Obviously the only semi automated scanner is the CoolScan 5000 with bulk feeder. I have two of them and use them heavily without any issues. Just sort your slide by mount thickness and do a minor tweaking of the gate opening and you won't have any jamming issues. I've only scanned up to 20 slides at a time.

The other advantage of purchasing a top of the line film scanner is that you can easily sell it on eBay when you finish your project.

Batch scanning will not achieve good quality scans, although what Larry recommended is about the only automatic handling possibility of the physical process of scanning. But without adjusting each scan either up front or post scan, using automated image adjustment will only get you the lowest common denominator of mediocre image quality. the only way to obtain good quality photo quality results is to invest both time and skill in color correcting and adjusting each image on the basis of the fact each image is unique. No two slide images are alike unless they were taken of the same identical subject and exposed in the same exact way. Automated image adjustment is essentially blind, what the the subject is and how it should look only human eyes can determine, automated processes can only measure the density and color scanned and if it varies from a pre-determined standard, adjust the values to fit that standard= the lowest common denominator of mediocrity.

Thanks for your advice. This forum is great!

Larry: From your experience, how long does it take to scan and save the files from a 20 slide batch? I have just trying to get a very rough idea of what to expect in terms of time for this solution. I read in a user's comment who used the Epson scanner that it took 45min to scan a batch of twelve slides. With the amount of slides I have that would translate into ~3100 of scanning time (260 days of scanning 12 hours a day 7 days a week)! Also, when you scan a batch of slides, do you do most of your tweaking of the photos by adjusting the scanning settings or do you use software solutions after scanning. I am just trying to get an idea of what to expect for a work flow. (e.g. 20 mins setting up the scanner for a batch of slides, 3hrs scanning, 25 mins saving /editing images)

EFX: I realize that automatic batch scanning will not produce the highest quality results. However, at this point it is a trade off between scanning slides at less than optimal quality or not scanning them at all. Not scanning them at all is equivalent throwing them in the trash. I just don't think I will feasibly be able to customize the scan settings for each slide. However, I would like to get the best quality scan possible with respect the time invested. Do you have any tips that can help get the most out of each slide (such as sorting slides darkness/contrast maybe) that would still enable me to actually scan all the slides?

I could also have them scanned by a shop for ~$0.50 a slide, but that is a chunk of change with the number of slides I have. I don't anticipate that they would set custom settings for each slide either so I wouldn't anticipate any increase in the scan quality over batch scanning them myself.

I am not unsympathetic because a little over ten years ago when I started scanning seriously I had accumulated over 40 some years of full-time photography a library of images that by my estimate was in the millions if I counted all of the bracketed exposures in the collection.

Today, after 10 years of a lot of scanning I have filled some 600 CD's with image files, but have barely made a dent in scanning all of the images I have on film. But, I am not concerned even though I never expect to finish this task.

The reason is I cull/edit the film images and have decided some are worth scanning and most of them are not. It is like people in your life, you value the few good friends you can count on and waste little concern for the gaggle of casual acquaintances who probably have no more regard for yours truly.

In other words it is not an either or proposition as you suggested, scan all 5000 or none. Take a few days to edit the collection and select those that are really worth putting the time and effort towards a first rate scanning job and if you don't get to any of the rest, so be it.

Under a minute a scan. I scan at full resolution and I guess it takes about 30 seconds, maybe 45 seconds counting the time to move each transparency in and out of the scanner.

Quote:
Larry: From your experience, how long does it take to scan and save the files from a 20 slide batch?