Plustek Color Flatbed Scanners User Manual

Version 1.0

for

Color Flatbed Scanners

All trademarks and brand names mentioned in this publication are property of their respective owners.

2000. All rights are reserved. No portion of this document may be reproduced

without permission.

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION.........................................................................................................................................1

OW TO USE THIS GUIDE

ONVENTIONS OF THIS GUIDE

OTE ABOUT ICONS

A N

CHAPTER I. THE TWAIN INTERFACE..................................................................................................2

NTRODUCTION TO

AN I

NSTANT DESCRIPTIONS

HOOSING

C TWAIN D

DVANCED SETTINGS WINDOW

Preferences Window..............................................................................................................................8

DVANCED WINDOWS FOR COLOR CORRECTION

Color Channels.................................................................................................................................... 12

Histogram ............................................................................................................................................12

Tone Map.............................................................................................................................................14

Image Gamma......................................................................................................................................16

CANNING TIPS

TWAIN .....................................................................................................................................3

IALOG BOX FEATURES

..........................................................................................................................................17

............................................................................................................................1

.....................................................................................................................1

................................................................................................................................1

TWAIN...................................................................................................................2

OOL TIPS

: “T

”.........................................................................................................3

................................................................................................................3

..................................................................................................................7

......................................................................................12

CHAPTER II. THE SCANNER SOFTWARE.........................................................................................18

VERVIEW

HE FAX UTILITY

About the Fax Utility............................................................................................................................ 19

Using Fax Utility..................................................................................................................................20

Fax Utility Settings ..............................................................................................................................21

HE E-MAIL UTILITY

About the E-mail Utility.......................................................................................................................22

Using the E-mail Utility.......................................................................................................................22

E-mail Utility Settings..........................................................................................................................23

HE IMAGE EDITOR

Opening the Program ..........................................................................................................................24

Acquiring an Image from the Scanner.................................................................................................24

Basic Image Adjustments.....................................................................................................................25

Using Editing Tools.............................................................................................................................25

Saving Images...................................................................................................................................... 25

Printing Images....................................................................................................................................26

Scanning Tip: Monitor Gamma...........................................................................................................26

For Additional Help.............................................................................................................................26

HE COPY UTILITY

About the Copy Utility .........................................................................................................................27

Using the Copy Utility .........................................................................................................................27

.................................................................................................................................................18

......................................................................................................................................19

.................................................................................................................................22

ICTURE PUBLISHER

- P

....................................................................................................................................27

................................................................................................24

Copy Utility Settings............................................................................................................................28

To Use OCR via Action Manager 32...................................................................................................29

To Use OCR Directly from TextBridge Program.................................................................................30

To Use OCR Directly from Your Word Processor...............................................................................32

Some key points about OCR.................................................................................................................33

CONTACTING PLUSTEK........................................................................................................................35

OCR P

ROGRAM

EXTBRIDGE CLASSIC

– T

..........................................................................................29

Introduction

How to Use This Guide

This Software User’s Guide provides instructions and illustrations on how to use your scanner. This guide assumes the user is familiar with the Microsoft Windows. If this is not the case, we suggest you learn more about Microsoft Windows by referring to your Microsoft Windows manual before using your scanner.

Chapter I discusses the scanner’s TWAIN interface.

Chapters II provides an overview of the software bundled with your scanner and is a useful companion to the help menus found within the software applications themselves.

Conventions of this Guide

1. Bold — Important note or first use of an important term in a chapter.

2. ALL CAPS — Represents commands or contents on your computer screen.

A Note About Icons

This guide uses the following icons to point out information that deserves special attention.

Danger

Caution

Attention

Danger

accidents.

Caution

damage to the product.

Pay Special Attention

may prevent mistakes.

A procedure that must be followed carefully to prevent injury, or

. Information that, if not followed, may result in data loss or

. Instructions that are important to remember and

Chapter I. The TWAIN Interface

An Introduction to TWAIN

The TWAIN program is a very important piece of software that comes with

your scanner. This program acts as an interface between the scanner hardware and the image-editing software you are using to view and edit images. The TWAIN program allows you to adjust a number of settings to define the quality of the scanned image. The following chapter describes the TWAIN interface (see Figure 1) which automatically opens when you click SCAN, or ACQUIRE from within a TWAIN compatible scanning program or image-editing application.

