Thanks for the info John, Jim, and Art.

As a follow up to the list, does anyone know of any scanner rental
services?  Or a decent service to do the digitization work for a reasonable
price?  I need to provide all the options to my boss and sadly this
information is a real pain to sort through via web searches.

On Tue, Jan 10, 2017 at 12:06 PM, Art Rhyno. <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Hi Matt,
>
> If you are pressed for funds, you can do a lot with a standard camera, a
> light table, and a macro lens. We have a set of about 15 reels of 19th
> century local newspapers where the microfilm was produced in the 1950s and
> they were sent back by a commercial scanner as being "unworkable". There's
> a sample here [1] of what we can get from the camera, and a video of the
> process [2]. These papers are still a challenge but I think the camera
> itself fares well. I borrowed a $600 macro lens from a friend to compare it
> to the much cheaper Raynox macro lens ($60 or so), and I found that it
> didn't make any difference. For that matter, a $7 magnifying glass did the
> same thing but it would drive you crazy trying to keep things in focus.
>
> I suspect a mirrorless camera would be the way to go for high volumes,
> many cameras have a "preview" function that has slightly less overhead than
> a regular camera shot, but the mirrors inside cameras are held by fairly
> flimsy plastic and are probably a weak point. Where this approach might
> have the greatest advantage is with microfiche, a format that does not tend
> to respond well to scanning methods. Ping me if you are interested in this
> kind of setup, it's definitely not something that could be put out for the
> public to use without a lot of refinement, but you can probably assemble
> the pieces for less than $1000, excluding a machine to run the process.
>
> art
> ---
> 1. http://ink.ourdigitalworld.org/sample.jpg
> 2. https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-PK1n92dlzwaXVFVjNuM3hXc2c
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Code for Libraries [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
> Matt Sherman
> Sent: Tuesday, January 10, 2017 9:43 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: [CODE4LIB] Good Tools for Microfilm Scanning
>
> Hi all,
>
> Does anyone on the list have much experience with microfilm scanning?  We
> have some old student newspapers and dissertations that we want to get into
> a digital format and while I do have a lot of expreience with photos, text,
> negatives, and large format media, I have not done microfilm. As such I am
> wondering if there is a good tool or set of tools to use when scanning
> microfilm? Either tools to scan with a standard bed-scanner or some kind of
> microfilm scanner?  Any suggestions would be appreciated.
>
> Matt Sherman
>