Why wait to digitize old photos? Right now is the perfect time to explore DIY photo digitizing or seek out a photo scanning service.

How to Digitize Photos in Time for the Holiday Season

September 5, 2025 by Talia Cirangle

As the holiday season approaches, many families find themselves reminiscing over old photo albums and shoeboxes of pictures. These fading photographs hold decades of memories, but people often tuck them away in a closet. Want a better alternative? Let's discuss how to digitize photos, and why doing so not only preserves them for future generations, but allows for easy sharing and holiday gifting.

Why You Should Digitize Your Family Photos

The holidays are all about family, stories, and togetherness – and nothing brings generations together like looking through old photos. Having a digital set of family photos ready for the holiday season offers several heartwarming benefits:

Instant Sharing: Imagine being able to transform your old family photos into a slideshow you play on Christmas morning. You can share a curated album with relatives who can’t attend in-person holiday gatherings. Instead of passing around fragile photos and heavy albums, everyone can view the memories on a TV or tablet.

Make Great Holiday Gifts: Digital photos unlock a world of personalized gift ideas. From custom ornaments to wall art, you can turn old family photos into thoughtful presents just by digitizing them. In fact, Photokive’s service can create a beautiful photo book from your digitized images. These make great gifts for parents or siblings.

Protection of Timeless Memories: Over time, paper photos can fade and discolor, and accidents can ruin them. Once scanned and backed up, your memories are safe from such risks. Photokive even offers customers a free protection guarantee against natural disasters. In short, digitizing your family's memories now will preserve them for many holidays to come.

Early Fall: The Best Time to Start Digitizing Photos

If the idea of scanning your photos sounds daunting, timing can make all the difference. September to October is the perfect time to start digitizing, so everything’s ready for the holidays. Here’s why:

A Calm Before the Holiday Rush: This window is ideal for tackling a project like photo digitizing. Distractions will be minimal ahead of holiday shopping and events. This will allow you more dedicated time to organize your pictures or coordinate with a photo digitizer.

Ample Turnaround Time: Beginning in early fall ensures your digital images will be ready before the holidays. This, then, gives you time to create albums, craft personalized gifts, or simply enjoy them with family. Starting now ensures you beat the end-of-year rush and avoid expediting fees.

Better Weather Conditions: Autumn’s milder weather is gentler on old photos than the hot, humid summer months. Plus, fall’s shorter days (more indoor time) make it convenient to focus on organizing your photo project.

Post-Summer Decluttering: Sorting through boxes of photos fits naturally into the rhythm of preparing for holiday guests. As you tidy up, why not finally address the old photo albums in the attic? With digital copies secured, you can easily repurpose these sentimental albums.

With the right tools, at-home photo scanning is great for small jobs, giving you more control over the pace and flow. A Photokive professional demonstrates how we shoot with an "album-focus". Our technology allows us to preserve your album pages while getting the best digital result.

How to Digitize Photos:
DIY vs. Professional Photo Scanning

When considering how to digitize photos, you can do it yourself or use a professional photo scanning service. Both options will get your old pictures into digital form, but there are pros and cons to each. Here’s a look at each approach to help you decide the best way to digitize photos for your needs:

DIY Photo Digitizing (Scanning at Home)

At-home photo scanning typically involves using a home scanner or a smartphone scanning app. The upside to DIY is that it gives you full control. You can work at your own pace, and keep costs minimal if you already have the equipment.

DIY scanning is also time-consuming and labor-intensive. The average American household has roughly 3,000 printed photos. Digitizing a collection of that size could take several weekends to wade through. Additionally, handling delicate old photos or album pages yourself also risks wear and tear if you’re not careful.

If you choose this route, be sure to budget enough time and invest in a decent scanner and photo editing software.

Professional Photo Scanning

A photo digitizing service takes the bulk of the work off your hands. You send your prints and albums to experienced technicians with professional equipment. The clear advantage here is convenience and quality. A good service will save you countless hours.

Another benefit is safe handling; professionals know how to deal with fragile, aging photos. Photokive’s uses a photography system that does not require you to remove photos from old albums.

The drawback to going with a professional service are typically cost and turnaround time. That's why it's important to choose a trustworthy service with a solid track record.

If you opt for a professional digitizer, do your research to find a reputable photo scanning provider. Look for features like secure shipping, package tracking, and clarity on how they organize and return your images.

How Photokive Makes It Easy to Digitize Photos

Photokive is a photo digitizing service that uses a white-glove approach to preserving photo prints and albums. Their process is straightforward and user-friendly. Here’s a step-by-step look at what to expect:

Request a Photokive Box: Photokive will send you a shipping kit with everything needed to safely pack your photos.
Fill it Up: Photokive’s process is album-friendly, so there’s no need to remove individual photos. Simply place your albums, scrapbooks, and any loose photos into the photo box. You can use the provided labels to indicate how you’d like the digital files organized.
Send it Back: The provided UPS shipping label is trackable so you can monitor the package en route. You will also receive regular updates from your Photokive Concierge at each stage of production.
Photokive Experts Get To Work: Photokive’s team of professional photographers will expertly digitize every image with care. They utilize high-resolution cameras and scanners to achieve optimal clarity. Digital images come out cleaner and more vibrant than the originals.
Download and Share: You can access your digital archive via a secure online gallery with 90 days of free cloud storage. Guests can download images to their devices or share the gallery link with family members.

The Kive Company has helped over 500,000 families preserve their memories since 2012. So, you can feel confident that your precious photos are in good hands.