The speed of scanning is quite simliar to the speed of photocopying. A large and busy court clerk's office might need a scanner which can handle 50 or 100 pages per minute. Document imaging is, of course, a second-best approach. A pleading, motion, or brief, is first created in digital form, in a word processor. Printing the document transforms it from electrons to paper.
Document imaging takes that paper document and re-translates it to digital data.
Overall, this process is very inefficient compared to filing the native electronic file. It is far preferable to keep the document in its native digital format throughout the process, creating a temporary paper copy only as necessary for reading purposes. Another factor militating in favor of straight electronic filing, bypassing the paper stage, is file size. To provide a suitable financial incentive for the preferable electronic filing approach, a court might decide to impose a user fee on materials filed in paper format, but not on electronic filings. Even if a court does not adopt universal electronic filing, it may wish to encourage litigants to use such a system for selected complex cases.