I agree, this can be lots of fun and very rewarding. I have taught classes of this method of "preserving" our gardens but instead of printing the images on paper we printed them on fabric (this was a quilting class). The fabric for doing this is readily available at quilt shops and stores such as JoAnn's and it's cut in 8"x10" size, perfect for the home scanners most of us use. I had previously taught this group of quilters a color theory class so they put their new knowledge to the test on their floral scans with great success. Some of them made wallhangings, while others just made an individual scan and framed it. All of them were beautiful! Diana

Practice will let you decide as you start scanning. Try a few of your own photos so you have a basic idea before you attend the shindig. Use the auto scan and see what it does. You have an upscale scanner so output should e great. If photos are small, worn, scratched or torn then I select a higher resolution or increase the size so I can work on it later. I rarely use other scanner settings, relying on my photo editing software to do these things. I recently scanned a 1968 passport black and white photo of my wife at 600% of the original size, cleaned it up and printed it as an 8 x 10 and it came out quite good IMHO. DPI. What do you intend to do with the scans? I ask because a computer reads 72 DPI but if you intend to print then that is useless and will show jaggies so if I intend to print I select 300 DPI. Again, play a little and make your choices.

Realize that CS5 is a full suite of products, mostly geared towards graphics and publication. Within CS5, Photoshop is the same...really geared towards graphics, but good for photo manipulation too. But if you can get it for a decent price, then have at it. I use Photoshop (via CS4) quite a bit, yet again, for photos you'll barely scratch the surface of the what the software can do. Good news is that there are plenty of tutorials both on Adobe's website as well as other websites, even YouTube has an extensive collection of PS tips to get you started. Scnners, it depends on what you'll be scanning. Just prints, or negatives, or slides? I have an Epson V700, about $500. Excellent for all three. Scanning while using the scanners dust/scratch auto removing functions can really slow a scan down. By a factor of...many! Seriously, it might take 20 seconds for a "regular" scan, but then use the built-in correcting software and it can take several minutes. That's true with every scanner. You might find that the correction software actually softens the scan a bit when trying to do dust removal, etc, so sometimes I just scan a straight file and use photoshop. If you will be scanning hundreds or thousands of prints/slides, there are scanners that can to batch processing. Set and forget, come back in a half hour, reload and let it run again. When shopping, keep an eye on the dpi rating. Some are "true" dpi counts, other scanners have "interpolated" dpi. In my opinion, interpolated doesn't really do you much good in the real world scheme of things. While this may sound frilly, consider wearing white cotton gloves, especially if doing negatives or slide scanning. It helps prevent you from getting body oil on any film or on the scanner glass. Sounds silly, but when doing good scans these things show up, and they are the last thing you want to see after waiting 30 minutes for a batch scan to finish. Be wary of Amazon, There prices are fine and all, but their packing for shipping is just atrocious. I'll order all sorts of stuff from them, but I'm hesitant when it comes to delicate stuff. Check out B and H, good company and excellent packaging. Lastly...not sure what you have for a computer, but when getting into high end scanning, file manipulation (Photoshop) and printing, try to calibrate your monitor. That way what you see on your monitor (pixel coloration) is what will come out of the printer. Sorry to drone on, best of luck! It's enjoyable to resurrect old photos.

I suggest speaking to a conservator who specializes in photographs. They may be able to recommend a method or product to fix the slides. If the slides can not be fixed, you can scan them and then fix the scans with photo editing software. I know it will not save the slides, but at least you will have the photos. And whatever you do, get them scanned before you or anyone else starts trying to clean them. Which brings me to the scanning: If you have a lot of photos that need to be scanned, it may be more cost effective for you to buy a scanner and do it yourself. You can get a very good scanner relatively cheaply and they are easy to use. You can get free photo editing software (Gimp) that has all the necessary features you need in order to fix the inevitable colour shifts and scratches in the photos, or if money is not an issue, you can get Photoshop or similar software.