Scanning Services

webwizard

Just found out about the fire at digmypics.com. I've used them for a couple of years. Now I guess I'll have to find another resource. I read the info on Scancafe on another thread. I'd like to know if their good service is still holding up or if anything has changed. Also, are there any others that might also be worth a look?

David_S85

webwizard wrote:

Just found out about the fire at digmypics.com. I've used them for a couple of years. Now I guess I'll have to find another resource. I read the info on Scancafe on another thread. I'd like to know if their good service is still holding up or if anything has changed. Also, are there any others that might also be worth a look?

I haven't used Scan Cafe myself, but it looks as if you already found that thread here.

Clubsmug has a deal going with BritePix.

webwizard

David_S85 wrote:

I haven't used Scan Cafe myself, but it looks as if you already found that thread here.

Clubsmug has a deal going with BritePix.

Thanks, Dave, I just sent 120 slides off to ScanCafe yesterday. So I'll report back later. I like the free preview feture that SC offers. I get to choose the images and only pay for the scans I want. They also offer a 15% discount to Club Smug members even though they are not on the website.

I checked out the BritePix web site. Their prices seem slightly higher for the same rez. Britepix quotes a 7-10 day turnaround. SC takes 30 days to turnaround an order.

flyingpoint

ScanCafe
I just completed a GIANT order with ScanCafe and came away very impressed. You can't beat the 50% deal and the quality of scans was quite good.

Art Scott

flyingpoint wrote:

I just completed a GIANT order with ScanCafe and came away very impressed. You can't beat the 50% deal and the quality of scans was quite good.

Are they good enuff that you could make large (30 x 40 inch) enlargements with little or no difficulty?? I know they send all scans to India (Bangalore) to be scanned.....yeah the being able to trash 50% of the order with out any penalty is good selling point also.

How long was your order gone?

I just used RealREtouch.com for a restoration job...had the scan done locally ( a 5 x 7 image at 300dpi was $9.99, luckily I get paid by a vlient for that), so I am not interested in having any more scans done locally especially my concert shot that I have thousands of that I would like to get up on my site to seel again.

webwizard

Their pricing beat the other two I looked at by a little. Their process seems too slow.

Their website allows you to track the order; nice. I'm disappointed that I have to wait almost 8 weeks before I can preview the scans on line. Then I have to wait more(10-14 days I'm guessing) further, till I have the selected scans in my hands.

When I placed the order thay were quoting 4 week turn time(plus the return trip). SC says the uptick is as a result of increases in business. I thought the original 4 week estimate was on the bubble because it really is 5-6 weeks before you get the scanned images back.

The review in Pop Photo, Dec 2007(http://scancafe.com/imgs/press/PopEditorial009.pdf ) was very complimentary but it took the reviewer 61 days before he got his slides back. Part of the delay, I suppose due to the fact that the slides have to go to India. Personally, I'm not too crazy about that.

Perhaps outsourcing allows them to offer the "pay only for what you keep" feature but I usually preselect the images to be scanned before I place my order anyway.

Since these were old archive images, urgency was not an issue. I'm probably going to send another batch to someone else so I can do some comparisons.

capitoljayhawk

webwizard wrote:

Their pricing beat the other two I looked at by a little. Their process seems too slow.

Their website allows you to track the order; nice. I'm disappointed that I have to wait almost 8 weeks before I can preview the scans on line. Then I have to wait more(10-14 days I'm guessing) further, till I have the selected scans in my hands.

When I placed the order thay were quoting 4 week turn time(plus the return trip). SC says the uptick is as a result of increases in business. I thought the original 4 week estimate was on the bubble because it really is 5-6 weeks before you get the scanned images back.

The review in Pop Photo, Dec 2007(http://scancafe.com/imgs/press/PopEditorial009.pdf ) was very complimentary but it took the reviewer 61 days before he got his slides back. Part of the delay, I suppose due to the fact that the slides have to go to India. Personally, I'm not too crazy about that.

Perhaps outsourcing allows them to offer the "pay only for what you keep" feature but I usually preselect the images to be scanned before I place my order anyway.

Since these were old archive images, urgency was not an issue. I'm probably going to send another batch to someone else so I can do some comparisons.

Any update on all of this? I am considering sending some slides to Scan Cafe, but I also see that Smug has a deal with Scan Digital.

Has anyone used both?

I am very interested in hearing about their relative quality.

PamelaSD

capitoljayhawk wrote:

Any update on all of this? I am considering sending some slides to Scan Cafe, but I also see that Smug has a deal with Scan Digital.

Has anyone used both?

I am very interested in hearing about their relative quality.

Just chiming in on behalf of ScanDigital- If you have any particular questions about our quality, please let me know. I can obviously run on about our strict quality assurance guidelines, how all scanning is done manually, how 3 separate technicians view each image, our fast turnaround time, strict security efforts, etc, but I'll spare you Always here and happy to help!

Pamela

www.scandigital.com
888.333.2808
Twitter: @PamelaSD or @ScanDigital