I have recently been using a digital camera for taking pictures of photographs and documents for my research. Size ranges from 2"x3" to 14'x12". I find this handy because it eliminates a scanner & PC which is difficult to use on location. I have been using a Kodak DC215. The problems are glare from glossy pictures, can't get close enough to small subject and loose the detail on the larger documents. Can you suggest a camera suitable for this application as well as a method of holding the camera or subject while exposing the piture?

-- Gary Hunter (hunter2@sympatico.ca), July 22, 2000

Answers

Gary, You have a bunch of problems going on here. I'm not familiar with the DC215, but I imagine that its close focusing capability is extremely limited. Glare from glossy photographs is controlled by lighting and its manipulation. You want your lights to be at 45degree angles to your subject and the lights must be adjusted so that the light is even across the subject plane. Ideally you will have lights on either side of your subject at equal distances from the subject, and the light from one side will cross the light from the other side in the exact center of your subject. Still with me here? Hope so because I'm starting to get confused! How accessable are these documents for you? Can you take them off premises? Seems to me that the ideal way to do this job would be to shoot traditional negatives (large format), scan them, and work from this information. The problem is solveable; just matters to what extent you wish to go.

-- fred (fdeaton@hiwaay.net), July 22, 2000.

1. Glossy pictures - Fred pretty much covered this with the lighting he suggested, but you might also try a circular polarizer to help eliminate glare in situations where you have little control over lighting. I'm not sure how well a polarizer would work for macro, but it's worth a try. I don't know what kind of lens mount, if any, is provided, but Kodak sells a set of 52mm accessories for around $20 through Walmart among others. It includes a 52mm circular polarizer, a 52mm UV filter, a 52-49mm adapter ring, and a 52mm lens cap. Worth a shot for $20.

2. Can't get close enough - that's a function of your lens system. Your 215 is rated for 8" in macro mode and 1.5' in wide or 3.3' in telephoto according to the review(unless I misremembered them -from a few minutes ago...). You might be able to get +1, +2, +4 Diopter macro lenses. They're available for a lot of cameras and standard sized mounts, check with camera stores or online. I don't know if they'll work with the fixed focus lens on your 215, but worth a try I suppose?

3. Losing detail on larger objects - how much detail you capture is a function of the lens system, focusing distance, and mostly the resolution of the CCD. I'd say you need about 100 Pixels Per Inch (PPI) in order to capture readable text from most documents. More is always better, up to about 300PPI if you want to reprint. So, if you're trying to capture a 14" long document with an 1152 pixel width CCD, you're only getting about 82PPI! With a 3.3MP camera you'd have a LOT more usable resolution -about 146PPI (2048/14") vs. the 82PPI you have now. Nearly quadrupling the overall resolution should be a big help. Bear in mind faxes use 200DPI, and they often look pretty lousy, so 200-300PPI would be better.

You might also try taking multiple exposures and stitching them together. With 4 shots, you'd nearly double your effective resolution in both dimensions. (I say nearly, because most stitching programs want a fair amount of overlap in order to help automate the stitching process.)

4. Holding the camera and subject - How about a copy stand? It's a rather simple arrangement that lets you mount your camera above a table and adjust the height above the table. Some are just a simple arm with clamp arrangement that you clamp on a regular table. Others have a table of their own. The side lighting Fred mentioned works very well with copy stands. You might also use a light tent for certain objects. The light tent is merely some sort of translucent material that surrounds the object to be photographed and allows the camera lens to peek in. The "tent" is lit from outside with multiple lights to give an even diffused lighting to the object -with no reflections. You could use a small white plastic garbage bag or a plastic milk jug with the bottom cut out and top hole cut larger for the camera lens. The copy stand would make this a breeze to set up by holding the camera for you.

5. If you're looking for a recommendation for a 3.3MP camera capable of macro and generally great imaging I'd suggest a Toshiba PDR-M70. I have one and it's macro is pretty good. You can focus down to about 6". The 2048x1536 resolution will give you between 128 and 146 PPI depending on the direction and the length of the page for a 12x14" page. You could do much better by imaging the top half and bottom half of a larger page and just stitching the two together. The M70 also has adapter threads, so you could get the adapter ring and attach a macro lens to get even closer. The adapter gives you standard 52mm threads, so finding accessories is simplified. Tiffen is also coming out with a 43mm adapter tube, lenses, and filters for the M70 to be available in August. If you find your way to Toshiba's website and look in the accessories section you'll find a link to DCPRO, which is tiffen's site. They have the accessories and copy stands, tripods, etc. for pretty reasonable prices. Check it out to get an idea of a very simple copy stand.

If you're the do-it-yourself type you can find plans for a copy stand on the net. Just do a search. The one I looked over had a piece of pipe set in a pipe collar attached to a board for the base. The camera attached to a 1/4" 20TPI threaded bolt that went through a block of wood attached between a pair of masonite boards that attached to two v-blocks clamped to the pipe with some wingnuts in a friction type mount formed by the blocks. It's a nice simple unit that could be knocked together for well under $20 in very little time with simple hand tools(saw, drill, hammer). Since the pipe can be unscrewed from the base the whole thing can be knocked down for storage.

Good Luck!

-- Gerald M. Payne (gmp@surferz.net), July 22, 2000.

I second everything Gerald said, except to say that anybody using a Kodak DC215 may not think of the Toshiba PDR-M70 as being affordable. You'll get a tremendous improvement in image quality just by stepping up to the Kodak DC240 or DC265.

If shot-to-shot time is at all important, I'd say your best camera would be the Toshiba PDR-M4. Easy to use, pretty good macro, easy to learn. Available for around $300, manufacturer refurbished.

For a copy stand, check E-bay. There's usually a simple used on going for around $40. I'm not as handy with tools as Gerald. . .

-- Mark Grebner (Mark@Grebner.com), July 23, 2000.

I was kind of hopeful that Mark Grebner would also answer this one. Don't let him fool you, Gary. He's all too modest: the All-Time Digital Document Capture King! [Okay, probably Canon and Xerox have done a few more... :-)] As I recall, he has several PDR-M4's being used for document capture in the field. And an Oly he swears by, er at? (maybe just at the Camedia software?) ;-)

I recommended the M70, primarily because I have one, and because of the greater resolution. I don't usually recommend products I don't have actual experience with or at least reliable feedback about from those I know pretty well. I thought 1600x1200 might be a bit marginal for 14x12" documents... Of course, for the cost savings I could see taking two shots and stitching them together for the large pages as being a viable alternative.(If you even need to rejoin them, that is.)

I also have a PDR-M5, and upon comparison to the M70, it pales rather badly overall -considering resolution, image quality, manual controls, overall build quality, etc. The new M60 promises to be a much improved replacement! If you're primarily doing document capture, and don't need a zoom lens, the PDR-M4 should be a great choice at, as Mark points out, a steal of a price!

By the way, I feel this should be said. I often recommend Toshiba equipment. I do so, because it's the brand that I have experience with, both in terms of quality and whatever shortcomings. I'm not a complete fanatic or anything, it's just the brand I know best. :-)

By the way, according to all the reviews and Nikon owners, the Nikons have about the best, out of the box, macro capabilities. That's not a document capture related feature, but you did mention needing to capture small subjects.

Good Luck!

-- Gerald M. Payne (gmp@surferz.net), July 23, 2000.