Microfilm and microfiche hold large quantities of documents, plans and publications in a very small space. We convert the images into digital files so the content is easy to use on screen, share and preserve for the long term.
Whether you have individual rolls and fiche or a larger collection, we capture every image carefully, check orientation and exposure and place the images in the correct order. You receive well-organised PDF files, with OCR on request so the text can be searched.
Microfilm rolls ready for digitisation. Photo: BiblioCopy.
Digitising microforms
For many years, microfilm and microfiche were the standard method for long-term archiving of large document collections. During filming, the material is reduced to a microscopic scale.
One common use of microfiche was to store extensive car-parts catalogues and repair manuals. Records for construction projects are also frequently stored on microfiche.
Special readers are needed to enlarge microforms back to their original size. Reader-printers once produced A4 enlargements directly from film; today, we use dedicated microfilm scanners to create a digital copy through optical magnification.
You receive the digitised fiche as PDF files, which you can view on screen or print again as a manual, for example.
Our commitment to quality
We create every digital copy manually. This takes more time and effort than automated digitisation, but often produces a better-quality result.
Manual digitisation allows us to correct individual areas of blur and variations in exposure, alignment and image size that automated processing cannot address.
Microforms were produced on special film using bitonal imaging, so intermediate tones such as greyscale were not captured as they appeared in the original. If the original is no longer available, it can still be worthwhile to extract the best possible digital quality from the film.
For very large quantities of microforms, such as complete public-authority collections, this manual process is usually too time-consuming and expensive; automated processing is generally more suitable.
We are happy to redigitise microfilm or microfiche from Stabi Berlin's collections for you.
You can also send us your own or borrowed microfilm and microfiche.