When it comes to scanning, many people today have multi-function printers that will also scan photographs. When you scan in an image from a print your scanning software does it all for you, you just hit a button and the job is done.
Before you send a photograph scan for repair, you need to look at the settings in the software to see how it is going to save your image. Does it give you any options to alter the way the file is saved or scanned? Most scanning software will give you a choice between a TIFF file or a JPG file. Look at the software that came with your scanner and check if you have the option to change the way it saves your images. Phrases to look for in the manual or software settings are best setting or the lowest compression, lossless format or large file size. Look for the top setting. 

A TIFF file, although larger, will give the best results. A JPEG file is a format that discards data to save space when saving. The higher the compression the more data is discarded and the less detail there will be in your image. Try to scan you image so the longest side of the photo ends up at around 3000 pixels long, just crop to scan the photo not the whole scanner bed. To do this measure your photo in inches and set the scanning DPI (dots per inch) as near as possible to these suggested settings:

• 10 inches or above, set the scanner to 300 Dpi
• 10 to 9 inches set the scanner to 300 Dpi
• 7 to 8 inches set the scanner to 400 Dpi
• 5 to 6 inches set the scanner to 500 to 600 Dpi
• 3 to 4 inches set the scanner to 1200 Dpi
• 1 to 2 inches set the scanner to 2400 Dpi

If your scanner manual mentions a maximum optical scanning resolution, scanning above this will not help. Any higher and the scanner will be using interpolation - that is adding new pixels between actual scanned pixels and were not not there in the actual scan. We want to avoid any kind of interpolation if we want a good scan, we only want to restoring the original details not those that have been padded out by your scanner software.

Do not simply set your scanner to the highest resolution and think that will be fine, it is not necessarily how high you can scan, its is about aiming for the correct scanning resolution.

If you find it impossible to get near the ideal scaning resolution just get as near as you can or send your print to us and let us scan it for you.

In order for a restoration to be carried out to a high quality highly compressed files must be avoided!