New to Scanning Books

Ceryta · 04-25-2011, 07:21 PM

Greetings, I am new to your forum. I am looking for new ideas for scanning. I think I have read all the posts about scanning books. I just wanted to see if any body had any different ideas, I could use. I want to scan all my paperback books into ebooks. I currently have about 3,000 books. I love my books but the hassle of trying to find space and keep them dust free is nerve racking. I also am one of those people who likes to reread books over and over. I have read most of my books on average three times. It is getting harder and harder to keep them organize, let a loan find a book when I want to read it again. I brought library software a few years ago and that helps me keep some what organize. Ten years, ago I had about 50 books , but as time went on and my income rose so did my collection. My father passed and I moved with my mother to keep her company and help with expanses. Let me tell you, the worst part of the move was packing and carrying my books. I thought my friends were going beat to death with the books. In my old place , I had a room just for my books but now I have to share my bedroom with them. I put some in a storage unit with some other stuff. So after a couple months of thinking about it , I finally decided to just bite the bullet and just do it. I have about 1,000 ebooks( 150 Kindles and 850 pdf books other places) already and they are so convenient. I read them on my netbook. I thought about getting a ereader, but I don't need any more gadgets and I can use my netbook just fine. I have looked at several methods, and have decided to do the crop and scan way. This is the fastest,easier, and cheapest way for me. I have been to the DIY bookscannner web site several times, but it seems to be to complex for me. Also I don't think those rigs would work too well with small paperback books. At first, it made me sick to think about cutting up a book, but I realize the story is the most important part not the actual book. Also all the books are just paperback books (mystery, romance, science fiction, thrillers,general fiction), not anything valuable. I am also not going to re-buy all my books in ebook form, I could not afford it. So I ordered a Fujitsu Scansnap and a paper trimmer from Amazon. I spent about $300. So it is gonna cost me 10 cents per a book to digitize it. I think that is a pretty good deal. I am going to start my project on Sunday, May 1, 2011. This is going to be my Sunday afternoon project. Sundays are usually my down days anyway. I gonna do as many books as I can every Sunday until I get done. Than I will recycle all my beauties, but not until I save the ebooks on my desktop, laptop, netbook and an external hard drive, you can never be to careful. And yes, I know about the copyright laws and the fact it could be illegal. The fact of the matter is that I don't care. I will never load my ebooks on to the internet to share or share with anybody at all, family or friend. They are for my own personal convenient use. My netbook is small and light. It is easy to carry around the house, sit on the deck, take to work for lunch, and go on vacation with. All things I have done in the past. But the thought of have all my books in one easily assessable place, to be able to pull up any book I want to read without having to get my lazy butt up with a few clicks of a button is worth becoming a criminal. So again, I ask does anybody different ideas I could use, before I start my project? Thank you for any help.

Elfwreck · 04-25-2011, 07:48 PM

Check the scanner settings. Get *comfortable* with checking the scanner settings. Scan at 400 to 600 dpi in black & white for paperbacks. (If you want, scan the covers in color.) Adjust page sizes to something big enough for the books with not too much space around the edges.

Expect the first book to go very very slow. Feed a few pages at a time into the scanner, and make sure all those pages have finished loading before you start the next ones. If it's too dark, or too light, adjust the settings and re-do.

By your tenth book, it'll go much faster, but you'll get better results by taking your time with the first few. (And it'll cost you more than 10 cents per book to digitize, unless your time is worth $0.)

Set up some music you like to listen to while you're scanning. You can't really watch TV or movies & scan; you need your eyes to keep checking the paper & the computer, but you can listen to music.

Toxaris · 04-26-2011, 08:49 AM

Get ABBYY finereader for you OCR work. The default OCR software is usually not that good. Also, try to get familiar with (x)html and CSS, since that is what most e-books are about.

Also, you might think about the darknet to obtain some of your books electronically that you already have in paperback. Some are very nicely done and will save you a large amount of time...

DDHarriman · 04-26-2011, 10:32 AM

Hello

I would be advising you for a different choice of hardware, but as you have already committed to the one you talk about, I join the advices with another to help you passing the time when scanning:

- If your library has audiobooks, get some, you will be “working” and still reading…

Best regards with your project, it’s going to be hard but worthy!

susan_cassidy · 04-26-2011, 01:21 PM

It might help to see what kinds of errors are common with the OCR software you use, then write a script to go through the OCR output, looking for those types of errors, so that you can manually correct them. You could have the script find and replace, but odds are that the characters you are searching for will be in there legitimately somewhere.

DaleDe · 04-26-2011, 04:12 PM

You might also want to read our wiki page Digitizing Paper Books to Ebooks

Dale

adv_dp_fan · 04-26-2011, 06:23 PM

I'd suggest checking out www.diybookscanner.org. I followed a plan the posted there for a cheap scanner and for about $50 built a bookscanner that you don't have to cut up your books to use. I've scanned a lot of my collection so far and want to do all of them but given the size I know that will be a goal I'll never reach.

