All About Scanning Your Film: What You Need to Know About Resolution

What is Resolution?  No, it has nothing to do with the New Year or making goals.  Resolution is one of the biggest factors determining the quality of your end result when scanning your old film to digital.  The higher the resolution you choose to digitize your film with, the higher the quality.  

The resolution amount is stated numerically.  For example: 400 DPI, 2000 DPI, etc.  Notice, the number is followed by three letters.  D. P. I.  This stands for Dots Per Inch, which makes up the resolution.  Think about a mosaic made up of little squares all over the image.  Each square is one color, and the more little squares of color you have to make up the art, the easier it is to tell what it's of.  It's exactly the same concept with DPI.  The more dots you have in your image, the clearer the picture will be, the clearer it will be, and the more detailed it will be.

You can also relate resolution to the megapixels of a camera.  Here are some comparables to help aid you in your decision of which resolution to scan your film at:

2000 DPI - A 2000 DPI scan is equivalent to 4.6 Megapixels. This is a medium resolution scan that we recommend for customers who only want to create printed photographs of up to 5"x7", post online, e-mail to friends or view on their TV. If you want to make larger printed photographs, crop out portions of the image, or have a higher quality image, we would recommend a higher resolution.

3000 DPI- A 3000 DPI scan is equivalent to 9 Megapixels. This is a high resolution scan that we recommend for customers who want to create larger photograph prints up to 11"x14", post online, e-mail to friends or view on their TV. If you plan to make larger printed photographs, use in a professional capacity such as publishing, or want a higher quality image, we would recommend the 4000 DPI.

4000 DPI- A 4000 DPI scan is equivalent to 18 Megapixels. It is the highest scan resolution scan for transparent film. This will allow you to crop out portions of your image, create large photograph prints, upload online, use professionally, pretty much whatever you want. If it fits within your budget we always recommend going with the highest resolution, because you are capturing more data, which means you are getting a higher quality image.

As with most things, the higher you go, the better.  While you may not need the highest resolution to accomplish your photo needs, make sure you take into account the information given in this article to make sure you get what you need!

Larsen Digital Services offers the best quality scans with several resolutions to choose from when converting your precious family memories to digital.  We scan photos, slides, negatives, and we transfer video tapes, movie film, audio tapes and more to digital so you can enjoy and share them for the rest of your life, and even pass it on to your posterity.

Don't have the time to scan your own film?  Send it in to Larsen Digital where your memories come first!  Take advantage of a special going on right now where you can get your slides scanned at ANY resolution for just 35¢ each!  Use coupon code SOCIAL35 and save your memories today!