Family Photo Organizing and The Holiday Season

In past posts, I have suggested that it becomes much easier to organize and share family photos when older print images are scanned into a digital format.

I have also suggested that many family members often have their favorite photos held captive by another family member who somehow wound up with albums or boxes of prints when someone moved or passed away. Perhaps the other family member has good intentions and plans to scan and share the images someday, but has not found the time.

What better time than the holidays to talk about sharing photos. Some of the largest and most encompassing extended family gatherings take place over the holiday season. Additionally, other family members are typically somewhat nostalgic, in a sharing mood, and of good cheer during holiday gatherings.

Perhaps you can recruit some other family members who would be happy to take part in a project to consolidate a family photo collection by converting it to digital format. Perhaps some family members would be happy to provide some funding to have older prints scanned professionally for easier and broader sharing.

If available older prints are collected and scanned, contributing family members could have originals returned and other interested family members could each have a consolidated digital collection on CD or DVD. If you think your extended family might want to use a professional scanning service, check out ScanDigital and ScanCafe, two of the largest.

Who knows where such a project could lead? Perhaps some family members would carry the project further and expand it into a genealogy project or develop an extended family online share site.

For more ideas on organizing, preserving, and sharing family photos, visit LocalArchiver.com.