Photo Restoration – Guest Blogger

Posted on November 14, 2014 by pixologie

We are lucky to have a guest blogger who happens to be a local Milwaukee artist right here . . . enjoy this blog reposted from Rosie Hartmann – who does Pixologie’s photo restoration!

I was so absorbed reading this book about photo restoration that I kinda took my picture of the day (POD) late and it was of the book. I get obsessive, I admit it. With the dabbling I have been doing in photo restoration I find a peace and tranquility. I can’t explain how soothing I find it to work on the restorations. I never expected that.

I do not like clinical things with my art or photography. Restoring old photos is very clinical. It started out with wondering if I could do a restoration. Now, it is turning into something more. I thought about this a bit. I wondered why I would like this kind of work so much. Moreover I wondered why I found some peace doing it.

This is what I came up with; It’s kind of like rebuilding and restoring yourself. You need to be careful to keep the integrity of the original picture just as I need to keep the core parts of what makes me, me. I think with any trials and tribulations we have seeing ourselves get repaired is often not a peaceful process yet there is peace in it.

For more information about Rosie, her own blog & her art website, go to: http://www.rosiehartmann.com

Four Things You Should Do With Your Antique Photos

Posted on November 11, 2014 by pixologie

What’s the oldest photo or album you have?

One of our clients gave us a truly historic antique book filled with heritage portraits to scan. He knew that all of the photos were of his mother’s family . . . and he knew the names of a couple of the people in the book.

Just look at how beautiful and fragile this album is. We gingerly opened it and used our Flip Pal scanner to gently scan the photos. The album was made to slide the portraits into slots and we couldn’t remove them due to the risk of tearing the pages.

Here’s four things you should do with your antique photos as soon as you can!

Gather all of them into one place for safe storage
Sit down with your family’s historian or oldest living relative and start identifying who is in the old photos. Use a post it on the back of the photo temporarily. Enjoy the reminiscing.
Scan your photos with a flatbed scanner, and the backs of the photos if there is identifying names and dates.
Tag the photos digitally with the name of the relative or use other photo organizing software to document the story behind the portrait.

Save the photos, portraits and save the stories!

My mom had a photo of her Uncle Barnny – and he was quite the character. I still have the photos and the stories of how he set their house on fire with his moonshine operation in the basement. Maybe I’ll write about that in another blog!

Let us know if you need any help with preserving the old family portraits, albums and photos – we’d be glad to teach you how, do it with you or do it for you!

www.pixologieinc.com

414-731-1881

Fun with the Videos Teenagers Make! (Also: Holiday Gift Idea #7)

Posted on November 8, 2014 by pixologie

This video made us smile a LOT and laugh – the boys were so charming in making a music video in Spanish and funny with their antics. Do you know any kids who made videos with camcorders back in the day (not so very long ago?) Of course, today anyone can make and share a video.

But what about ten, fifteen, twenty years ago and more? There are millions and millions of fun family moments caught and trapped on film and videotape.

These clips are off a MiniDV tape we converted to a digital file for one of our clients who graciously agreed to let us share the video with our followers. She has brought us over 40 of her family VHS, MiniDV, and 8mm tapes to convert to digital files so she can view them, edit them and share the memories. They have just loved reliving those memories that really were long ago and forgotten.

So . . . this is Holiday Gift Idea #7 – (Don’t worry, I am going out of order, if you want a full list of our gift ideas at Pixologie, just email us at contact@pixologieinc.com! : ) Here’s how movie conversions can be a great gift idea:

Convert a few movies to DVDs; share as Christmas gifts to watch on the big television or computer
Convert some of your VHS tapes to digital files that you can edit, clip and pull together a movie of family memories to share at your holiday gift gatherings.
Purchase gift certificates from Pixologie to give to family members who you know have movies they need to get digitized.

Videos are so much more powerful than photos – we can see our family and friends (some of whom may not even be with us anymore) living, having fun, talking and making memories. Let us know how we can help!

Find us at http://www.pixologieinc.com or call 414-731-1881

When Did You Last Look at Your Photos from 2013?

Posted on October 23, 2014 by pixologie

family album with DVD

Remember 2013? Hmm. . . if someone asked me straight out what was great about last year, I truly don’t know what I would say. Life is so busy, I can’t remember last week much less over a year ago.

This is a shame, because my family has amazingly fun memories to share and celebrate together. So I tried out something new – making a digital photo album with just my 2013 photos in it. See the photo above.

I’m holding the photobook open to our 2013 Hartmann Family Reunion pictures. Look at Alex holding that basketball – he’d won it in our famous brown bag auction and wasn’t going to let anyone take it away from him!

