Photo & Media Archiving – Where Do You Start?

It’s been a little over a month since my last blog post where I shared how I was heading out to Los Angeles to help my parents in their transition to an assisted living facility. I’m happy to report that they are settled in and making the adjustment to their new lifestyle. They have their moments of “how did we get here?” but for the most part, they appreciate the regular and delicious meals, the nurse who makes sure they each take their medication on time each day, the plethora of activities available and the ease of transportation provided to them. Their apartment is small but works well for this stage of their life. Getting all their stuff into this apartment? Not so easy.

I have spent the past 5 or so years doing quite a bit of family archiving. I have scanned close to 5000 photographs and created a digital archive of family photos. I have transferred hours of old 8mm movies and organized them onto DVDs that separated time periods and events into different chapters with text information about the date, location and people in each scene that was shot. (See my blog article about converting 8mm film and why I prefer to create a context when going through the process of transferring old film to digital or DVD.) I had also spent a lot of time helping my dad create digital archives for his professional photographs while organizing them for his website, http://www.martinelkort.com. I ‘thought’ that I had a handle on much of the memorabilia. Boy was I wrong!

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