The TWAIN interface allows you to make important adjustments before scanning. For example, you can scan in different modes: black and white, grayscale or color; increase or decrease the resolution (dots per inch of an image), and adjust the brightness and/or contrast. The Prescan option allows you to adjust the borders of the scan area by increasing or decreasing the size of the crop box located inside the Prescan Area. The TWAIN interface also provides you with statistics such as how large an image will be after scanning, in terms of both file size and physical dimensions.

Sourc

Scan Mode

Resolution Brightness

Contrast

Scan Area

Coordinates

Scan Area

Dimensions

Scan Area

Borders

Prescan

Area

Figure 1. TWAIN Window

Image

Size

Units Version

Pointer

Note: Apply for the scanner model built with a transparency adapter only.

Magnifying Glass

Horizontal Vertical

None 90°°°° Right

90°°°° Left 180°°°°

Instant Descriptions: “Tool Tips”

Let the mouse pointer rest over any item within the TWAIN dialog box and a description of the item will instantly appear. However, for more information about the use and function of specific items, you can refer to the on-line TWAIN Help by clicking on the Help button towards the bottom of the window.

Choosing TWAIN

To select the TWAIN interface: From your TWAIN compatible program, locate the scanner setup or TWAIN source option usually listed under the FILE menu and choose the appropriate TWAIN source for your scanner.

TWAIN Dialog Box Features

This section describes all of the options available in the TWAIN interface. It is very important to correctly configure the first two items (Source and Scan Mode) in order to successfully perform a scan. All other items are optional and allow you to tailor the characteristics of the scanned image.

Source - This option is available only for scanners built with a

transparency adapter. There are three possible sources listed:

• Normal - Use this setting to scan normal sheets of paper or any non-

transparent material.

• 35mm Slide - Use this mode for scanning slides.

• 35mm Negative - Use this mode for scanning negatives.

Scan Mode - There are three settings to choose from:

• Text - scans in black and white and is suitable for scanning text.

• B/W Photo (grayscale) - scans in 256 shades of gray, giving black and

white images or photos depth and shadow.

• 16-bit B/W Photo (grayscale) – scans in more than 65,000 shades of gray,

improving the realism of b/w images.

• Color Photo - scans in millions of colors for photo-realism. Choose this

mode when scanning color pictures or graphics.

• 48-bit Color Photo – scans in billions of colors for professional imaging

requiring precise uniformity of color.

Resolution - Resolution is measured in dots per inch (dpi). The higher the

resolution, the more detailed the image, and the more memory and drive space the image will use.

Brightness - This is the amount of light that is concentrated onto a document

while it is being scanned.

Contrast - Contrast adjusts the tonal range of an image by lowering mid-tone

values and increasing values for high and low tones.

Flip Horizontally - This option will only appear when scanning

transparencies or negatives, if your scanner is built with a transparency adapter. It will flip the scanned image around the central vertical axis. This

feature will not show up on the prescanned image, but will only affect the final scanned image.

Flip Vertically - This option will only appear when scanning

transparencies or negatives, if your scanner is built with a transparency adapter. It will flip the scanned image around the central horizontal axis. This

feature will not show up on the prescanned image, but will only affect the final scanned image.

Rotate 90°°°° Clockwise - This option will only appear when scanning

transparencies or negatives, if your scanner is built with a transparency adapter. It will rotate the scanned image 90°clockwise. This feature will not

show up on the prescanned image, but will only affect the final scanned image.

Rotate 180° - This option will only appear when scanning transparencies

or negatives, if your scanner is built with a transparency adapter. It will rotate the scanned image 180°. This feature will not show up on the prescanned image, but will only affect the final scanned image.

Rotate 90°°°° counter-clockwise - This option will only appear when

scanning transparencies or negatives, if your scanner is built with a transparency adapter. It will rotate the scanned image 90° counter-

clockwise. This feature will not show up on the prescanned image, but will only affect the final scanned image.

Prescan Window - The Prescan Window (figure 2) is the large white area in the

middle of the TWAIN window. Documents or images that are prescanned will be displayed there.

Prescanning images is very useful as it gives you an idea of how a document or image will look after it is scanned. You can use the Magnifying Glass to zoom the view of the prescanned image by clicking on the magnifying glass button towards the upper right of the TW AIN window and then clicking on the part of the image you wish to view in detail.

Scan Area

Borders

Figure 2. Prescan Window

If you change any settings either in the TWAIN window or in any of the Advanced windows, the effects of the changes (except for Flip, Rotate, Filter and Descreen) will immediately appear on the prescanned image in the Prescan Area. This allows you to instantly judge the effects of almost any setting you change.