Check out a few more pages . . . I really have to say, my eyes tear up when I think about all the blessings my family has had. Below are photos from New Year’s Eve at my dear friend Tammy’s house – was so much fun. My husband was a nurse at the time and had to work the night shift – so my kids and I had an absolute blast with Tammy, friends, neighbors and a whole houseful of kids.

Oh my goodness, 2013 was the year we drove to Yellowstone National Park – oh the sites we saw. My book has four pages and 24 photos that capture the best of the best moments from that trip. And my kids had such an adventure. We highly recommend Yellowstone for your next summer vacation!

Then there’s the holidays. . . I have about four pages of holiday photos, just enough to capture the essence of celebrating Christmas with the family. This is the first page of December memories with me and the kids making Christmas cookies and photos of snow – and our crazy dog Tillie jumping to catch snow flung at her!

I love that my family has a physical book to look through and see how much fun and adventure we have together.

How would you feel showing a book like this to show your children, family and friends with your best moments of 2013?

You can experience it yourself – with the Pixologie Digital Family Photo Album with DVD. After showing this concept to people, overwhelmingly, the consensus was that we should continue making these books for others who want to celebrate and share the best stories of their lives!

Click here to learn more – http://www.pixologieinc.com.

To order a Digital Family Photo Album with DVD – http://www.shop.pixologieinc.com

Who Knew We Could Scan 60,000 Photos in 10 Days!

Posted on October 1, 2014 by pixologie

To celebrate International Save Your Photos Day 2014, Pixologie committed to an audacious goal of scanning 100,000 photos in the run-up to Saturday, September 27. Here’s what we actually achieved:

61,000 photos scanned with our Kodak Picture Saver high speed scanners and preserved for over twenty individuals and families
Another 50,000 approximately on our docket to be scanned throughout October for an additional six families

Lessons Learned

With our Save Your Photos Day goal and event, our clients felt a call to action. Most of our clients want to get their photos organized, but many needed that extra motivation to start. With the extra attention to saving photos, people understood that flooding, tornados, hard drive crashes, etc. are a real threat to their family memories. The devastation of losing photos in a disaster or to time was more apparent because of this special day.

However, we found that our clients had been waiting for the day to be organized before bringing their photos in for scanning services. Our goal was impacted by the fact that we had to physically remove most of the photos from the albums brought in. We did not just want numbers, we wanted our clients to have a usable digital archive of their photos.

20140926_084742

Here’s a story of a great couple whom we’ve known for over three years and who have not been ready to get their photos out of a chaotic situation in their closet.

Over 50 Years of Memories Too Overwhelming to Even Look At

Stephen and Mary had fifty-five diverse photo albums, all different sizes, types and levels of deterioration along with hundreds of photo envelopes – overloading the shelves in their bedroom closet and never brought out to be shared. Even though most of the photos were in albums, the memories spanned over 50 years of marriage and were so overwhelming that the escapades of their eight children growing up, celebrations, travel around the world, and their annual mission work were hidden away. We picked up their photo album collection, took out all the photos from the albums and scanned the pictures.

After the scanning process, we tagged their digital files with relevant keywords so they could search their photos for events and important topics. We will return their photos in elegant Legacy Boxes along with DVDs of their photos.

Our next steps are to help them create digital photo books by picking out the best of their photos on topics such as their mission work with an orphanage in Honduras which spans many years and their family “yearbook” featuring and celebrating their traditions and faith.

Because of Save Your Photos Day and the relationship we had developed with them over the years, Stephen and Mary have taken their photos out of their closet and are bringing their memories and stories back into life to be celebrated and shared.

Consider Scanning a First Step to Getting Your Photos Organized

As mentioned before, we found that many of our SYPD clients were waiting until they organized their photos to bring them in for scanning. Unfortunately, that day doesn’t usually come when you have time to organize your photos, and instead, you are rushing around creating further photo chaos trying to find needed pictures for a special event.

Some Ways We Can Help

Bring your albums and boxes of photos to Pixologie for Open Studio Time. We’ll get you started on preparing your photos for scanning.
Have a lot of photos to scan? Consider renting our Kodak PS50 to scan your photos at home. It comes with a laptop, so scanning is super easy and super fast at up to 50 photos per minute.
Still too overwhelmed? Give us a call. We’d be happy to talk with you and help you make a plan to get your photos out of chaos and back into life to be celebrated and shared!

In the end, we were humbled that our clients embraced our goal for Save Your Photos Day and feel so blessed to be a part of making sure their stories were recovered, shared and preserved!

Please feel free to contact us with any questions!

