pnh@pmin24.osf.org (Peter Harbo) (02/07/91)
I am looking for information about hand-held scanners. I would like the following features: - Software to help "stitch" together two images (the Thunderware scanner is supposed to have this) - OCR recognition (the Complete PC half-page scanner is supposed to have this) - Image scanning and saving in TIFF format (Thunderware, Scanman: does Caere do this too, or just OCR?) - Image scanning in Postscript format (Complete PC half-page is supposed to do this...) Anyone use any of these?
johnc@synopsys.com (John Crossley) (02/13/91)
I recently got a ScanMan and READ IT! software for some OCR work. At first I got the Complete PC scanner, but I took it back and got the ScanMan. Here are my answers to your questions: In article <PNH.91Feb6142519@pmin24.osf.org> pnh@pmin24.osf.org (Peter Harbo) writes: > I am looking for information about hand-held scanners. I would like the > following features: > > - Software to help "stitch" together two images (the Thunderware scanner > is supposed to have this) The ScanMan software will allow you to make a selection "transparent" and use keyboard keys to superimpose the overlapping text. Works well as long as there is minimal skewing. > - OCR recognition (the Complete PC half-page scanner is supposed to have > this) The only half page scanner that has this built in is Typist from Caere. This unit costs $500 and requires at least 4Mbytes of RAM and a 68020 or better CPU. (I have a Mac Portable so I skipped this option.) > - Image scanning and saving in TIFF format (Thunderware, Scanman: does > Caere do this too, or just OCR?) The Complete Scanner will also save in TIFF, although it requires you to select TIFF each time you save. > - Image scanning in Postscript format (Complete PC half-page is supposed > to do this...) I didn't notice this feature. Tunnel vision strikes again! I am having fun training my computer to recognize magazine text. It's like a game to see how accurately it will scan the next TIFF file. The ScanMan works well and the application offers the tools I need to prepare the scans for OCR. ScanMan saves in TIFF as a default and READ IT! just loves the resulting files. ScanMan's software has the ability to scan sideways across the page and automatically right the image for "stitching" together with previous scans. The big problem with hand scanners is skew. When scanning at 400 dpi it doesn't take much to make the lines slanted. I can usually correct this during the scan by applying a little pressure to the right or the left of the scanner as I draw it down the page. READ IT! can handle a certain amount of skew before it starts considering the bottom of line n to be part of the top of line n+1. John Crossley (415) 962-7069 johnc@synopsys.com