ebooks from film negatives of pages

[avidpubs]

Hi.... I have a number of published ( in paper) books.
I hold the original pages of the books, some with b&w photos, in film form.....ganged up 16 pages on a large film sheet ( about 1m x 750mm each sheet).
I'd LOVE to convert these to ebooks.....using PDFs?
Any suggestions how to do it at reasonable or low cost?
my thanks in advance.

d Roberts

[curtw]

This discussion really belongs elsewhere on the site--I'm sure a moderator will move it soon. Look for a scanner with software that will:

• Convert negatives to positives,
• allow you to select areas within an overall large image as separate multiple scans, and
• comes with OCR software or can export to TIF format (and assuming your computer is some flavor of Windows, the built-in OCR tool will ddo the job for you)

I have an Epson V370 that does all of these. It's way outdated, but I'm sure there are good equivalents. when I do 1:1 scale book scans, I scan at 600 dpi. I'd recommend setting your scanner to either 300 or 600 * whatever scale your negative is smaller than the original text.

[Dr. Drib]

Moderator Notice

What makes you think this qualifies as NEWS?

Please post responsibly and take the time now to read our posting guidelines.

This thread has now been moved to the General Discussion forum.

[HarryT]

It actually belong in the "Workshop" forum, to where I've now moved it.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by avidpubs

Hi.... I have a number of published ( in paper) books.
I hold the original pages of the books, some with b&w photos, in film form.....ganged up 16 pages on a large film sheet ( about 1m x 750mm each sheet).
I'd LOVE to convert these to ebooks.....using PDFs?
Any suggestions how to do it at reasonable or low cost?
my thanks in advance.

d Roberts

That sounds like the film for making offset press plates . That sheet is kind of big for most scanners.
Paintshop Pro as a command to Invert (make a negative) of an image, but first you probably need to divide the overall plate to 16 individual images (do not reduce any image for best clarity)

BTW you want a 'Photo' image scanner that can accommodate: 1) a full page 2)permit the film to be positioned

[Toxaris]

You might be better off just scanning the books. That would be easier I think.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Toxaris

You might be better off just scanning the books. That would be easier I think.

On a related note, it's odd that this came up; I received a boatload of PDF's, marked "scans" today, from a client, who wants to turn them into ebooks. But they're not scans; they from a smartphone feature called "scan." In reality, he took pictures of his pages (at all sorts of cockamamie angles, sideways, you-name-it); they were apparently saved as old-style imaged PDF's, and then he sent them to me to "be converted."

Honestly, I didn't even know where to START to explain it. (This in addition to this line: "I don't have the financial resources to do..."). I told him that having us scan/ocr the images, make a digital file, etc., from it wouldn't be one iota cheaper than paying a competent scanner to scan from his typed manuscript file, and the latter would be a crapload more accurate. I wish I could show you guys, but, damn, the "scans" are just really, really BAD. I don't know how folks can think we can wave a magic wand and make it work. He seems really nice and all that, but...DAMN.

(Oh, and I forgot: it looks like half the pages are marked-up in handwriting. {SIGH}. I had a "Clay Davis moment" when I saw that. It's just that type of day.)

Hitch

[Tex2002ans]

Originally Posted by Hitch

(Oh, and I forgot: it looks like half the pages are marked-up in handwriting. {SIGH}.

Almost nothing makes me more angry than people who mangle their pages by underlining/handwriting throughout the book. Think of all the future digitization!!!

Makes me angry also when the only version available on Archive.org is mangled. It is better than not being digitized at all, but imagine if that person never wrote in it in the first place!

So everyone note, do not write in your books, Tex won't forgive you if you do!

[Toxaris]

Originally Posted by Hitch

(This in addition to this line: "I don't have the financial resources to do...").

These things really annoy me. You see it all the time. If you sell stuff and people start their response by things like 'I am a single mom', 'my husband left me', 'I just got unemployed' and then do a very low bid. Not only this is often not even true, but why would this be a reason to have a special treatment?
Don't get me wrong, if true these kind of things have serious impact and can have big consequences but is this a reason to misuse it?
If I want something, I have to save for it and that may take a while. It is all about priorities and life necessities.

Sorry about the rambling...

[mrmikel]

If they really don't have the resources, then why are they paying someone else to do it?

There are OCR apps for phones that aren't very expensive and some are free. If they are out of work, etc then they have the time to do it. Most of making epubs is not technology, but time, oodles of it.

There is tons of information on here you can use in all time you have because you are unemployed.....

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by mrmikel

If they really don't have the resources, then why are they paying someone else to do it?

It's hard. I get asked for free help all the time. I mean, ALL the time. I get pinged by people from forums, (not MR, mind you), etc., asking for "could you look at this and just tell me..." sort of thing. Sometimes, if it's a) interesting or b) instantly obvious, I'll do it, but mostly...no. I just can't. It's hard enough to keep a business going (in the US) in this day of super-duper uber-el-cheapo competition from offshore without taking one's eye off the ball.

There are OCR apps for phones that aren't very expensive and some are free. If they are out of work, etc then they have the time to do it. Most of making epubs is not technology, but time, oodles of it.

There is tons of information on here you can use in all time you have because you are unemployed.....

Yes. I understand it, I do--they have an asset that they want to use to help pull themselves OUT of the hole they're in. But hell, I'm not a publisher, I'm not (can't) take payment "on the come," as it were. Believe me, I get asked for THAT all the time, too ("can I pay you from the proceeds of my sales?"). It's a tough thing to turn people down, but....unfortunately, my staff don't get paid that way, so I have to ensure that real money comes in, so that everybody can pay their real rent. ;-)

P.S.: for those concerned, I did explain, in minute detail, everything he needed to do. At last email (now to 8) he's elected to retype the whole thing. We'll see.

Hitch

[mrmikel]

Being an author is a difficult way to make a living. Many successful ones have stories of working in Safeway stocking or something similar until they finally caught on.

If the OP is low in financial resources, a careful camera setup could yield OCR recognizable images. In any situation like this, time is the big element in either setting up or correcting, or massaging them from the negative form to a positive that can be recognized.

If you don't have the money, you will have to put in the time.

BTW, it is important to have rights to everything in these books. Pictures have separate rights which seem to me to be as complicated as copyright.

[Toxaris]

Only a small percentage of authors can actually live off their books. Most of them need a job next to it. I thought that is a well known fact or at least it should be for aspiring authors.
It is just like other jobs, you need to know what it is about and what the side effects are. Imagine wanting to become a carpenter and being allergic to wood... Research is important as each author should know.

[mrmikel]

BTW, forgot international posters...Safeway is a grocery store in the western US. David Eddings the science fiction author spoke of doing just this at science fiction conventions.

[dwig]

Originally Posted by mrmikel

...
BTW, it is important to have rights to everything in these books. Pictures have separate rights which seem to me to be as complicated as copyright.

You misunderstand somewhat or have worded this poorly.

The rights picture posses, or more accurately that the owners of the pictures posses, is their copyright rather than something different that is "as complicated as copyright". It is not a different class of rights and copyright isn't limited to words.

The complication comes from the pictures in a publication, both in the publication and any and all cover art, often have their own independent copyright. The text of a book may fall into public domain while the cover art or some included artwork, drawing or photograph, may still retain its copyright. This is why public domain books are often reproduced with new cover designs rather than their often better original cover art.