Email: mollieandann@pixologieinc.com

Telephone: 414-690-0791

About the Save Your Photos Alliance Pixologie is a member of the Save Your Photos Alliance, a group committed to being the world’s premier organization for the SAFEGUARDING, RECOVERING, RESTORING, and REUNITING of photos and treasured memorabilia before and after disasters occur.

Learn more about the Alliance at: www.saveyourphotos.org

Learn more about the National Disaster Photo Rescue organization: http://nationaldisasterphotorescue.org/

Family Photos Deserve an Audacious Goal

Posted on September 25, 2014 by pixologie

Three Things You Need to Know About International Save Your Photos Day

Craziness at Pixologie over the past week . . . since we committed to scanning 100,000 photos in honor of International Save Your Photos Day this Saturday. With our Kodak Picture Saver scanners, we have scanned anywhere from 2,000 to over 10,000 photos a day and have seen so many memories that are finally coming out of boxes, envelopes and deteriorated albums. (WARNING: DO NOT ATTEMPT THIS AT HOME, SEVERE RISK OF FRUSTRATION AND THROWING FLATBED SCANNER OUT THE WINDOW!)

Here’s three things you need to know about Save Your Photos Day and why we went out (like way out) on a limb to bring attention to this day.

ONE: There is a Save Your Photos Alliance

We were humbled during the Association of Personal Photo Organizers’ 2014 National Conference when volunteers spoke about helping tornado and flooding victims be reunited with some of their photos.

Out of this presentation was born a group of photo organizers, non-profits and businesses who have committed to the safeguarding, recovering, restoring and reuniting of photos and treasured memorabilia before and after disasters occur.

The Save Your Photos Alliance designated Saturday, September 27 as International Save Your Photos Day. Pixologie is a proud member of the alliance and thrilled to be having a special Open House here at our studio this weekend.

TWO: The National Disaster Photo Rescue (NDPR) Group Proves Photos Matter

The NDPR online index of recovered photos

Located in Joplin, Missouri, the NDPR volunteers have rescued, cleaned, indexed and stored over 35,000 photos and documents that were blown from homes and businesses on May 22, 2011. Over half of these items have been returned to their owners. Here’s a link to their website.

A photo is a lifeline when disaster hits. Please take a few minutes to watch how Joplin has recovered from the horrific tornado that tore apart their town. While the video doesn’t deal with the photo recovery efforts, it definitely makes one think about all we have to be thankful for.

THREE: You Can Help – Your Donation Will Be Matched by Pixologie Up To $1,000

Run by volunteers, the NDPR could use our help for expenses in helping these photos be saved. Donations will be used to provide mileage reimbursement and meals for volunteers who donate countless hours of service both at disaster sites as well as working with recovered photos to repair and restore them for return to the owner.

We have a challenge grant for the NDPR – we will donate matching dollars to the NDPR for every dollar we collect for Save Your Photos Day up to $1,000.

So. . . whether or not you have your own photos to save or you’d like to help someone else save their photos, please plan an hour to stop on by our Open House this Saturday.

Your photos really do matter – ask anyone who has lost their photos to a tornado or flood.

How about joining us in making your own audacious goal?

Get your photos out of chaos and back into your life to be protected, celebrated and shared!

Save Your Photos Day at Pixologie

Saturday, September 27, 1 to 4 pm

9803 South 13th Street, Oak Creek, WI 53154

RSVP to 414-690-0791 or FACEBOOK

Stepping Out of Photos For a Moment . . . Can You Find Your Music?

Posted on September 12, 2014 by pixologie

When you need motivation for getting going on your photo project, music can be extremely inspiring. One of my favorite songs about memories is by Bon Jovi . . . (Okay, it is a bit romantic, but he sings about photos!!!!)

WATCH You Want to Make A Memory Video

SWITCHING GEARS FROM PHOTOS TO MUSIC

There is a lot of music that I love listening to while working on things that have taken me a while to get to. I am switching gears for this blog from organizing photos to talk about your music collection. Why in the world would I do that?

Music matters too! It inspires, sets the mood and brings back many memories. (Calling the 80s – my childhood & Uptown Girl!)
Pixologie has connected with Murfie – an online music collection and store. Murfie is a partner of the Association of Personal Photo Organizers which is important to us – because it tells us that Murfie understands the significance of photos and memories and what we do.

Murfie is a fellow Wisconsin business – located in Madison just an hour and a half from our Pixologie Studio in Oak Creek, WI. We had to go check them out especially when Tyler Stubbe, long time Murfie employee, told us they have over half a million CDs in their warehouse of music.

