organizing slides

**Saxon Holt s*@saxonholt.com**

>> May I ask how you organize your slides?

My system also requires the use of computer tracking as I am well over
250,000 slides.  Physically the slides are all filed in standard slide pages
(which hold 20 slides) by project or garden and cross referenced with
botanic names and pertinent key word information such as perennial, pergola,
etc. in the computer.

The slide pages are stored in file folders in bankers boxes chronologically
as to when the file was first started. The slides are numbered by where I
can find them, so 684-20 would be last slide on the first page of that 684
file.  Frame 684-121 would be the first slide on the 6th page - because the
first 5 pages hold 120 frames.   As I add slides to a job file the position
number with-in a particular file grows.  As we add slides we use the
computer to enter new information on placeholder slides (anywhere from 1 to
6 per page) so we don't have to enter captions on every slide.  Actual
captions and file numbers are only printed (on Avery labels) when they are
submitted to publishers.

I use a software program developed for photographers called Hindsight.
Besides printing labels, it allows multiple search criteria by job number,
key word or scans, and organizes submissions and all the paperwork.  While
scanned images can be part of the database and we do have several thousand
scanned, I find it *far* easier to do text search when looking for just the
right image.

As an aside, while digital imaging is becoming more important in how we
preview slides to clients, it will be a very long time before we actually
send digital files for publication.  The best quality  scans that publishers
need for great reproduction are from very large files - 50 to 100 megs.  Not
only is it expensive and time consuming for a photographer to scan images at
that level it is difficult to store, sort, and review.  Low res scans may
look fine of the web but are no indication of the quality for print
reproduction.

Saxon Holt

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