inventoried and tagged, all that’s left is to deposit the container into the backroom, ready for the scanners to start work.

If you have any questions, you can contact me personally at 310.773.3970 or find me on Twitter at @KileySD. Hope you hear from you soon!

With Spring Cleaning season upon us, we asked friend Chantale Bordonaro for some tips on how to best organize your photos and home movies.  Chantale, Certified Professional Organizer, founder of Simplicity Source and LA’s Incoming Chapter President of the National Association of Professional Organizers knows her stuff – see what she suggests below.

But first, let me remind you about ScanDigital’s Spring Cleaning Special that gives you 15% off all orders placed before April 14^th. Let us help you organize your photos, slides, negatives and home movies effortlessly! Use the coupon code : SpringClean09

Easy Ways to Organize Your Photos and Home Movies

By Chantale Bordonaro

Organizing digital photos and movies can rapidly become a very daunting task if you are like many of my clients and just keep them on the memory card forever! Off course, you can click away and just purchase a new memory card once the first one is full…. But remember that the idea is to enjoy those memories and to share them, right?

Here are some easy tips on how to start organizing your digital special moments:

First Step:

1-   Temporary holding folder:

Every couple of weeks, download your memory card onto your computer in a temporary holding folder name “photos to sort “ on your desktop.  If you have time now, start picking your favorites. 

2-     Keep the best ones!

Eliminate the clutter; delete the ones too dark, the ones where mom is missing her smile; be tough just like you were when you delete the papers ones. Even though digital does not take as much space, you still want to control the flow.

3-     Rename your photos and movies:

Be descriptive and consistent!

4-     Tag your photos with key words (or names of people in them)

Second Step:

Initial purge done! Now you want to move the photos and videos to their permanent home in My Pictures.  But wait!  That’s where the system really becomes important for future retrieval.

1-     Create detailed subfolders:

The easiest way is to create subfolders under My Pictures.  Decide on the structure based on how you would usually look for them. Would you try to look by year, by event, by location, etc? For me, I like to create names like 2009-11 Luca 3^rd birthday party or 2009-01 New Year Celebrations

2-     Use numbers to replace actual month

Notice the number after the month? It makes it easier then actually writing January or November, as now the folders will actually be sorted chronologically.

3-     Moving time!

Once the folders are created, just moved the pictures or movies in the right one. Voila!

Couple more top tips:

1-     Use Tags to mark photos that will need some touch-ups (those can be done later)

2-     Don’t be afraid of using software to help you stay organize. You have plenty of free options out there from Adobe Photoshop Album, Picasa from Google, IPhoto, or IView.

3-     Archive, archive, active!

Burn CD or DVD of your photos and video once you downloaded them. Schedule weekly back-up of your files on an external hard-drive. Also, you can back up your photos online on websites such as ScanDigital.com.

With couple of easy steps, you will be able to go back down memory lane with only couple of keys to push and a lot less frustration! Who knows, next, you might even start creating albums online to share with friends and family!

I’ve been meaning to write this post for some time, but I wanted to share with everyone our experience from NYC at the end of October.  I spent a week in New York with Pamela Weiss our head of marketing/PR and Matt Stone our VP, Operations.  The original impetus for the trip was the PhotoPlus Expo trade show and then we extended the trip a bit to accomplish other meetings as well.

It was an exciting and fast paced trip, but we returned with new ideas, new customers and new connections.  We also had a ton of fun and enjoyed being in the city along the way.  Just an all around successful week.

We decided to take a red-eye in order to not lose a day with the West to East coast.  We had enjoyed a comfortable flight on the new VirginAmerica airline (I’d recommend giving them a try) and arrived in NYC’s JFK airport at 5:30 AM, grabbed our bags and headed off to our hotel.  After dropping off our bags, we went to the Javits Center to set up our booth for the show.  We completed set up by 8:30 AM and had about 3 hours to kill before we could access our hotel rooms.

Quick thinking, I decided we’d all go to my favorite breakfast spot from my NYC days, the Crooked Tree Creperie on St. Marks between 1st Avenue and Avenue A.  We arrived to learn they were closed which became a theme of the trip – three attempts, three strikes.

So we grabbed breakfast and a diner close by and headed back to the hotel.  Then we waited…and waited…and waited some more for our rooms to open up.

We were all pretty worn out, Matt and I decided to hang out in the lobby and Pamela decided to fight the drowsiness with caffeine.  Which resulted in a highly caffeinated Pamela snapping photos of an exhausted Matt and I in the lobby.  Here is some of her finer work:

Finally we checked in and settled in.  A great businessman once told me success is all about shoe leather, meaning you just have to get out and work those leather soles for revenues.  Matt and I agree, but only wanted to work the bottom leather if the top leather was looking great.  So we hit Grand Central Station for a shine:

With newly shined shoes, during the first evening in NYC, I had the pleasure of attending the Inc. Magazine reception for their 30 under 30 list, due to our July feature in their Start Up issue.  It was great to meet the Inc. team in person and I met so many great young entrepreneurs.