MY TOUR AT MURFIE HEADQUARTERS

Here’s what I learned during my tour in Madison. You can:

Stream your CD and vinyl collection eliminating the need to store hundreds and hundreds of old CD cases in your home
Sell your CDs and vinyl records in a personal shop
Purchase CDs (digitally from other Murfie members – you are buying a physical CD that Murfie stores for you.)
Download CD files to add to iTunes and other music playing software
Trade albums with other members
Add albums to your Wishlist, choose a price, Autobuy and much more

Okay – I couldn’t resist taking some fun photos of the Murfie team.

The Murfie team let me ship my classic music collection in to try their services out. I loved it – thought it was supercool to hear MY music over the internet. (Literally, I was playing my CD – Murfie copies EVERY single CD that is shipped to them – per their obligations to the music industry.)

And. . . I loved to see that I could very easily sell my CDs also. And. . . I found Bon Jovi’s Lost Highway album for $3.00 – which has my very favorite “Let’s Make a Memory” song on it.

So – it’s a THUMBS UP for our fellow Wisconsin business – Murfie Music!!!

If you are interested in Murfie, here’s a discount code for you! Send your music collection in and use discount code: PIXMSN1 for 10% off!

www.murfie.com

Who Goes to Thailand Alone?

Posted on August 8, 2014 by pixologie

Pixologie Co-Founder Mollie Bartelt’s sister does!

Accomplished photographer and artist, Rosie Hartmann traveled to Thailand in February 2013 to experience a thrilling solo adventure where there was no turning back (to safe Bay View, Wisconsin!)

Rosie is my sister. As she shared beautiful photos of Thailand on Facebook during that trip, she delighted us all with the mysteriousness of that far land; foreign lifestyle and sampling of beautiful color the Thai culture offers the senses.

So, we saw maybe 100 photos that she posted during her week. And then, all 2200 photos that she took stayed hidden on a hard drive for the next 18 months. Then, Rosie gave Pixologie her hard drive and we designed a book – no words necessary for this one.

Last night, she picked up her book – and as she turned pages, the stories just flowed out of her. Flowers, food, expensive Coca Cola, panda bears, buddhas and so much more. She was thrilled and couldn’t wait to show everyone the final product – since most people had stopped asking when they’d get to see all of her Thailand pictures.

Please go to our Facebook page and enjoy the pages and experiences of Thailand that Rosie brought back for us all. And. . . come into our studio to see a copy. The images bring out many emotions in all of us who look through Rosie’s work.

Thank you for sharing your trip Rosie!

Thailand by Rosie Hartmann – View on Facebook!

Rosie Hartmann, Artist & Photographer Website: www.rosiehartmann.com

And. . . if you have photos from an amazing vacation – don’t let them sit on your computer! Call us: 414-690-0791 or email: contact@pixologieinc.com.

http://www.pixologieinc.com

We Survived Shark Tank Casting Call Today! : )

Posted on July 21, 2014 by pixologie

What a day we had at Pixologie! A Shark Tank kind of day complete with our 60 second pitch, plenty of photos ops and lots of fun at the Milwaukee Art Museum.

Thanks to US Cellular, Shark Tank had the open casting call in Milwaukee today. We’ve had so many people tell us we should submit our business to be on the show – that it seemed like a no-brainer to get in line at 5:30 am this morning to join the line of other would be “bait” for the sharks!

The sunrise at the Milwaukee Art Museum!

At 5:30 am, there was a nice line going around the railing on the South side of the building. We figured we had around 60 people in front of us . . . and the line stretched out down the steps of the museum and just south to Michigan Street. The first people in line had arrived at 2:30 pm the day before and slept overnight! We thought about that – but we are NOT that fanatical about the front row! : )

At 6:00, when we were fresh and ready!

We enjoyed visiting with the other people waiting in line and we definitely made some new friends. In a way, this casting call was like a big networking event. We also had fun watching all the media, Shark Tank staff and US Cellular staff with video cameras interviewing people. We saw fun clothing, a cabinet maker, an awesome type of thermostat, an annual birthday book journal, kitty litter picker-upper, makeup and much, much more.

He created a make-up line!

Finally, Scott Salyers came up to announce the handing out of bracelets. While we waited for ours – he was gracious enough to have his photo taken with us!

With Scott Salyers – funny, funny guy! Made us laugh a lot during our time at the casting call!

And then . . . our Shark Tank bracelet arrived and looks so good below along with our Rustic Cuff bracelet which states “Do not go where the path may lead; go instead where there is no path and leave a trail!” We are blessed every day knowing that our work will help others learn how photo organization and management can bring memories out of chaos and back into life to be celebrated and shared!

Woohoo! #53 in line!