04-25-2011, 07:21 PM	#1
Ceryta Junior Member Posts: 5 Karma: 10 Join Date: Apr 2011 Device: netbook	New to Scanning Books Greetings, I am new to your forum. I am looking for new ideas for scanning. I think I have read all the posts about scanning books. I just wanted to see if any body had any different ideas, I could use. I want to scan all my paperback books into ebooks. I currently have about 3,000 books. I love my books but the hassle of trying to find space and keep them dust free is nerve racking. I also am one of those people who likes to reread books over and over. I have read most of my books on average three times. It is getting harder and harder to keep them organize, let a loan find a book when I want to read it again. I brought library software a few years ago and that helps me keep some what organize. Ten years, ago I had about 50 books , but as time went on and my income rose so did my collection. My father passed and I moved with my mother to keep her company and help with expanses. Let me tell you, the worst part of the move was packing and carrying my books. I thought my friends were going beat to death with the books. In my old place , I had a room just for my books but now I have to share my bedroom with them. I put some in a storage unit with some other stuff. So after a couple months of thinking about it , I finally decided to just bite the bullet and just do it. I have about 1,000 ebooks( 150 Kindles and 850 pdf books other places) already and they are so convenient. I read them on my netbook. I thought about getting a ereader, but I don't need any more gadgets and I can use my netbook just fine. I have looked at several methods, and have decided to do the crop and scan way. This is the fastest,easier, and cheapest way for me. I have been to the DIY bookscannner web site several times, but it seems to be to complex for me. Also I don't think those rigs would work too well with small paperback books. At first, it made me sick to think about cutting up a book, but I realize the story is the most important part not the actual book. Also all the books are just paperback books (mystery, romance, science fiction, thrillers,general fiction), not anything valuable. I am also not going to re-buy all my books in ebook form, I could not afford it. So I ordered a Fujitsu Scansnap and a paper trimmer from Amazon. I spent about $300. So it is gonna cost me 10 cents per a book to digitize it. I think that is a pretty good deal. I am going to start my project on Sunday, May 1, 2011. This is going to be my Sunday afternoon project. Sundays are usually my down days anyway. I gonna do as many books as I can every Sunday until I get done. Than I will recycle all my beauties, but not until I save the ebooks on my desktop, laptop, netbook and an external hard drive, you can never be to careful. And yes, I know about the copyright laws and the fact it could be illegal. The fact of the matter is that I don't care. I will never load my ebooks on to the internet to share or share with anybody at all, family or friend. They are for my own personal convenient use. My netbook is small and light. It is easy to carry around the house, sit on the deck, take to work for lunch, and go on vacation with. All things I have done in the past. But the thought of have all my books in one easily assessable place, to be able to pull up any book I want to read without having to get my lazy butt up with a few clicks of a button is worth becoming a criminal. So again, I ask does anybody different ideas I could use, before I start my project? Thank you for any help.

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04-25-2011, 07:48 PM	#2
Elfwreck Grand Sorcerer Posts: 5,185 Karma: 25133758 Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: SF Bay Area, California, USA Device: Pocketbook Touch HD3 (Past: Kobo Mini, PEZ, PRS-505, Clié)	Check the scanner settings. Get comfortable with checking the scanner settings. Scan at 400 to 600 dpi in black & white for paperbacks. (If you want, scan the covers in color.) Adjust page sizes to something big enough for the books with not too much space around the edges. Expect the first book to go very very slow. Feed a few pages at a time into the scanner, and make sure all those pages have finished loading before you start the next ones. If it's too dark, or too light, adjust the settings and re-do. By your tenth book, it'll go much faster, but you'll get better results by taking your time with the first few. (And it'll cost you more than 10 cents per book to digitize, unless your time is worth $0.) Set up some music you like to listen to while you're scanning. You can't really watch TV or movies & scan; you need your eyes to keep checking the paper & the computer, but you can listen to music.

04-26-2011, 08:49 AM	#3
Toxaris Wizard Posts: 4,520 Karma: 121692313 Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: Heemskerk, NL Device: PRS-T1, Kobo Touch, Kobo Aura	Get ABBYY finereader for you OCR work. The default OCR software is usually not that good. Also, try to get familiar with (x)html and CSS, since that is what most e-books are about. Also, you might think about the darknet to obtain some of your books electronically that you already have in paperback. Some are very nicely done and will save you a large amount of time...

04-26-2011, 10:32 AM	#4
DDHarriman Guru Posts: 860 Karma: 4380 Join Date: Feb 2008 Location: Almada, Portugal Device: Cybook Gen3, Sony PRS 505, Kindle DXG and Samsung Galaxy Note	Hello I would be advising you for a different choice of hardware, but as you have already committed to the one you talk about, I join the advices with another to help you passing the time when scanning: - If your library has audiobooks, get some, you will be “working” and still reading… Best regards with your project, it’s going to be hard but worthy!

04-26-2011, 01:21 PM	#5
susan_cassidy Wizard Posts: 2,251 Karma: 3720310 Join Date: Jan 2009 Location: USA Device: Kindle, iPad (not used much for reading)	It might help to see what kinds of errors are common with the OCR software you use, then write a script to go through the OCR output, looking for those types of errors, so that you can manually correct them. You could have the script find and replace, but odds are that the characters you are searching for will be in there legitimately somewhere.

04-26-2011, 04:12 PM	#6
DaleDe Grand Sorcerer Posts: 11,470 Karma: 13095790 Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: Grass Valley, CA Device: EB 1150, EZ Reader, Literati, iPad 2 & Air 2, iPhone 7	You might also want to read our wiki page Digitizing Paper Books to Ebooks Dale

04-26-2011, 06:23 PM	#7
adv_dp_fan Zealot Posts: 103 Karma: 57138 Join Date: May 2010 Device: Sony 505, iPad 1 & 3, Galaxy Note 8.1	I'd suggest checking out www.diybookscanner.org. I followed a plan the posted there for a cheap scanner and for about $50 built a bookscanner that you don't have to cut up your books to use. I've scanned a lot of my collection so far and want to do all of them but given the size I know that will be a goal I'll never reach.

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