From: pfk@rz.uni-jena.de (Frank Klemm)
Subject: Re: Best way to scan in pictures? (Newbie question)
Reply-To: pfk@rz.uni-jena.de (Frank Klemm)
Organization: University Jena, Germany
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 16:20:10 GMT


In article <C0KI8n.57M@techbook.com>, jamesd@techbook.com (James Deibele) writes:
|> Here are my newbie questions which I hope somebody can answer so I can
|> up the pose of "big brother the computer expert".  :-)
|> 
|> (1) What kind of scanner works best for scanning in photographs?  
|>
Normal "Flachbett-Scanner" like the HP Desk Scan III work very well.
Note, that is very difficult to scan rastered pictures like pictures in
Books etc. Best results you got with an slide scanner. But this quality is
much more than needed for displaying a picture on a computer monitor.
|> 
|> (1a) How much do they cost?  Is it possible to do a "good" job with one
|> of those scanners I see advertised below $500?  Below $1000? Or is any 
|> scanner under $10,000 (or $25,000, or whatever) pretty awful? 
|>
About $1,500 I think. Slide scanners from $1,800 for 1000 dpi and 36mmx24mm
until $15,000 for 5040dpi and 125mmx100mm 
|> 
|> (1b) Alternatively, do most large cities have print shops (or whatever)
|> that do this type of work?  If so, what's a reasonable price per
|> picture?  I've seen places that do OCR, but when I called, it turned 
|> out that it was cheaper to rekey (so I still have stacks of articles
|> that I'm supposed to type in ... someday ... :-) ).  The yellow pages 
|> seems to have only places that do OCR or "line art" under "scanning" 
|> and none of the print shops nearby seem to do image scanning.
|> 
|> (2) Is it even possible to scan slides?  I wouldn't think so ...
|> 
|> (3) Given a decent scanner, do you have to do a lot of touchup work to
|> get a decent photo on the computer screen?
|>
Yes, Gamma correction, Sharping, Noise reduction, Color correction, Resolution
converting to get a normal format like 800x600 ...
|> 
|> (4) I don't know anything about the Kodak CD cameras.  Can someone 
|> outline the good and bad points of these?  I assume that it's possible
|> to read these into a Mac or PC somehow, but that might be a wrong
|> assumption ...
|>
Pro:
  CD as media is good
  You can do digital processing from the pictures
Cons:
   Only 100 pictures are supported (660 MB/ 3 MB each = 220 pictures ?????????)
   Expensive 1.50 DM (ca. $1) per picture
   Only 36mmx24mm
   Only up to 3072x2048
   Compression is ineffective (JPEG makes less than 1 MB, typical 800 kB)
   Copyrighted - sources are not distributed
|> 
|> (5) GIF files always seem pretty large, but I understand that JPEG
|> format loses some details.  I've got all monochrome machines myself, but
|> she's got a pretty snazzy Dell (running DOS and Windows) at work.  What 
|> format works best for a SuperVGA card?
|>
GIFs are much bigger. The big data reduction consist of color quantization.
Because GIF are 256 color pictures, they are the best result for 256 color displays.
JPEG looks a little bit better than GIF on a True color or High color display. On
a 256 color display vice versa, because JPEG dislike a postal color quantization.
Note than JPEG are much smaller.
Targa : GIF : JPEG
 30   : 7    :  1    	for normal color pictures
 12   : 8    :  1       for B/W pictures  
|> 
|> (6) What's the best viewing program for a DOS box?  Windows? (I'd say
|> "best" was defined as good quality images fairly quickly, though some
|> would probably prefer image quality or speed.)
|> 
I use a self written program for the Speedstar to display Targa files in all
available video modes (16 color, 256 colors, 32k and 16 M colors). Before I must
convert the source to TARGA. This gives the best result. For quick view I use
alchemy.
|>
Frank