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Like many of us, I have thousands of pictures that I'd like to scan. I've been thinking through the process of doing this and see an immense task. One of the pain points I've identified is the need to place each picture individually on the glass for scanning.
It has me wondering whether there is any open source software that will, given a scan of multiple pictures, automatically identify the individual photos and offer to save them separately. I currently have an HP Photosmart printer/scanner and would like to make use if it if possible.

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I'm not going to put it as an answer since I have never used it, but 30 seconds on google explained that it is often a function of the scanner and produced a link to this software: ransen.com/ransenscan/Testimonials-RansenScan.htm – EBGreen Feb 17 '12 at 14:00
i'd imagine it'd be alot easier to just send the photos off to one of the many many companies that offer large scale scanning operations for practically pennies. – Sirex Feb 17 '12 at 14:13
I already have a scanner - an HP photosmart that is nice but have no such feature. So I'm looking for something "aftermarket". – uSlackr Feb 17 '12 at 14:13
perhaps, but it really is way way easier to just do it that way as a once off. I'm working on the assumption that in this day and age any future photos will be digital, mind. – Sirex Feb 17 '12 at 14:22
@Sirex, thanks for the idea. I generally like to do these things myself – uSlackr Feb 20 '12 at 16:39

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Many scanners and all in one devices have this feature. I don't want to make shopping suggestions but a quick search at Epson, Kodak (is still around) and HP as a start might give you a direction. You can usually put several pictures on a flatbed and the software sorts out individual images. There are also some units that have a document feeder

It seems there are several software options as noted in comments. Photoshop will allow you to scan several photos and then separate. This Photoshop scanning link explains in more detail. Added benefit taht Photoshop is a great too to work with the images separately as well. Photoshop Elements sems to ahve a similar function and a lower cost Elements

There are sure to be many other solutions

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Thanks - I updated my question to say I already have a scanner I'd like to make use of. – uSlackr Feb 17 '12 at 14:14

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