Low Cost Photo Scanning and Image Editing on Your Mac

Last week I discussed how it sometimes makes more sense to use a 35mm camera instead of a digital one. However, sometimes it's still convenient to have your photos on your computer, whether you want to send them to someone, upload them to a website or use them as a desktop background.

In order to get your pictures onto your Mac, there are a couple of options.

The first option is simply to scan the photos that you want. To do this, you need a scanner, which can be bought for as little as $50 on sale from your local computer, electronics, or office supply store. I've got an old, very large Umax Astra 1220S (from about 1998), which does the job perfectly. Today you can buy a decent USB powered Canon that is a third as large.

The drivers that come with the scanner may or may not be decent. The Umax drivers that came with mine are good, but they only work in OS 9. Unfortunately, the newer version of the Umax scanning software available on their website is horrible, and it's still OS 9-only. It treats you like you've never used a computer before and makes it difficult to access some of the more advanced options.

There are no OS X drivers for the 1220S; however, there are third party solutions. The US$60 VueScan application is great, as it works with over 300 scanners (including the Astra 1220S) and gives you access to all of the scanning options you might want without the ugly "newbie" type interface. (See Charles Moore Reviews VueScan 7.6 Scanner Software for a lot more on this program.)

When scanning your documents, make sure that the options in the scanning software are set correctly. If you don't bother setting brightness, contrast, resolution, and other settings, your scan won't come out right. It still may not be perfect even if the options are correct, but you can always edit the image once it's on your Mac.

If your scanner supports scanning negatives, that's another way to go as well.

If you plan on printing your photos, I recommend scanning them at a higher resolution (300 dpi or better), as it will appear pixelated if you try to print out a large size photo from a low resolution scan.

The other option for getting your 35mm pictures onto your computer is to order a picture CD when you get your film processed. It's usually just a few dollars extra and gives you images on a CD that can be accessed by either a PC or a Mac. More often than not, these will be 1.5 MP scans - fine for viewing on your computer screen but not good enough for large prints.

The downside to this is that it gives you every single picture on the roll on the CD. If you only wanted 2 or 3, it may be best to scan them individually yourself instead of ordering the whole CD. But if you want most of the pictures on your Mac, it's a good way to go - scanning all 24 or 36 pictures does take some time.

Once you've got the pictures on your computer, how do you edit them? The obvious answer would be to use Photoshop, but not everyone has it. If you don't have Photoshop, you can use one of the other image editors out there. There is always GraphicConverter, and if you have a relatively modern (within the last 2 years or so) Mac, it may have come preinstalled - check your Applications folder. If not, you can download it. It's a shareware application that sells for US$35 ($30 without a CD). It may be worth buying when you consider that Photoshop costs several hundred dollars.

If you want a bit more power, Photoshop Elements is available. As the name suggests, it consists of "elements" of Photoshop with an interface very similar to the full version. You can get a demo version on Adobe's website, and it can be purchased from Amazon for $50.

An older version of the Photoshop might also be an option. If you're running OS 9, you can get version 4.x or 5.x for very little (and these older versions work well in OS X classic mode as well).

Another options is Color It!, which sells for $49.95 and runs on any Mac with System 7.0 or later that supports color. It doesn't have as many features as Photoshop, but it doesn't cost much either. I bought a new, boxed, shrink-wrapped copy a couple years ago for about a dollar. It doesn't work natively with OS X, although MicroFrontier is developing an OS X version. (See Almost High-End Graphics for a Low-end Price for more on Color It! 4.)

For a relatively small investment, you can put your 35mm photos on your Mac. And for not much more, you can print out any size that your printer can handle - and you'll still have the original 35mm prints for your photo album.