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CONVENTIONAL FILM
PICTURES BETTER FOR PHOTO ENLARGEMENTS
Some photo uses like creating large signs or wall murals demand
higher resolutions. High resolution is the ability of the camera
or scanner to capture more pixels. You can read more about resolution
in our image resolution newsletter - click
here.
Anyone who wants to achieve great results when enlarging images,
display large prints (in digital photography, that's 8X10 inches
or larger) or crop small sections out of images for later enlargement
needs the ability and equipment to get high resolution images into
their computer. A digital camera needs to have at least 3 to 6
megapixels or even higher (megapixels, or millions of pixels, are
the unit used to measure the resolution of digital cameras; the
more, the better - especially for large wall mural or display applications).
If you want to increase the quality of your enlargements, a conventional
film camera might do the job much better and less expensively.
Enlarging with Imagener or YottaPrint always
provides much better results if you have the option to use photos
taken with a regular camera for example, then use a scanner to
scan the images in at a very high resolution. Pictures taken with
a film camera then scanned in give you the ability to increase
the resolution as high as the scanner will allow, which can be
many times higher than a digital camera. For example, a 3 megapixel
camera will give you images between 200 - 300 dpi. A conventional
picture can be scanned in at 1200 dpi and will give you much better
results for wall murals or poster printing, without the cost of
the digital camera.
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WHY YOU NEED A
SCANNER
A scanner complements digital photography and digital image work perfectly.
The quality of output from your computer can be greatly enhanced by the
use of a scanner. A scanner excels at getting images into your computer
with enough resolution to get much more satisfactory
results out of Imagener and YottaPrint.
Our testing provided outstanding results
when we scanned in wall mural images at 1200 dpi (dots per inch) as opposed
to our initial testing with 200 and 300 dpi images from a digital camera.
Having
only a digital camera and a computer limits what you can do with digital
imaging. There are applications for scanners that you might not have
dreamed of. Here's a partial list:
- Convert printed text to an editable document using optical
character recognition (OCR) programs. These programs "read" the
text from any printed material allowing you to place quotations
and excerpts into your documents.
- Make copies without a copier using your scanner and computer.
You can also reduce or even eliminate paper filing of your
records by scanning your documents
into your computer (making sure to back up for safe storage).
- Send
faxes using your computer's fax modem. A scanner, not a fax
machine, is all you need to have full fax capability right from
your home.
- Capture
images quickly for web pages or for use in presentations.
Scanners can put images of any type into digital form fast.
- Create
a computer image database of family photos or any photo
collection. This
gives you the flexibility to find and use more of your
images quickly.
- Add photos to your e-mail.
- Capture documents such as letters, faxes,
memos, and reports into a document management system. Then
you can use optical character recognition to read your documents
allowing
you
to search using keywords so
that you can
find your information
easily.
Adding a scanner to your computer gives you these
and other options. Also, today relatively high quality scanners
are not that expensive.
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Affordable High Resolution. Good flatbed
scanners are less than $200. One of the best we found is the OneTouch
9320 USB Scanner .
This scanner has a superhigh, 6,400x3,200 dpi optical resolution
and is very affordable at only $129. It has five, one-touch buttons:
one each for color-page scanning, e-mailing, optical-character-recognition
(text) scanning, copying (printing), and photo scanning.
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Less than $100. Another scanner
we highly recommend that is even less expensive is the Scanjet
3970 Digital FlatBed Scanner from
Hewlett Packard. It is a great utilitarian scanner for a first-time
user or a student. Its features include a built-in Transparent Material
Adapter for scanning slides and 35mm negatives, and the four one-touch
buttons lining the front for scanning, printing, image-sharing, and
creating photo CDs. This scanner will scan images into your computer
at up to 2400 dpi (much more than most digital cameras for sure!)
and we found it here for
less than $100. |
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