The next day we began the PhotoPlus Expo show.  Our booth turned out great and we had an opportunity to speak with a meet many existing customers and reach so many potential customers.  We always gain so much be being on the tradeshow floor speaking directly with our customers.  Running an online business, it is so easy to be trapped behind the computer, but so important to be out greeting customers and talking about our business.  The show lasted three days and was well attended.

Here is a great shot of our booth:

After our first day at the show, I wanted Matt and Pamela to experience Duke’s – a terrific BBQ restaurant on the east side.  It was a staple of my diet for more than two years in NYC and I was thrilled to return.  Matt didn’t hold back ordering their Sampler Platter, which basically was five kinds of meat on one plate.  Sides were served on a second plate and everything is washed down with the house beer – Pabst Blue Ribbon (which is elegantly served in a bucket).  This photo says it all:

After three days on our feet, we celebrated another successful ScanDigital tradeshow at my favorite restaurant – Blue Water Grill:

Pamela and I stayed in NYC for two more days after the show to meet with members of the press and tell the ScanDigital story.  The highlight for me was the afternoon we spent at the Hearst Tower.  The Tower was completed in 2005 after I had moved to Los Angeles, so I had never seen the building.  I must say it is now in my top 5 buildings in the world.  I was amazed and Pamela quickly was tired of hearing me rave about the buildings outstanding architecture.  The building was designed by Sir Norman Foster, was the first Gold LEED certified skyscraper in NYC.  I’ll let you read about it here if you’re interested, but one quick fact – using an exoskeloton design they saved the use of over 2,000 tons of steel…Amazing!

Overall it was a fun, exciting and successful NYC trip for the ScanDigital team!

Check out a 30 second slideshow here:

I found my old 35mm camera again this morning. I haven’t used it since college—but it’s been lovingly packed up and carried with my wherever I move, even if it’s to just sit on a shelf or in the back of my closet.

I have two digital cameras which see far more use, but nothing will ever make me give up that old camera.

Two reasons: it was my first real, grown-up, utterly manual camera—everything this camera did was my choice, good or bad—and my grandfather gave me this camera as a gift before I left for college. It was a requirement that all incoming photo students own a 35mm camera with an internal light meter. The camera was given to him several years before, but he had another which he preferred.

The camera itself is a Rolleiflex and is a workhorse of German engineering that will quite likely outlive the 35mm film format. I keep it in a mismatched leather case that doesn’t quite close because the front of the original fell off during a trip to the zoo and dropped into the wolf enclosure. I remember there being a moment where I was watching the case fall and thought, “I could still grab it…but then I might drop the camera…” The wolves could have the case. I spent a majority of my time in college with this camera to my eye—even without it I saw the world through a frame: how would I photograph this? What aperture? What speed? Each and every moment could be a perfect image just waiting to be caught.

Time seems different when you can press it into film. There is something frozen about a photograph, something still and quiet. You have to slow down if you want to look at old albums or slides—you have to specifically seek them out. It’s the same to taking pictures on film—you have to move deliberately to some extent. If there’s anything to call our lives in 2008, slow is far from it, and stopping everything to try a find your family’s old pictures isn’t as appealing. Especially not when digital cameras enable us to have years of images and memories just a few mouse clicks away.

Does that mean that we have any desire to get rid of these old photographs, negatives, or slides? Not at all, just like I would never even dream of getting rid of my grandfather’s camera. These are history—more than that, these are our histories. One of a kind and utterly priceless.

When was the last time you looked through your stacks of old photographs? Many of us even have inherited drawers or boxes filled from our parents, and their parents as well. All filled with small windows into the past that we might not have ever seen. Wouldn’t you like to?

This is where ScanDigital is ready to help you.

There are a few new things that we are happy to introduce this month to our customers. We are always in the process of developing new ways to improve our service on all ends to offer the best digitization services on the market.

Large Flatbed Scans – ScanDigital is now offering scans up to 12.2”x17.2” in either 300dpi or 600dpi. By adding this service ScanDigital will be able to offer high quality full scans of large photos, newspaper clippings, artwork, album pages and scrapbooks. By capturing the entire image in one scan the quality is far superior to having to “stitch” different images together in an editing program. The pricing at 300dpi and 600dpi is $1.88 and $2.88 respectively and is relatively inexpensive when considering that elsewhere the price is upwards of $6.00 a scan. For those of you who scrapbook this option is a great way to protect and share your cherished hard work.

