Heritage Scanning and Digitisation Services

Family photos archiving

With the rise of genealogy websites more and more people are looking to digitise old family photos for others to view online – whether it be in the form of photo prints or unprinted negatives. Those who have large collections will find it time consuming to individually scan photos on an ordinary office scanner, while it can prove to be an expensive exercise to have large collections of negatives developed. This is where Pearl Scan’s archiving service provides the best possible solution.

Read more about our photo scanning service here

Cine film scanning and digitisation

We can transfer Cine Film to digital format for families, archives and museums all over the UK and whole of Europe, to help organisations and individuals digitise and preserve their cine film archives. This specialist digitisation service offers range of benefits, including saving on storage space and increasing the accessibility of the footage. We can digitise a range of formats, including regular 8mm – right up to larger sized 35mm film. We provide both a DVD and MP4 version of the video file for for 3″ or 5″ size reels, 8mm or Super 8 format. We scan at 1080p HD format direct to digital.

Glass plate negatives scanning

Glass plate negatives have not really been used since the beginning of the 20st century, however a lot of heritage collection archives use them to display negatives of events in history. As you can probably guess, glass plates are not the most secure medium to store such important images on – which is why we offer a glass plate scanning service in order to fully digitise, and even enhance, the original image. This digitisation will also make glass plate images available to be uploaded to websites and archives for quick access.

Video digitisation

The world of film has moved on considerably since VHS was the most popular form of film storage. With original video players disappearing fast, it is now more important than ever to digitise VHS to continue to make them accessible for future generations. Whether it’s recordings of your now not-so-young one’s first Christmas, or an amateur dramatic group’s archives, we can transform these to digital version. We digitise videos from a range of mediums, including VHS, S-VHS, VHS-C, Digital 8, Betamax, Mini DV, Micro MV Video, Hi-8 and U-matic to a whole host of formats to suit individual needs.

Audio digitisation

We can digitise audio recordings from a range of formats, including cassette tapes, reel to reel tapes and Shellac/Vinyl records. If the original copy is badly degraded, although we cannot promise a perfect quality digital version, we do our best to capture as much information as possible from the original analogue version. We can, however improve sound quality with special techniques to remove background noise etc.

Analogue formats are also no longer supported by a wide range of devices, making these recordings at risk of getting to the point of being inaccessible.

Read more about our audio transcription service here

Online image sales

If you have completed a photo scanning or digital archive conservation project with us to digitise your prints, we can also offer online image sales for your newly digital images. If you feel your photos are worth sharing and selling to the mass market, we can spread the word to help you sell your photos to interested and relevant parties. We can host your photos and related data onto our image sales website and give you complete control over the way your photos are marketed. This service will also provide others with the opportunity to browse a broad range of fascinating historical photos in the best quality possible.

Flipping book digital page turning service

This service allows companies to add a feature to their digital archives that gives the illusion of actually turning the page of a hardcopy book. Flipping book makes digitised archives interesting and easy on the eye, while helping to make the transition to digital much easier by giving archives an extremely manual feeling – along with all the benefits of going digital. This is a fully bespoke service, with customers able to tailor the style to suit the needs and feel the project.

Halogen digital preservation software

We understand the importance of preserving heritage collection archives. And with our digital preservation software, you can do just that! Halogen can help you to store and retrieve documents safely – but with ease. The software is able to run on a wide range of systems, while the customisable interface enables customers to tailor the system to suit users. With Halogen digital preservation software, your heritage collection archives will be stored and kept safe from theft, loss and damage – all while also bringing you space, time and money saving benefits.

Read more about Halogen