[Ripplinger]

My process is scanning, OCR, create a Djvu file (I find it's easier to work with when proofing), as well as .doc. Import the .doc into Atlantis (a very nice word processor). Do as much editing and cleaning up in Atlantis as possible, Atlantis makes it easier to clean up the 100s of styles that OCR usually leaves you with, export to .html. Import that to Sigil and do final cleanups. Sigil will create a very nice TOC. Atlantis can also export to .epub, which you can also import into Sigil that I found to be very nice to work with also, Atlantis did a pretty nice job.

How much time you spend on the initial scanning and OCR will make the final steps easier. With ABBYY, run the deskewing, clean up the images removing the black artifacts that are sometimes around the edges, etc. Train the OCR for a few minutes at least, I find spending about 5 minutes on that is usually enough for a good OCR. I scan in png format at 600 dpi, I want really clear copies for the proofing process.

Footnotes are always difficult in ebooks. You can either put the footnote immediately following the paragraph, or put them all at the end of the book. Link to the footnote, and then have a link back to where you were reading from the footnote. Same with the bibliography, I would just add it to the back of the book. I haven't had to deal with footnotes yet, but I'd probably do it keeping them all together at the end of the book with links back to the text position.

The most time-consuming part of the process is proofreading the final epub and making corrections, the step which people tend to totally ignore or do minimally. OCR is never perfect. I like reading on my reader where I can enlarge the text, making it easier to pick up common errors like "comer" for "corner" for instance, and then editing in Sigil when I find an error. This is the most important step that will make the book an enjoyable read or not.

When done, if you need another format after this point, I just convert with Calibre.

Edit: Just a note on the scanning process. This is the easiest part of it all. I spend maybe a little over an hour scanning a book with around 250 pages on a flatbed scanner, I just park me and the scanner in front of the TV while doing it... time passes pretty quickly.