Book Scanners?

[Rbneader]

Well, I'm not sure where this goes so I'll try here.

I've been thinking about digitizing some physical books lately, and wondered if anyone had tried using desktop receipts scanners? They can scan both sides of the page, and typically get 600 dpi. Is that enough to scan a book?

Thanks!
RbNeader

[graycyn]

No idea if they are suitable or not, but one usually does not need 600dpi to scan a book for OCR, 300dpi is plenty.

[Elfwreck]

For "receipt scanners," watch out for single-sided. You need a duplex scanner to scan books (unless you want to scan one side of the page at a time). Many basic office scanners are single-sided.

Other things to check: DPI limitations for duplex (sometimes it's different); customizeable page sizes (how does it recognize the page); color v BW scanning (if it's color-only, you'll get whopping huge scans for books), and does it scan to multi-page documents?

If you're satisfied that it can do the things you need it to, get one *that has a return warranty* so you can return it if you try it out and find it just won't work. (Maybe the rollers jam if you put in more than 10 pages at a time. Maybe it scans too light or too dark and it's not adjustable. Maybe it doesn't jam much, but when it does, you have to practically take the machine apart to fix it. Maybe it's horrendously noisy. And so on.)

[markom]

Originally Posted by Rbneader

Well, I'm not sure where this goes so I'll try here.

I've been thinking about digitizing some physical books lately, and wondered if anyone had tried using desktop receipts scanners? They can scan both sides of the page, and typically get 600 dpi. Is that enough to scan a book?

Thanks!
RbNeader

Info on some good portable scanners like Canon P-215.

http://thewirecutter.com/reviews/the...e-canon-p-215/


If you already have a digital camera you might like this idea too:

http://www.booksorber.com/index.php?page=features#easy

[kevinp]

It depends on whether you're willing to destroy the book to scan it also. If you cut the spine off the book, you can run it through a desktop scanner with a page feeder that will do duplex.

I've scanned a few books without destroying them. I can set my scanner to automatically keep scanning with a pause time in between scans of two seconds. That's enough time for me to turn the page and put the book back down on the scanner. This way takes more time obviously, but it doesn't ruin the book.

[Kumabjorn]

Originally Posted by kevinp

It depends on whether you're willing to destroy the book to scan it also. If you cut the spine off the book, you can run it through a desktop scanner with a page feeder that will do duplex.

I've scanned a few books without destroying them. I can set my scanner to automatically keep scanning with a pause time in between scans of two seconds. That's enough time for me to turn the page and put the book back down on the scanner. This way takes more time obviously, but it doesn't ruin the book.

Interesting feature. I've used ABBYY Fine Reader with an HP DeskJet 3070A to scan some Japanese books into PDF/A format. It has worked surprisingly well, and those books are now searchable and it is easy to do annotations in Adobe Reader. However, I have to click for each spread (folio? two pages), it probably doesn't take more than two seconds anyway, but being essentially lazy that feature is appealing. How do you take a break with that method?

[kevinp]

It's dependent on the drivers that come with your scanner. I was using a Canon CanoScan 8800F for some of the books and another scanner for another (which I can't remember right now).

[Rizla]

Have you considered photographing?

[kevinp]

I looked at some of the videos on YouTube where people have made the machines with two cameras and two pieces of glass set in a V where they lift the glass, turn the page and then take another picture. They looked like a lot of work to build, let alone buying two cameras to work with it. If I were scanning lots of books, I might consider building one. I don't think this is what the OP had in mind.

[theducks]

The Ion Audio 'booksaver' looked promising.
There were quality control /or shipping sensitivity issues that one user resolved by making internal focus adjustments (not your normal user task).
The other issue was they never released it in the USA

[SolRaven]

Originally Posted by kevinp

I've scanned a few books without destroying them. I can set my scanner to automatically keep scanning with a pause time in between scans of two seconds. That's enough time for me to turn the page and put the book back down on the scanner. This way takes more time obviously, but it doesn't ruin the book.

That's ingenius. Which software has a setting for pause?

[mastermesh]

never used it yet, but there's some interesting apps on android market for using camera on phones/tablets to 'scan' by taking photos of each page.

[Kumabjorn]

Unfortunately that doesn't work very well. I have tried a few and in reality it is difficult unless you are two, the book simply won't lie flat enough to get a good picture.

[Turtle91]

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

Unfortunately that doesn't work very well. I have tried a few and in reality it is difficult unless you are two, the book simply won't lie flat enough to get a good picture.

The "V-shaped" platten in those youtube videos (and at the diybookscanner.org site) holds the pages flat so the cameras can take a great picture.

But, if building your own scanner, or purchasing their pre-made scanner kit, is more than you want to attempt, there are flat bed scanners that have narrow bezels around the glass so that you can get a good flat scan of the page (example here).

The ABBYY Finereader program allows you to pause between scans...selecting multiple page scan allows the option of setting how many seconds to wait between successive scans.

Cheers!

[Kumabjorn]

Yes, I did discover the pause setting in ABBYY Fine Reader, unfortunately I probably have some severe case of ADD, when I take up the book to change page all too often I start reading something on that page and then you never know how long it will take. My mind start to wander into the book instead of focusing on the task at hand.