Around 9:15 we were invited inside and loved, loved the air conditioning! Everyone was encouraged to find a seat where Scott then gave tips, instructions and funny smart aleck remarks. Put everyone at ease! (Like they wouldn’t be timing us with timers; that we didn’t have to be perfect – but be ourselves and do be sure to ask for a specific amount of money. )

The pitches went very fast. Around 10:12 they called the first numbers and by 11:05, I think they were calling us up! In the room where we gave our pitch, they had five tables set up for a quick turnaround. We got set up quickly!

Our pitch went exactly as we planned and practiced. . .

Gave a great, relevant statistic (Yahoo! reports that 1 trillion photos will be taken this year and that is in addition to the 3.5 trillion already taken since the 1800s)
Had a fun visual (ours was a clear container of lots of photos, slides, old albums, VHS tapes all mixed together) – the casting gal said it looked like her mother’s house!
Introduced ourselves and our company
A couple of lines about what we do (Photos out of chaos and into life to be celebrated & shared, etc. etc)
A line about why we are unique (hands-on help, studio location & trademark licensing)
Our ask – you’ll find out what ours was if we are ever on the show! : )

The gal said we did great – and she smiled at us! We don’t think we could have done it any better!

We’ll find out how we did in the next week. If we get a phone call, we’ll get a second interview. No phone call? Well, we had a WONDERFUL time!

Back out into the gathering area, we were so happy that we hadn’t been devoured and spit back out by the casting crew! Then we met Barclay Pollak, from US Cellular’s sister company, TDS to mingle and interview some of us entrants. We had fun telling him about Pixologie – and he asked us how we knew he had lots of VHS tapes at home. (Because everyone over 20 either has VHS tapes or they have their parents!)

Barclay, Ann and another really nice guy – they owe us a video in a month or two! : )

After that we headed over to the US Cellular Semi-Truck Trailer/Entertainment Center and thanked the staff there for helping bring Shark Tank to Milwaukee!

We came, we pitched, we survived!

POSTSCRIPT – To write this blog, I used the photos from two cell phones, a camera card, the camera’s memory, Twitter & Facebook. It was hard! No wonder we need photo organizers! : )

Website: pixologieinc.com

Business Development: pixologiebusinessdevelopment.com

Fantastic Vacation Photos? Don’t bet on your phone or Facebook being the place to store those memories!

Posted on July 16, 2014 by pixologie

Capturing City Center at Dusk in Las Vegas

Viva Las Vegas! I just finished an amazing trip out to Nevada’s hottest spot (literally!) where the day offers beautiful scenic day trips and the nightlife is loud, eye-popping and colorful. Truly a great girls trip to celebrate one turning 40, we took nearly 500 photos!

Some of our best moments . . .

Checking out the Fremont Street Experience
Trekking around Charleston Mountain
Conquering the Strip
Traveling through the Valley of Fire
Sweating it out at Hoover Dam

As a professional photo organizer, I loved all the opportunities to take pictures of these spots with my traditional digital camera. My girlfriends, by comparison, spent some of their photographic time composing selfies with their smartphones.

Such an interesting contrast of how we wanted to capture our vacation. And I learned a lot about how my friends manage their photos. Here’s what I found fascinating as I know many other people have similar habits:

Smartphones are their photo home. One of my friends actually pulled up a photo on her phone from her last Vegas trip which was several years ago.
Facebook is another home of their photos. My other friend was hoping I could upload my photos so they posted on her timeline. As hard as I tried to get my album up so that it would be on her timeline, I couldn’t figure it out. In order to make it work, she took screen shots of my Facebook album to make her own album to post.
Each of them have an iPhone with a PhotoStream to make the sharing process much easier – but they (as many do) found it confusing to access and navigate.

I know that we are bombarded with photo apps and social media opportunities to share our fun memories. And in the short term, this is great. We loved for our friends and family to track what we experienced on our trip.

For the long term, I wouldn’t want to bet on smartphones and social media to be the place where I go to find my photos and enjoy the memories.

Here’s my few suggestions on how to manage your photos once so that the sharing, celebrating and remembering is accomplished all at once!

Take your wonderful photos (all of them – both on smartphone and camera) Delete the ones you don’t want.
Download the photos to your computer – save in a consistent place (Mac – iPhoto; PC – Windows Explorer)
Review again and delete unneeded photos
Then share to your social media, order prints, etc. and enjoy.

I would love to help you with your photo questions. Feel free to email me at mollieb@pixologieinc.com and let’s get your memories in a better place!

In the meantime, enjoy this final selfie of the three of us – it’s my favorite from the whole trip!