35mm Slide Transparancy Care & Storage

[obcbeatle]

Originally Posted by thecatspajamas

Jerry,
The viewer doesn't "project" at all, but it does magnify the slide and backlight it. So looking at it that way is like staring into about a 2"x2" TV screen, but works well in most cases.

Edited to add: Looking again at the photo shown in the Amazon listing, it's a little misleading. The slide drops into the viewer through a slot in the top just in front of that wide white rectangle which is the backlight button. What looks like a screen at the front in their photo is actually a magnifying lens, so you're still looking down into the thing at the slide in the middle of the unit, not at something projected to the front of it. It's strictly a one-at-a-time experience.

My usual process is to first hold the slide up to the light (leaning back since the light in my office is above/behind me), then if I need to see more detail or get vertigo from leaning back and sitting up too much drop it in the slide-viewer, and then if I need to see even more detail or get an image of it I go to the scanner. I guess from that point you could get a projector that would project the scanned image from your computer onto the wall, but I've never had need for that. Just depends on what you're doing as to which is most appropriate.

Thanks Lance ... as usual very useful information. And thanks to everyone for their replies and suggestions. One more thing I wanted to ask ... it was suggested to clean the slide transparencies. After doing a little research on this it seems there are many methods being use. Anything from gently using a new soft bristle paint brush to compressed air. I can't imagine using compressed air, and I'm not even sure about using a new paint brush. Is cleaning slides something that someone else in this group has done? I know I can try to find a reputable photo lab that might clean these slides as well as scan them for me. But even that I'm finding tough to do because there is a significant amount of trust in letting someone else handle these Marvin Newman slides. I guess I'm a do-it-yourself kind of person and don't mind learning to do things a proper way with a little instruction. Anyway ... my plan now is to buy a slide viewer as was suggested by Lance and others, then clean the slides myself if it seems like something I am capable of doing w/o damaging the slides (I would practice on some family slides first), and then eventually buy a scanner to do my own scanning. I need to further research drum scanning vs. non-drum scanning. Apparently drum scanning is best ... but very expensive. Thanks again to all that replied to my original post!