Our Services

Photo & Document Scanning

Loose Photo Scanning

Just sort your photos into bundles, enclose in a zip lock bag or envelope and label each. We will use that label to file the digital images into albums. Or if you prefer to have your photos scanned in no particular order, just provide us with photos and we’ll do the rest! If your photo has writing on the back, we can scan that as well.  Includes auto colour correction and enhancement at no extra cost.

If you have delicate, oversized or extra precious photos, these can be scanned on the flatbed scanner one at a time. This will incur an additional cost.

Photo Album Scanning

We can remove photos from your albums, scan and enhance to make them look their absolute best. Whether your album has slip in pockets, sticky pages, or the old photo corners, we will carefully take each each photo out, remove any dust and scan each photo individually. Photos can then be cropped, rotated and colour corrected easily with each individual scan.

If you want to dispose of your albums after scanning, we can remove photos from the album without replacing back into the album. If you wish your photos to be returned to the album in the correct place, this will incur an additional cost.

For delicate and difficult to remove photos, we can scan the whole album – page by page – on a flatbed scanner and save the page digitally as one image. Or we can separate out each photo from the full page scan and save as a separate images – this will incur an additional cost.

Slide & Negative Scanning

Each slide and negative strip are gently cleaned of dust and mildew and scanned individually on our flatbed scanner. If there is deterioration and damage to the slides or negatives we can manually correct fade and colour, remove mould and scratches for an extra cost. If there is extensive damage we can discuss restoration with you.

Just sort your slides and negs into bundles, enclose in a zip lock bag or envelope and label each. We will use that label to file the digital images into albums. Or if you prefer to have them scanned in no particular order, just provide us with slides and negs and we’ll do the rest!

Document Scanning

For that stack of business, financial or medical records, legal papers, historical documents, scrapbooks, autograph books, postcards, certificates, newspaper clippings and even a precious handwritten letter, we will carefully scan, digitise, and return them in original condition.

We can scan and digitise your letter, A4 and A5 papers as single or multipage pdf documents. All scans will be treated as confidential.

Photo Repair & Restoration

Over time photos, slides and negatives lose their vibrancy, become damaged, faded, mouldy and fall apart.

Once your photos are digitised you want them to look their best. This is where CopyCat ScanLab can help.

We will access the damage and discuss with you the level of restoration needed – Simple, Moderate or Severe and quote you prior to any work commencing. With photos where the damage is too severe or facial features are too degraded we are unable to restore.

Simple:

• Remove minor cracks, creases, spots and scratches
• Restore faded colours
• Sharpen, correct lighting and contrast

Moderate:

• Remove multiple cracks, creases, spots, stains and scratches
• Patch up missing sections such as photo corners, sections of landscape.
• Moderate touch up of faces
• Crop out or blur unwanted background

Severe:

• Fix major cracks, creases, spots, stains and scratches
• Colourise black and white photos
• Recreate missing areas
• Remove a background, object or person

Super8 & 8mm Film

In the 1950’s and 60’s it was a common sight to see a Kodak 8mm camera at family gatherings and on vacations. In 1965, Super8 superseded the bulky, heavy 8mm with a cheaper and more convenient camera. These reel-to-reel films are 50+ years old most likely degradation is starting to set in. Convert now and enjoy yesterday’s memories on today’s technology.

• Latest reel-to-reel film scanning projector
• Flicker-free frame by frame copying
• Sort, splice and catalogue your films into shorter clips
• Add title pages, your choice of music, scene transitions
• Combine still photos and film together

Note  Whilst we will do our utmost to provide you with the best possible film transfer, it will depend on the condition of the film and how it has been stored. If not stored in a steel film case, the film may have deteriorated and ‘vinegar syndrome’ set-in.

If we feel the quality is not good enough, we will send a snippet of the video to you and you can decide if you would like to go ahead with the transfer.

Tape & Disc

VHS / Video8 / Hi8 / Digital8 and DVD transfer to digital

As we move into a ‘smart’ cloud-based digital world, VHS & DVD’s have become obsolete. Many of our clients have captured hours of video footage from 1980s and 90s but no longer have the media player to view their movies. Video tapes are delicate and will have deteriorated over the years.

CopyCat ScanLab will convert your VHS tapes and video camera tapes to your preferred media* You have the option of receiving the raw video (copied directly from the tape) or have your copies enhanced by adding title pages, your choice of music, scene transitions and so on. We can combine video’s or shorten into separate clips based on event or date if requested.

Note  Whilst we will do our utmost to provide you with the best possible tape transfer, there are a number of problems that may exist:

• The magnetic particles in the tape’s binding that store the image and audio lose their charge, causing audio and visual distortions, static, bleeding colours and fuzzy edges.
• Converting from analogue to digital will result in a loss quality both audio and visual.
• How the tape has been stored, the quality of the original tape used.
• Resolution of VHS tapes are typically digitized at 480p, which is about half the resolution of high definition.
• Malfunction and breakage due to mould, dust, grime, overuse and underuse.

If we feel the quality is not good enough, we will send a snippet of the video to you and you can decide if you would like to go ahead with the transfer.

Other Services

Sharing Folders with Family & Friends – Google Photos and Apple Photos

CopyCat ScanLab can show you how to set-up a Photo Sharing solution for Google or Apple. Once you have organised your Cloud photo folders/albums and added facial recognition, we will show you how to share with your selected group. You can add and remove people to these share groups at any time.

So often a friend or family member will take a photo of you or your event and promise to forward it. Life is busy and it’s easy to forget to send them to everyone in the photo.  Days and weeks go by and you end up having to nag them to do it!

We will show you how they can easily add their digital photos and videos to your shared albums, make comments and ‘like’ them and even download for themselves.

Digital File & Storage Solutions

CopyCat ScanLabs can help you to declutter your Phone, PC, iPad. We can sort your photos and videos into folders – events and/or dates – so that you can easily and quickly find what you are looking for.  We will create an easily reference library so that you can find that special photo or video quickly and easily, remove double-ups, resize, crop and rotate photos.

We can show you how to use google photos and apple photos including face recognition and sharing. If you are not confident with the cloud, let us sort out your Mac or PC etc to easily find the images and videos you are looking for by place person event date.

The Cloud Advice

Not confident with The Cloud? Whether you use Windows or Apple there are amazing apps to allow you to create, maintain and share photos and videos. We can help you learn how to use them to their fullest capabilities.

Shopping

We are happy to purchase your media storage device on your behalf. There will be an additional charge for collection. Minimum 1 hour charge.