FotoBridge | Digitizing Photos Blog

FotoBridge, the national photo scanning service picked by New York Magazine as "Best Photo Digitizer", recently completed a significant photo scanning engagement to digitize NBCUniversal's corporate photographic archives.

Based at Rockefeller Center, in mid-town Manhattan, NBCUniversal is a collection of some of today's most valuable media assets owned by Comcast and General Electric (51% and 49% respectively). The company traces its' history back to predecessor companies Vivendi Universal and MCA Inc. Formed in 2004 through the merger of GE's NBC with Vivendi's  Universal Entertainment and subsequent buyout by Comcast in 2009. Today, the NBCUniversal family of brands include NBC, Universal Pictures, NBCUniversal Television Group, NBC News, CNBC, MSNBC, Bravo, The Weather Channel and Hulu.

The most recent photo scanning effort included digitizing nearly 40,000 - 35mm slides from the NBCUniversal archives. The collection included one-of-a-kind images of studio leaders, executives, staff, production facilities, costumes, offices, marketing campaigns and events. Now digitally preserved, backed-up and accessible - the collection can be easily leveraged for future events, publications, internal communications, and public relations purposes, among others.

Photo Credit / David Shankbone via Wikipedia

Our life time collections of photo prints, slides, negatives, home movie film and even aging video tapes are vital links to our past. The images captured on these analog media types show us who we are and where we come from like nothing else can. But often these nostalgic family treasures are locked in old deteriorating media and are at great risk of being lost forever.

Digital archiving and backup provides safety, revitalization and enables sharing in a way that can unlock our one-of-a-kind personal content to a myriad of new digital possibilities. FotoBridge, the national photo scanning service, was launched in 2007 to provide a simple and trusted way to digitize large collections of analog media in a secure, timely manner - accessible to everyone.

But how do the professionals at FotoBridge, who are passionate about their mission of preserving the world's highly-valued personal lifetime photo and movie collections, get the word out?

"Word-of-mouth is the best and most effective way of spreading the word about how important digitally preserving your analog memories is... and the services FotoBridge offers to make that simple, affordable and safe" said Julie-Ann Morris, President of FotoBridge. "Often online advertising and social media helps reach new people, but for a service like ours which is based upon trust and personal service - nothing beats real customers sharing their experience with family, friends and colleagues. Occasionally, we also use traditional media promotions in select markets which increases awareness - my personal favorite was a radio spot we sponsored last year featuring up-and-coming national radio and television personality, newspaper columnist, author and MSNBC political analyst Michael Smerconish.

"Have you tried New York Magazine’s Best Photo Digitizer award winner, FotoBridge?  Everyone needs to preseve their irreplaceable photo and home  movie collections; treasured memories are deteriorating with each passing day.  FotoBridge’s secure USA-based facility provides the highest quality scanning and transfer service and they will never send your originals overseas.  Fotobridge provides end-to-end, roundtrip tracking of your precious collection which is why they are trusted by over ten thousand loyal customers, pros, and experts. Go to FotoBridge.com to see how you can enjoy and share newly digital memories in ways previously not possible.  There has never been a safer, more convenient and affordable way to digitially preserve old memories.  FotoBridge offers simple, inclusive flat-rate packages with no hidden charges.  Preserve your visual heritage today with quality and affordability.  Digitize your prints, slides, negatives, home movie film, and videos with a company that has been trusted to preserve over 20 million images (and counting).  Visit them at FotoBridge.com.  Again that’s f-o-t-o Bridge dot com."

News of the unprecedented Colorado wildfires sweeping the state has prompted many companies from across America to search for ways to help those fighting the blazes, those displaced, and people facing catastrophic loss. Lowes, Target, HP and even the Denver Broncos are among the many organizations donating relief funds to The American Red Cross, and lending support in ways that make sense.

For those people being evacuated,  more than 32,000 and increasing, rescuing important documents and treasured, irreplaceable memories in the form of photo prints, slides and analog home movies is often a top priority.

