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There are three factors for organizing: how many photos, how chaotic are they, and how much organizing are you going to do? With more experience you’ll be able to start estimating how long it will take you to do a certain task on a certain number of images. But to get those numbers you have to measure EVERYTHING you do and start finding averages.
The DVD probably wasn’t finalized, so you’ll need to find a compatible camera and finalize the disc. This is also common with minCDs in early digital cameras such as the Sony models.
You might start with the training archives here to find relevant resources: https://thephotomanagers.com/community-forums/training/
My broad advice would be:
- Don’t work for free
- Don’t charge too little
- Consider billing time + materials as you get started
- As you get more clear on the services you offer and can quantify what it takes to deliver your services, you can migrate to project-based pricing with clear parameters and increased profit
Yes, you can install the run the software from a second hard drive. I’ve used a lot of different recovery apps through the years, and many have come and gone. I’d probably start here: https://prosofteng.squarespace.com/mac-data-recovery
Yes, this one is faster and more reliable than the USB and Bluetooth gear I’ve been using. The downsides are that it’s more expensive and specific to different camera manufacturers, but I can totally live with this tradeoffs for speed and reliability!
What if I told you that you could charge the same per-unit prices. but increase your scanning speed 10x? In early June the Photo Managers will be hosting a webinar about camera scanning that you won’t want to miss. Stay tuned for details….
If you connect a hard drive to your Windows computer and reveal the properties you should see the format of the drive. In a cross-platform world I recommend you purchase some software that will let you work with Mac-formatted drives on your Windows computer. This is my favorite: http://macdrive.com
You should never install recovery software on a hard drive that you’re trying to recover data from. Every time you write data to a hard drive you decrease the chance of recovering data.
Also note that most free/trial recovery software will show you what can be recovered, but won’t complete the process until you pay for a license of the software.
Because you have a DX Nikon camera (which means it’s not a full-frame sensor) then you should use a DX lens. You CAN mix and match, but I wouldn’t especially not for camera scanning where quality and resolution are so essential. I recommend the Nikon DX 40mm for your camera for scanning prints, negs, and slides.
If you get in to this and find something lacking you can always buy more, but I think you’ll have the basic you need with that shopping list.
I charge per scan, which is motivation for me to work efficiently. And of course, clients expect quality, so I have to deliver great work. I usually scan 600-650 pieces per hour for any format. If there’s a slow batch such as negs that are hard to remove from sleeves I can still do 300-350 per hour. The other night I need a speed test where I hand-brushed every negative (but didn’t organize them in subfolders) and I was able to capture 800 an hour.
Prints, slides, and black and white negs are post-processed quickly and easily with Lightroom without much effort. Post-processing color negs with the Negative Lab pro plugin is more tedious and I can normally do about 400 per hour.
The platform doesn’t matter because they all have USB ports and all the phones (iPhone, Android, etc) can be mounted as USB storage. My clients and I import and manage our photos with Adobe Lightroom Classic. iMazing is another cross-platform option, and I’m sure there are others.
I have a suggestion that is simple, free, fast, and reliable, but takes a bit of discipline. It’s the same workflow I use for all my photos and suggest the same for my clients.
I disable all cloud syncing from my iPhone, and treat my phone like a digital camera. That means I capture a photo or video, download it to my computer, and delete it from my phone, just like a memory card. This way I have everything locally, safely backed up, and I don’t have a full phone or clogged iCloud account.
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