Digital Imaging - Create Digital Files From Anything With a Scanner

   This is a very exciting chapter, because now we know a little more about choosing a computer and printer, a scanner can open up a whole new world to digital imaging. If you have a digital camera, then with a USB lead you can download your images straight from your camera to your computer. If you don't have a digital camera, then you can still scan your photos, documents, slides, negatives or whatever you desire into your computer via your scanner. To help with your digital imaging, let's have a look at the types of scanners to look for ...

The Flatbed Scanner

This is the most common type of scanner, which acts like a mini photocopier. Of course, you can scan in documents for print output, but you also get to save the file as a 'digital' file. Flatbed scanners are normally A4 size (scans up to approx 8" x 11"), although you can purchase an A3 size (which is twice the size) and they are quite cheap to buy https://www.54454474.com/. If you have many printed photos you would like to file, scanning them is ideal, as once your photos are scanned, you can save them in digital format on your computer and organize them into folders.

Flatbed Scanner Resolution

Similarly to printers, the scanner resolution is measured in dots per inch (dpi). To achieve high quality printing results, scan at maximum resolution https://goldammo.org/. The file will be heavier in size, but computers nowadays have multiple gigabyte hard-drives, so storing them shouldn't be too much of a problem. I have a scanner with an optical resolution of 600 x 1200 dpi, which does quite a good job. There are scanners now with even higher resolutions e.g. 1200 x 2400 dpi - the higher the better, as this will allow you to scan an image for print output to much larger sizes than A4 (that is if you have at least an A3 or large format printer).

What size Resolution and Measurement do you want your final print?

Bearing in mind what size your printer will print up to - say for example you have an A4 size printer (prints up to approx 8" x 11")

300 dpi for printed output is classed as high resolution (although you can go higher - but this just increases your digital file size, and in most cases might not be necessary).

So you want to print your picture at a size of 8" x 8" with a resolution of 300 dpi

Your original image is 4" x 4" - you scan it in at 600 dpi (= 300 dpi x2). By doubling the resolution in your scanning options https://wildsvg.com/, will take into account the final printed version of 8" x 8" at 300 dpi (which you can set these measurements in your image editing software program, once scanned in).

Of course if you have a larger than A4 printer, you could you can print out at least 12" x 12" in measurement from your original 4" x 4" image. If your scanner allows, as we're tripling the size, try setting the scanning resolution to 1200 dpi. Note: If you decided to scan this size still at 600 dpi, it should still be high enough resolution for printing. I had an image artwork printed up to 33" x 23" from an 8" x 11" at 150dpi and the printed size still looked okay. (I wouldn't go below 150 dpi for printing though), but it's worth experimenting!

Scan in your Artwork and Textures

Flatbed scanners can also scan artwork, drawings, textures and anything you can get under the lid of your scanner https://sim.store/. I once read in a book to do with scanning that someone placed a fish on the glass plate of a scanner to scan in the scale texture. I might give that one a miss, but that's up to you if you don't mind smelling of fish!

Film Scanners

If you use a film camera, then a film scanner would be very beneficial, as you can scan in negatives and slides (both colour and B/W). Many film scanners come with adaptors also for scanning in APS film. Film scanners generally have much higher resolution settings than flatbed scanners. I bought a film scanner around the year 2000 which has an optical input resolution of 2820 dpi.

Tip: when scanning in negatives, I choose my highest input resolution setting, and after scanning my negative into my image editing software, my measurement comes in at approx 1" x 1.5" at 2400 ppi (pixels per inch). Although the file size is only small in measurement size, I undertake any image editing and then re-save the file at this size https://tulibaby.pl/. Incidentally this file size is 27.2M (megabytes).

Then when I wish to resize my image for printing I can easily resize to any size I want. As my large format printer can print a height of 24" and any length, I can resize to 33" x 23.25" (A1 poster size) at 300 dpi without losing any clarity of detail.

Scanning Speeds

Scanning speeds can vary from model to model and could take from 1 to a few minutes to scan. Note, if you're scanning at a higher resolution, then it is going to take a little longer.

Flatbeds with optional hoods for scanning negatives and slides

You can buy flatbed scanners with hoods for scanning film negatives and slides, but it's worth checking out what optical input resolution they will go up to, before buying. All in all, it depends on what you want to do with your output?

Scanning Software

Software that comes with your scanner for you to install in your computer is reasonably straightforward. Standard procedure is to make a Preview Scan before you finally scan into your image editing software. The software also has adjustment features for brightness, cropping, colourization etc, and is great if you don't have image editing software. What I normally do is perhaps use the crop feature so I'm not scanning in unnecessary editing later, but then use my image editing tools for brightening, cleaning up etc before I finally print.

PC and MAC Compatibility

Whatever computer system you have, make sure the scanner is compatible with your system before you buy.

On that note, I hope these points have been of information to you, toward your digital imaging endeavours. Now I have talked about hardware and peripherals, I'm going to look at the fun side of digital imaging using image editing software, starting with basic ideas, going through to the more advanced. Watch out for the next article on digital imaging