Capzles Partnership – ScanDigital is proud to announce that we have partnered with Capzles.com, an innovative new photo and video sharing site that lets users design their own timelines. Capzles’ amazing new flash technology allows for users to fully customize their timelines and seamlessly integrate photos, videos and blog entries. Check them out at www.capzles.com.

ScanDigital Growth – Over the past year ScanDigital has added more than 15 new employees to our skilled and dedicated team. Our experienced and highly trained team has been integral in helping ScanDigital become the industry leader in both quality and turnaround time. Each new member brings with them ideas and experience that have helped us improve all aspects of our business. By adding our great team members we are able to meet the ever increasing demand for our services while maintaining the quickest turnaround time. Also, you can rest assured that all their materials are being handled with the upmost care by trained professionals who are dedicated to providing you with the best possible images.

ScanDigital has recently been working with many home organizers in the effort to help simplify the lives of their clients. Most of us have a system of storing our photos, slides and negatives that is somewhat similar; partially labeled and piled up in a closet somewhere. You may be the only one who is even able to decipher what is where. Now, with the help of ScanDigital you can store those images away neatly and have full access to your images on disc and online anywhere in the world (even organized into folders no less!).

When sending their collection of images and movies into ScanDigital, customers can label there rolls of film, carousels of slides and photo albums so that those same names and groupings appear when viewing them on your computer. ScanDigital’s scanning service means no more searching for twenty minutes to find those photographs from that great vacation 10 years ago. After sending them to ScanDigital they will be right at your fingertips, in high quality and digitally enhanced.

Along with the digitally organized images ScanDigital offers a digital photo frame that we will preload for the customer with their newly scanned images. These photo frames look great and are good space savers as you can rotate through many images on the same frame. The photo frames also make perfect gifts for loved ones.

I recently took a large bin of images out of my parent’s house and had them processed at our El Segundo facility. Because of our great turnaround time I was able to put the bin back before my mom even noticed it was missing. When I gave her the DVD loaded with all the images in labeled folders she was thrilled. It was great to see her reaction as she was amazed that our slide scanning and editing restored old slides that she was sure were faded beyond repair.  She had forgotten what was even in the bin in the first place and now she is enjoying her images and the bin has been put into storage!

If you were to start exploring the process of getting your images scanned into a digital format you would quickly see that most often the price to scan your photos is lower than the price to scan your slides and negatives. You are probably thinking, “Great! I will just send in my photos to be scanned and hold onto my negatives for safe-keeping.” Unfortunately for a small savings you would be keeping yourself from receiving the highest possible quality.

When scanning a print you are not working from the original material (negative) so essentially it is similar to making a copy of a copy. No matter how much we can do to adjust an image and while the results are often great, the results from scanning negatives or scanning slides almost always allows for a higher quality digital image. Because of how the slides and negatives are chemically processed it allows for a color quality that cannot be met on a standard photographic print.

Many consumers assume that because of the larger size of the prints they would create better digital images but with the high quality slide and negative scanners available that is just not the case. At ScanDigital we use Nikon scanners specifically designed for 35mm negative scanning and 35mm slide scanning. They are designed to scan at a very high dpi (we offer both 2000 dpi and 4000 dpi) with Digital Ice technology that automatically fixes very small scratches and any small dust particles that didn’t get completely removed during the slide and negative cleaning.

Slide scanning is a particularly important thing to do as the life of these slides is short-lived. Ektachrome slides for example can start deteriorating rapidly after just thirty years. Many customers express concern over shipping their irreplaceable slides across the country, believing that they are safer tucked away in the closet. Unfortunately by not preserving them digitally they are suffering irreparable damage as time goes on. ScanDigital is integrated with UPS for safe, secure and trackable shipping so don’t wait, save your precious memories by sending in your slides today!

At ScanDigital we have been very pleased with the great response we have had to our new film and video digitization services. We are proud to match our unrivaled quality in photo, slide and negative scanning with great video and film transfer. All video and film is transferred onto DVD which is easy to play in any standard player. The quality is excellent and it brings to life old memories that have been sitting in the back of your closet for years.

But what if you are looking for something more than just a DVD copy of your film or video? ScanDigital is happy to place your film and video avi files onto a hard drive. Once you have the full avi files you have the ability to do so much with your old film. There are a number of programs available to edit your home movies ranging from very basic programs like iMovie to professional level programs such as Final Cut Pro. From transitions and effects to adding music and chapter points, you are given the ability to personally customize your precious memories.

Special Events can be a great way to use your newly digitized film. Seamlessly integrate stills and video together for that big slide show, everyone will love what you have created for the big anniversary, rehearsal dinner, birthday etc. Also, you can now post your videos on the web. This will allow you to share your video with friends and family members all over the country, even all over the world. We have already heard stories of our customers sharing great moments with family members as they watch their old films and videos. And that is really what our process is all about, restoring precious memories so that it can bring family and friends together, no matter how far apart they are.