How to scan old photos for the best restoration

Before you start

• Wash and dry your hands, and hold prints by the edges. Fingerprints on old photographs are hard to remove.
• Brush off dust gently with a soft, clean brush or a camera lens blower. Don't use water, wipes or cleaning sprays on the print itself.
• Wipe the scanner glass with a dry microfibre cloth. Every speck on the glass ends up in the scan.
• Take prints out of frames and plastic sleeves if they come out easily, because glass and plastic add glare and reflections. If a photograph is stuck, leave it where it is (more on that below).

Scanning with a flatbed scanner

A flatbed scanner gives the most consistent result, and an inexpensive one, or the scanner on a home printer, is fine. These are the settings that matter:

• Resolution. 600 dpi for ordinary snapshots and postcard-sized prints. 1200 dpi for small prints, such as wallet-sized photos, so there's enough detail to work with. For large prints (A4 or 8×10 inches and up), 300 to 400 dpi is plenty.
• Colour mode. Scan in colour, even for black-and-white photographs. Old prints are rarely pure grey, and colour keeps their warm tones and subtle shading.
• Automatic fixes. Switch off auto-enhance, colour restoration, sharpening and dust removal if your scanner software offers them. You want a faithful copy of the print as it is.
• Cropping. Leave a small border around the photograph. It's better to crop afterwards than to lose an edge.
• File type. Save as a JPEG at the highest quality setting. Jibbidy accepts JPG, PNG and HEIC files up to 20MB. If you keep a TIFF as your archive copy, upload a JPEG version.

Using your phone instead

No scanner? A careful phone photo usually works well.

• Find soft, even daylight near a window, but out of direct sun. Turn the flash off.
• Lay the print flat on a dark, matte surface, such as a table or a sheet of card.
• Hold the phone directly above the photograph and parallel to it, so the corners look square rather than wedge-shaped.
• Watch for your own shadow, and for glare on glossy prints. If you see a bright patch, move the photo or yourself until it has gone.
• Fill the frame by moving closer, not by zooming in. Tap the screen to focus on the photograph.
• Use the picture as it is, with no filters or edits. iPhone HEIC files are fine to upload.

Photos stuck in albums or frames

Photographs on self-adhesive ("magnetic") album pages, or stuck to the glass of a frame, can tear if you pull them. Don't force them. Scan the whole album page, or photograph it in place using the phone tips above, then crop to the picture you want.

What a good scan can't fix

Scanning captures the photograph as it is. Jibbidy then sharpens fading, blur and softness, and brings back detail in faces, clothing and backgrounds. It doesn't repair tears, creases, scratches or stains. Those need a human retoucher, who typically charges £20 to £60 a photo, and we'd rather tell you that up front.

Quick checklist

• Clean hands, clean glass, dust brushed off
• 600 dpi (1200 for small prints), scanned in colour
• Automatic fixes off, a small border left, saved as a high-quality JPEG
• On a phone: soft daylight, no flash, phone held flat above the print