Acid--hurts photos or paper?

Apr '05 Scrapperbee

The posts are always warning against wood, lignin, etc., touching photos. In my old (very old) scrapbooks, which I made before acid and lignin were even talked about, the photos are still okay, but the paper and the scrapbooks fell apart. Why am I confused?
Apr '05 Princess_Belle

RE: Scrapperbee: The posts are always warning against wood, lignin, etc., touching photos. In my old (very old) scrapbooks, which I made before acid and lignin were even talked about, the photos are still okay, but the paper and the scrapbooks fell apart. Why am I confused?

Acid damages photos and paper and usually changes their colour ... have you got any photos that are 20 years + old in those old sticky albums? Chances are the colours are quite different to reality.

High lignin content in paper breaks it break down faster and as a general rule the cheaper the paper the higher the lignin content. Newspaper has a very high lignin content.

I think you probably had a scrapbook with a high lignin content. It's good news that the photos are ok, so that means you can transfer them to another scrapbook, which I highly recommend ... or at least an acid/lignin free photo album.
Apr '05 Amandalea

RE: Princess_Belle: Acid damages photos and paper and usually changes their colour ... have you got any photos that are 20 years + old in those old sticky albums? Chances are the colours are quite different to reality.High lignin content in paper breaks it break down faster and as a general rule the cheaper the paper the higher the lignin content. Newspaper has a very high lignin content. I think you probably had ...

They may have fallen apart due to the type of glue you used too.
Apr '05 Karen B

RE: Amandalea: They may have fallen apart due to the type of glue you used too.

Are you taking REALLY old photos, like old family heirloom black and whites? They used a different chemical process than is used now. Many new black and whites are actually printed with a color process, but I believe even the old black and whites will be damaged eventually by acid.
Apr '05 Scrapperbee

RE: Karen B: Are you taking REALLY old photos, like old family heirloom black and whites? They used a different chemical process than is used now. Many new black and whites are actually printed with a color process, but I believe even the old black and whites will be damaged eventually by acid.

Some of the photos are really old, almost all are black and white, so maybe that's why they weren't harmed, at least much. And, yes, I have taken my pictures out of the old scrapbooks and am in the process of redoing them--which is slow work, because I have many years of pictures and momentos to do.

Thanks for the info.