A great way to make photo books more original is to combine new mobile and camera pictures with old photos from family albums.
Just like your own family, your grandparents and parents also took hundreds of photos on film – that’s the story of every family. These are black-and-white photos from your grandparents’ childhood, their wedding, and your own mother’s early years. These images are so important to every family’s history, and they make a wonderful gift idea.
Today, there are so many great ways to bring these photos onto your phone, your computer, and finally into a photo book. In this article, we’ll introduce some apps you can download and use on your phone to scan old photos.
Google PhotoScan
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.apps.photos.scanner
The first app we’d like to introduce is PhotoScan by Google Photos. With this app, you can scan and save your favorite printed photos using your smartphone’s camera. It takes a bit of time to scan each photo, but if you just want to capture a few favorites, this free app is a great option.
Photomyne Photo Scan
https://photomyne.com/get-photomyne
Another app worth mentioning is the Photo Scan App by Photomyne. Available for both Apple and Android devices, this app allows you to scan your photos and gives you the ability to organize, save, and share them.
Epson Scanner
If you want to scan a whole batch of photos and are willing to invest a bit more, you might want to take a look at Epson scanners. There’s a range of photo scanners available at different price points. With Epson FastFoto scanners, you can scan your photos in batches. The included photo software makes it quick and easy to enhance your images. This includes cropping and rotating, as well as restoring the colors of faded photos. Brightness and contrast are also optimized automatically.
Whichever option works best for you, it’s worth seeing how your photo collection can come to life digitally—and how it allows you to create a photo book with these images. Your family history photo book might feel like an overwhelming project, but having the photos on your computer is the first and most important step to getting started.
Get organized!
One of the main reasons we never get around to creating these kinds of photo books: we simply don’t have enough time to go through all the photos. One possible solution is to create one album at a time and tag the photos with dates and events. This makes future designing much easier, and your photos will already be organized—whether they’re birthdays, weddings, or other occasions, it really helps to have a theme.
Creating a photo book is a wonderful gift idea. Why not make a book full of old family treasures? A book for the grandparents or one featuring all the birthdays you’ve celebrated together? Start working on your special gift today!
