Portable Photo Scanning

[Imagebuffet]

My cousin has family photos dating back 100 years and more, including what I believe are ambrotypes. I would like to digitize these photos, but I probably need to travel up to Michigan to do it. I'm thinking of buying a netbook and a scanner. I've used a digital camera to do this sort of work, and it performed OK, but maybe a scanner would be better?

Any suggestions? Should I stick with simply photographing the images?

[toverman]

My opinion is that you'd get a better reproduction if you scan them. But if they are mostly large ones (bigger than a flatbed scanner), taking the time to light them properly (even lighting sources coming from both sides, line up the sensor plane of your camera parallel to the flat surface the photos are lying on, etc.) would probably work best.

[kenw]

I've used a USB-powered flatbed scanner for this type of "field" work, like scanning at family reunions and where ever taking the print back home to scan is just impractical or not allowed.

I've seen good USB-powered scanners for under $100. Since they use the USB port for power, no separate 120v power is needed as long as your notebook battery holds up. A netbook would be perfect for this imho, altho i've only used my existing notebooks.

[toverman]

We have an uninvited guest living in the garage. My wife bought a mouse trap to uninvite the little guy, but I thought the instructions on the box were a little tasteless.