FotoBridge, the national photo scanning service, announced today it is offering safe, free, off-site storage of photo and movie collections at its' facility in New Jersey for up to 90 days. In order to take advantage of this offer, evacuees will be required to securely package and ship their collections via UPS or FedEx to FotoBridge. FotoBridge will secure and store their original media at its' digital archiving facility and return ship to an address designated by the evacuee when determined at no cost, FotoBridge will pay for return shipping via UPS Ground.

"We have been fortunate to have hundreds of customers from Colorado since starting our photo scanning service in 2007", said Julie Ann Morris, President of FotoBridge. "But we know the vast majority of people in Colorado and across the country have yet to digitally preserve and sufficiently backup their  highly valued analog collections. Safely handling and storing one-of-a-kind, personal photo and movie collections is what we do everyday - it's how we can help", added Ms. Morris.

For additional information, please contact FotoBridge at www.FotoBridge.com, toll-free at 1-877-809-8636, or at info@FotoBridge.com.

Photo Credit / Creative Commons by USDAgov

You know you have those old photos in a shoebox collecting dust, fading, and risking damage every day. Well, it’s time to drag them out for a chance to win the ultimate photo organizing, photo sharing and photo scanning and archiving prize packages sponsored by FotoBridge!

Strong demand across the United States for FotoBridge's photo scanning services and an expanding market for digital preservation and conversion services, means new career opportunities in New Jersey at FotoBridge.

If you live in the Greater Philadelphia Metro/Southern New Jersey area and have the drive to deliver world-class digital imaging services, we'd like you to join our team of dedicated professionals.

• Do you have a passion for Photography and Digital Imaging?

• Are you a digital citizen that really “gets” it when things move online?

• Can you solve technical challenges without missing a beat?

• Do you have digital image workflow design & optimization skills?

• Are you a writer or creative digital content creator that lives to produce and share engaging content?

Got at least 3 items covered?  Read on… there is more!

• Do you have the energy and drive to move forward at 90mph, when others are happy to go 55mph?

• Can you energize a team to deliver for your cause and accept responsibility for outcomes?

• Are you a supportive, positive, competitive type?

• Are you an executer that understands the difference between activity and productivity?

Still reading? OK, then if you have the ambition to join a fast-moving startup company because you can contribute – contact us, we need you.

EMail us at Careers@FotoBridge.com

Positions:

Operations (Managers, Specialists, Associates)

- Capture & Processing
- Quality Assurance
- Fufillment

Marketing (Manager, Specialist)

- PR, Branding, content creation
- Online integrated campaign execution
- Social Media & EMail marketing

CVs, resumes, links received will be retained for 6 months. FotoBridge response limited to indications of FotoBridge interest.

For many family historians, perhaps the only thrill that surpasses finding long lost family photos, is finding photos that depict our ancestor's role in history itself. For today's baby-boomers, those images are often of uncles, aunts, cousins, parents and grandparents that were part of the the so-called "greatest generation". Sometimes called the GI Generation, Tom Brokaw popularized the term "greatest generation" in his reports chronicling the stories of Americans that grew up during the Great Depression and fought to victory in World War II.

Today, with help from online sites like fold3, there is a way to preserve and share those old military images being rediscovered with each passing day. Digitizing photos enables those rare, one-of-a-kind family heirloom military photographs to be shared, and more importantly, digitally preserved forever. So whether you scan photos yourself or choose a photo scanning service to get the work done, find a community site and start sharing your family's role in history. For military history, that site is fold3.

Originally launched in 2007 as Footnote.com, fold3 began with a huge online records and image database of over 5 million original documents. It quickly gained popularity among genealogists and historians as the got-to place for military documents - quickly and easily accessible online. In 2011, Footnote was re-branded as "fold3" (which comes from our military's flag folding ceremony) by Ancestry.com, which acquired it's parent company in 2010.

fold3 has done an especially good job of turning government records dating back to the Revolutionary War and historical photos into easily accessible content. When this content is combined and linked online with crowd-sourced images from personal collections, powerful stories of everyday soldiers and forgotten heroes and their families can be preserved and shared in a compelling form of digital storytelling.

NOTE: Images source fold3 via site