Photographs, for example, are continuous tone or analog sources. Drawings or paintings may be original or printed works on paper or similar media. All these resources must be digitized in order to be stored and processed on a computer system. A popular method of digitizing photos and artwork is using a flatbed scanner. A high-intensity light is projected onto the image and the scanner samples the reflective intensities from the source.
Scanners come in a variety of makes and models.
Scanners are usually bundled with an application that can be used for capturing digital images and saving them as files. These are stand-alone programs that are used in conjunction with the scanner. Another approach is to acquire the image using the all-purpose image processing program, like Photoshop. Most scanners have a special plug-in that allows you to acquire images directly as Photoshop documents. Web pages employ digital images for a variety of uses.