Richard wrote:
"Most of the people doing document imaging are using DSLRs or mirrorless digital cameras these days,
it seems."
What mechanisms are they using to control ambient light, to uniformly light the document,image or
whatever that is being photographed, to assure uniform focus and no edge distortion, and to do all
of this in a manner where the workflow is faster than just lifting a scanner lid, putting things on
it and patiently waiting for the TWAIN interface to do its thing? What I think is a good feature of
the HP device -- and I don't know this and would want to try one out in a showroom before buying
it -- is that it seems not to care about ambient light and seems to have a pre-set focal distance
that allows for a decent depth of field on the platform (so, a thick book won't pose a problem about
coming out blurry, for instance). Most important, though, is that it seems to scan correctly no
matter how the room is lit. I find that hard to believe, so I would like to see a live demo.
I've messed with admittedly antique camera stands before and never found a good way to uniformly
light LP album covers. They are usually glossy or semi-glossy, and almost any direct light creates
reflections and washed out hot spots. Flatbed scanning simply doesn't present this problem, as well
as offering uniform focus and, in the case of my now-antique Epson large-format scanner, reliable
on-the-fly color correction (saving a Photoshop step for non-archival scanning).
So, I can't see how a DSLR on stand is less time-consuming than a flatbed, but if this HP device
lives up the the performance shown in the videos, it might well be a time-saver.
-- Tom Fine
----- Original Message -----
From: "Richard L. Hess" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, November 04, 2014 9:22 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] potentially interesting new computer/scanner concept
> Hi, Tom,
>
> In the specs it says its built-in projector lamp is used as the scanner illumination and the video
> shows a band of light going down the scan.
>
> The 3D camera appears to be a parallax type of 3D all in the little hood.
>
> The i7 4790S has a Passmark score of about 10,000, so it's a pretty capable machine. I just bought
> a machine with a similar processor and a 256 G SSD for a non-profit (grant project) to do video
> oral history editing (by students, not me).
>
> My two hotshot desktops run around 6,000 Passmark scores and the top of the line Pentium 4s ran
> about 500.
>
> You ask a lot of good questions.
>
> The buzz on the street is that dedicated scanners are going away now that we have 24 and 36 MP
> DSLRs. Most of the people doing document imaging are using DSLRs or mirrorless digital cameras
> these days, it seems.
>
> I expect the Sprout to be expensive and a way that HP is trying to go against Mac and also create
> a high-value product that will rise above commodity PCs.
>
> The integration may intrigue some, I don't feel it's necessary for many of us, but it certainly
> looked fast to use.
>
> Thanks!
>
> Cheers,
>
> Richard
>
>
>
> On 2014-11-04 8:34 PM, Tom Fine wrote:
>> The HP Sprout:
>> http://sprout.hp.com/
>>
>> Of course they don't give the full scanning-area dimensions, only "20
>> inches wide", but I noted that the surface cover sheet sold seperately
>> is 22" by 16", indicating to me that it also covers the border areas,
>> and thus the scanning area is likely 20" by 14". If that is the case,
>> this may be a very quick and convenient way to scan LP covers, magazine
>> pages, book text, etc. Flatbed scanners are great, but time consuming. I
>> say this as one who has scanned hundreds of LP covers the old-fashioned
>> way.
>>
>> One thing I wondered about right off is, how much does ambient light
>> effect the scan quality? Must you have exactly-placed light sources as
>> you would using a camera stand (the big turnoff about that method).? Or,
>> does this thing have some sort of system where it ignores ambient light
>> and only uses whatever light frequency is put out by its LEDs?
>>
>> I'm also not clear how it's a "3D scanner," as the way its demonstrated
>> in the video indiates nothing like full 3D scanner functionality (360
>> degree scanning, fractal modelling, etc).
>>
>> -- Tom Fine
> --
> Richard L. Hess email: [log in to unmask]
> Aurora, Ontario, Canada 647 479 2800
> http://www.richardhess.com/tape/contact.htm
> Quality tape transfers -- even from hard-to-play tapes.
>
>
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