The Scan Area Border, designated by the dotted box in the Prescan Area, can be resized and moved. This is very important for keeping the image size (in terms of computer memory) as small as possible. To do this, first prescan the document or image you wish to scan by loading it in the scanner and clicking on the Prescan Button. After it appears in the Prescan Area, resize and move the dotted box so it fits snugly around the edges of the prescanned image.

Placing the mouse pointer INSIDE the Scan Area Border box will change the cursor as shown to the left and allows you to move the entire frame by dragging the mouse.

Placing the mouse pointer at the EDGE of any side of the margin will change the cursor as shown to the left and allows you to reduce or expand the frame around the image.

Pointer - Changes the cursor from magnifying glass to pointer. The pointer

must be used to adjust the Scan Area Border or change settings.

Magnifying Glass - Clicking on the magnifying glass button changes the

cursor to a magnifying glass and lets you easily zoom in and out of the prescanned image in the Prescan Window.

To zoom in, click the left mouse button. To zoom out, click the right mouse button. To stop zooming in and out of the image, click on the Pointer button just above the Magnifying Glass button.

Note: The magnifying glass only affects the view of the prescanned image

in the prescan area and in no way affects the scanning process or the final scanned image.

Scan Button - Accepts all settings and begins scanning.

Prescan Button - By clicking on the Prescan button, you can scan the source

document into the Prescan Area in the middle of the TWAIN window. This allows you to modify the scan area (for smaller images such as photographs) and gives you a rough idea of what the scanned image will look like before you scan.

Advanced Button - Advanced controls for precision scans. See below for detailed

explanations about the Advanced Settings window that appears when you click on this button.

Cancel - Clicking on the Cancel button saves your current settings and closes the

TWAIN window

Help - Clicking on this button runs the on-line help program

Attention

Status Bar - The status bar (figure 3) contains important information about the

settings in the TWAIN window.

Figure 3. Status Bar

Scan Area Coordinates shows the position of the Scan Area Border in terms of X

and Y coordinates.

Scan Area Dimension shows the exact width and height of the Scan Area Border.

Image Size displays the amount of memory your image will use. The larger the image

size, the longer it takes to actually scan the image. Larger images, due to their memory requirements, will also take longer for your image-editing applications to process when making any corrections.

Tips for reducing the file size of an image:

• Change the scan mode – Color mode collects the most amount of

information and therefore requires more memory than grayscale or black and white.

• Reduce the resolution –See S canning Tips later in this chapter for detailed

information about selecting the proper amount of resolution.

• Reduce the scan area - When scanning images that are smaller than a full

page, make sure you prescan the image and adjust the scan area borders in the Prescan Area window.

• Some file formats such as GIF and JPEG can compress image data, greatly

reducing the amount of space an image takes up on your hard drive.

Units shows the measurement units used i n the Prescan Area. The measurement uni ts

can be changed by clicking on the Advanced button.

Version displays the version of the TWAIN program you are using.

Advanced Settings Window

The Advanced Settings window (figure 4) has 4 tabs running along the top Preferences, Histogram, Tone Map and Gamma, all of which will be explained in detail below. Click on one of the tabs to display settings. For additional instructions click on the Help button at the bottom-right of the window to view the on-line TWAIN help.

Figure 4. Advanced Settings

Most of the menu options are considered advanced features. W e strongly suggest that you first become familiar with scanning and using the settings in the TWAIN window before attempting to use any of the following features. Many of these advanced features will also be available to you in your image-editing software after you scan.

PPrreeffeerreenncceess WWiinnddooww

The Preferences window (figure 4) has a number of settings that control how the image is scanned and how it is viewed in the Prescan Area.

MMoonniittoorr GGaammmmaa

Monitor gamma defines how the colors in an image will be displayed on your monitor (not the color data in the image itself). The monitor gamma setting allows you to change the gamma values for your monitor.

The monitor gamma only aff ects the prescanned image in th e prescan area. This is because image-editing applications have their own monitor gamma settings. The settings defined here should be exactly the same as the settings in the imageediting application you will use to view and edit the scanned image.

To correctly adjust the monitor gamma, you must first have your computer and working environment stable. This includes the lighting in the room, and making sure your monitor brightness, contrast and colors are properly adjusted. Next, drag the slider bars to alter the monitor gamma. When finished, click OK to exit.

+ 27 hidden pages