Cleaning Prior to Converting to Digital

What We Do

Economy Film:

A blast of clean, dry air is used to blow the dust from each side of the film.  

Premium Film:

For our premium film, we use a two step process for cleaning the dust from the film:

1. The static charges on both sides of thew film which hold the debris to the film on slides or negatives are released with a sophisticated system (from Keyance)
2. A blast of clean, dry air is used to blow the dust from each side of the film.   

What To Expect

Economy Film:

Loose debris will be blown off,  but embedded or highly charged debris will remain.

Premium Film:

Loose debris and some embedded debris will be blown off,  but embedded debris will remain.  

The emulsion on the dull side of the film is what the image is made from.  This emulsion is a gel, not a solid.  Debris that have been in contact with this gel will sink into the gel and are embedded in it. Removing embedded debris takes the emulsion with the debris, creating a worse problem.  

But, now that your physical photos have been converted to digital, the digital image can often be digitally repaired.  This requires special skills and software, costs $10 to $40 per image.  

What We Do

All Grades:

Every print or album page is brushed with soft bristles to remove dust and debris.  

What To Expect

All Grades:

This process will get the loose stuff off, but sticky stuff will remain.  "Sticky stuff" usually comes from the back side of the print that this print is in contact with.  For this reason, if you pull images out of an album that uses glue to hold the print to the page, you will need to do something to protect the photos from the residual glue.