Cameras record memories!

Today I've bitten the bullet and gone back to digitising our vast collection of photos. It is several months since I last scanned any photos. One of the reasons for this is that I have preferred to focus on taking digital photos with my new camera. Since receiving this as a Christmas present I have taken almost a thousand photos with this camera. If I include the ones I have taken on my phone when I have not had my camera with me, I have actually taken more than a 1000 photos in 5 months. Thankfully, as these are all digital files and my camera and phone both have really useful upload apps, it has been an easy matter to back them up to the Cloud before copying them directly from the camera onto my laptop at full resolution. Copying fifty or so digital photos can seem a little slow but now I am back to scanning I have remembered what slow copying is!

Guinness and Lucy 1992

Today's photos for scanning are from 1992 and I am trying to multi task by writing this whilst the scanner plods its way backwards and forwards over each photo. I find it really difficult to just sit and wait for the scanner to finish but I am realising that it is probably as slow to scan whilst writing as it is whilst trying to read a novel as both activities easily distract from the scanning. It looks like I will have to restrict myself to listening to an audio book or colouring in future.

Guinness 1992

Lucy 1992

Attic and boiler renovation 1992

I  have now scanned photos from the first six months of 1992 (not all today!) and realised that it is going to take me much, much longer to scan the ones from the remainder of the year. Although the first half of the year included a 21st birthday party and house renovations, the number of photos totalled just under 100, probably about 4 films of 24 shots. We have far more than this of our 1992 summer holiday in which we travelled around Europe, including Germany, the Czech Republic (Czechoslavakia as it was then), France and the Netherlands. Two albums of photos from this holiday will take ages to scan but then so will the wedding photos of my daughter from later that year! But think of the memories that will resurface as I scan these photos.

Pointing the way - Germany 1992

Although scanning is a slow process, it does mean that each photo is scrutinised as it is taken out of the album, placed on the scanner and then labelled and placed in a new album. Instead of just occasionally flicking through the albums on our bookcase, I am looking more carefully at individual photos and remembering when, where and why they were taken. So many memories! 

Cuckoo Clock - Germany 1992

I am so thankful that I have these old photos. I cannot believe how much I had forgotten that the photos bring back, If anyone had asked me what I had done in 1992 I could probably have worked out that I had organised a 21st birthday and a wedding that year but many of the details of these events would be very hazy. I certainly would not have been able to tell anyone much about our summer holiday.  

Border crossing - Germany and Czechoslovakia 1992

One of the great things about digitising our old photos is that it has allowed me to easily share photos and memories with family and friends via email and Facebook. With the cost of processing in the past, often only one copy of a photo exists. Now everyone who would like their own copy can easily have one for free. 

Probably my 2nd birthday

Most people take for granted that they are able to build up a huge photographic record of their life and that of their children and grandchildren but it is not so long ago that this was not the case. My mother-in-law has very few photos other than ones we have taken over the years. I find this quite surprising and rather sad. My parents took photos of themselves and friends when they were courting and added to these regularly over the years, particularly on family holidays. I am very lucky to have access to several albums of their photos from when I was a child and even earlier. With my mum's help, I have recently started to organise their collection of photos but I have decided to digitise these by photographing them with my clever camera instead of scanning them!