Camera for digitizing old/fragil documents

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Can anyone recommend a digital camera to use in copying old documents in libraries or courthouses? Many old, legal documents are bound and cannot be laid flat to scan or copy. Lighting may also be suboptimal--I hope flashes don't damage old documents. I am looking at Nikon Coolpix 950 and Olympus C-2000Z but either one is a lot of money to invest without some good advice about whether they will meet my needs. I think I might need to use a tripod so having to undo the tripod to change the SmartMedia card may ruleout the Coolpix although the B&W mode may be a distinct advantage. Also, can anyone recommend SW to use in piecing together separate photos of different portions of documents?

-- Martha Hansard (mhansard@usit.net), September 03, 1999

Answers

If it were me, I would forget about using a digital camera and stick with my 35mm and macro lens for a project of that kind. I would concentrate on developing a setup with a good, diffuse flash, and a stable copy stand. I would have the photos processed into Kodak photoCDs (3072x2048 resolution).

The software I use when I want to piece together different portions of images and remove flaws is Paintshop Pro. I find it easier for this purpose than Adobe Photoshop.

-- Jim Popenoe (popenoe@humboldt1.com), September 04, 1999.


I'd agree with Jim. There's nothing particularly advantageous about digital for archival copy work. What size originals are you copying? Assuming the archive has some kind of lighting and/or windows and it's possible to move the docs to a light source, you should be able to use a copy stand or tripod, a 35mm camera and a 50mm macro lens. Meter off a gray card for correct exposure. The macro lens is necessary since it produces images at close range that are sharp from corner to corner--crucial for large format documents. I think it's easier--and undoubtedly cheaper--to change film than download hi-res images to a laptop. What kind of volume are you facing: a few dozen or hundreds of copies?

-- Gary Watson (cg.watson@sympatico.ca), September 05, 1999.

Unlike the other respondants to this question I won't try to dissuade you from a digital solution. But, I may make a different suggestion than you expect.

Digital imaging has one or two major advantages over photographic imaging in your case. First of all, an image that starts out digitally doesn't have to be processed and scanned in order to turn it into a digital image so it's several orders of magnitude quicker if you eventually need a digital image. Second of all, it's actually cheaper and faster in the long run if you need the images in a final digital form. What? Cheaper and faster? Well, think about it. Imaging old documents in possibly poor lighting and under adverse conditions can be troublesome. If nothing else, a digital camera would ensure that you could see the finished output almost immediately, rather than waiting for the developing of prints. As for transfer speed, that's a non-issue. If you have a laptop all you require is a USB port or a pcmcia transfer card that will accept the media that your camera uses. If you have compactflash, an adaptor is very cheap(under $20). If you have smartmedia, an adapter can be found for under $50 with a little searching.

The real issue to consider here is not whether you should be looking for a fully digital or post processed digital solution, but which fully digital solution you should seek. The cameras you mentioned are both great tools, but they have inherent limitations. Most noticeably, they have a resolution of only 1600-1800x1200 or so pixels. This may not be a big problem depending on the size of the documents and text, but then again it may require you to do a lot of pasting and matching up in order to get finished pages. The only way to tell if they'll suit your needs would be to get a photocopy, if possible, of a page representative of the smallest text you'll need to capture and see how many shots it takes to handle it by trying it out in a camera shop or other retailer. I think you'll find that 1600 pixels wide would be minimally acceptable for type as small as 10 point when filming an 8" wide section, but not any smaller since 200 dpi is basically fax machine quality. Not great, but it's not impossible. The down side is that 1200 dots will only cover about 6" vertically, so you'd need to piece together 2 images just to get one 8.5x11" page, let alone larger pages. Not the optimal solution.

What I'd recommend instead is a simple hand scanner connected to a laptop. There are a number of models available, and they are considerably cheaper than digicams. Most go for under $200, with many in the $100 or sub $100 range. They're usually limited to grayscale or B&W, but that's usually sufficient for the type of work you're doing. The fact that they can be moved by hand allows you to get close to bindings or to merely scan the info you want. Some of the newer units are built specifically for print scanning and convert the type directly to ASCII text files for use in word processors.

I'd also recommend going to http://www.capshare.hp.com/ and having a look at a solution offered by Hewlett Packard. It's not the cheapest way to go if you already have a laptop, but it's compact and very well suited to what you want to do. It also comes with software designed to let you reformat the info captured so that it can easily be dropped into a variety of windows programs as well as transfer the info to laptops or wireless infra-red printers. Have a look. A web search may even yield prices 50% or less of the cost of the cameras you mentioned.

A nice solution, but of course you can't take photos with it. :-(

Good Luck!

-- Gerald Payne (gmp@francorp.francomm.com), September 06, 1999.


If you're interested in the HP Capshare I mentioned, check out:

http://www.shopper.com/prdct/155/463.html

for the best prices. Good Luck.

-- Gerald Payne (gmp@francorp.francomm.com), September 06, 1999.


Thanks to all for the valuable info. The immediate feedback I can get using my notebook with a digital camera or the Capshare is very attractive. I plan to test a sample document with an Olympus C2000 to see how good the resolution can be. I am also impressed with what I have found out about the Capshare and am seriously considering it--although it is an expensive solution. I couldn't find any less expensive competitors for the Capshare.

-- Martha Hansard (mhansard@usit.net), September 07, 1999.


I had held off commenting on this topic until I had a chance to try it. I have an Epson 750Z digital camera. Last night my wife took a photo of piece of paper because we didn't have time to write down all of the information off of it. When I looked at the photo later I was amazed at how well it worked. She took the picture in Macro mode with the flash on, at 640 X 480 resolution. I suspect that if we were to use the B&W mode and full resolution the camera, 1280 X 960, it would have come out even better. The Epson 750Z is also much cheaper than a Olympus 2000 or Nikon 950.

-- Bob G. (rgreg88721@hotmail.com), September 07, 1999.

I like the idea of the capshare, it's also convenient in that it can store 50 pages of text. It's not cheap, $400 & change was the lowest price I could find, but it might be the right solution for some people. If it were me and I already had a laptop I'd really spend some time searching for a hand scanner. There were a number of different models made and there must be some still on the market today. Many connected via a parallel port so they were pretty quick and well supported by laptops.

If you can't find a scanner for under $150, or so, I'd say that a digicam was the way to go as long as you have other uses for it. I'm sure if you dig around a bit and try non-traditional sources like ebay and maybe even pc parts suppliers like Egghead or CompUSA, that you'd find something. It seems to me that I saw a hand scanner in an office supply store just this summer for a reasonable price. Have a look around.

Good Luck!

-- Gerald Payne (gmp@francorp.francomm.com), September 07, 1999.


Been there, done that. The answer: Toshiba PDR-M4 mounted on a copystand, connected by USB to a laptop computer (I'm using a desktop on a cart, because I'm shooting 20,000 frames per week)

3 seconds per shot. Plenty of resolution. I shoot all day and burn a CD each night.

I've learned a lot during the first four weeks of this project. Biggest: the PDR-M4 does a crummy job with flash. Better to use good local lighting and a very stable base so the camera can select longish exposure times.

Even documents which can't be laid flat can generally be placed in some kind of reading stand. I tried using a tripod, but I'm finding an actual copy stand (Testrite, $70) is better.

-mark grebner

-- Mark Grebner (Mark@Grebner.com), December 21, 1999.


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