A Basic Scanning Tutorial - Rewritten - Please read

[DVDCoverArt]

PREPERATION

First of all, you have to make sure you scanner's surface is clean, get a soft cloth and gently wipe it, getting rid of any dust that may have settle on the surface. You may want to use some Spray and Wipe or Windex if there are marks on your scanner glass, but make sure you wipe the glass dry before you place down the cover.

Do not use the edges of the scanner to keep your cover straight. Most scanners will “Cut off” a portion of the edge of the cover. Instead, place the cover in the center of the glass and keep it as straight as possible, then use Photoshop’s “Measure Tool,” located under the “Eyedropper” to straighten the cover. Photoshop's straightening technique which will allow you to rotate it down to 0.01 degrees if you need to, which is a lot more precise than most image editing software...

FLATTENING OUT THE COVER

1. Do not use the lid of the scanner when scanning covers.

2. Do Not use your fingers to try and straighten out the folds prior to placing the cover on the scanner.

3. Do not use the edges of the scanner to keep your cover straight. Most scanners will “Trim off” a portion of the Cover's edge. Instead, place the cover in the center of the scanner bed and just keep it as straight as possible. Then use Photoshop’s “Measure Tool,” located under the “Eyedropper” to straighten the cover (instructions further down).

4. Place a white sheet of construction paper on the Cover. If scanning a cover that has primarily white edges, place a black sheet of construction paper on it.

5. Followed by a large catalog or a large thick book, it should be large enough to cover the entire cover.

6. Press firmly down on the center of the catalog/book with one hand while pressing on the top section with the other hand, then move your hand to the bottom section once the scanner reaches the center..

7. For snapper covers, hold them firmly down with your hands.

These steps will result in a flat cover and spine area.

I will assume the majority of people are using Photoshop, since polls indicate that this is the program the majority of our members use. You will get the same results if you use comparable functions in other programs.

dpi Settings

Scan Everything at 600 dpi. They should be scanned as documents, not photographs. You should scan from within Photoshop.

STRAIGHTENING COVERS & LABELS

Go to the toolbar on the left-hand side of the screen. Find the Eyedropper tool, right-click it and select Measure Tool. With the measure tool selected, view the scan at about 12.5% or larger, providing you can see all four edges. Then click and hold the Measure Tool from one corner across to the other corner and let go. You can also use text within the page rather than the edge of the cover since the edge is not always perfectly straight. Then go to Image --> Rotate Canvas --> Arbitrary. Click OK and the cover will now rotate so it is perfectly straight. I suggest performing this procedure twice. With labels you have to use text or lines within the image to level them.

NOTE: Don't forget, I don't like scanned labels, so they have to be REALLY good in order for me to accept them.

Then go to Image --> Rotate Canvas --> 90 CW or 90 CCW depending on which way you scanned your cover, so that the cover is in the Landscape position. To determine whether you need to use the Measure Tool again, use the Rectangular Marquee Tool to verify how straight each of the Cover’s edges are. You can perform the “Measure Tool” function again if you are not satisfied with the straightness of the cover.

CROPPING

Then go to the select tool on the toolbox. Select the Rectangular Marquee Tool and crop the edges of the cover. Try to trim off as little of the original cover as possible when doing this.

HALFTONE DOTS

Now we will try and get rid of the Halftone Dots while still keeping as much quality as possible. Go to Filters --> Blur --> Gaussian Blur. Set the radius from 0.8 - 1.4 but no higher or lower. Try not to blur the image too much...just enough to be able to rescue it later on.

Then go to Filters --> Noise --> Despeckle. Make sure your scan is still 600 dpi (6480x4350) then apply the Despeckle filter 2 times, because the image is larger, we need to apply this filter more, but DON'T apply it more than 3 times, otherwise you will lose too much information and the cover will look too edited.

Then resize your cover down to 300 dpi at 3246x2160 pixels (site preference), or 3240x2175.

Then go to Filters --> Sharpen --> Unsharp Mask. Set Amount to 60%, Threshold to 1, and the Radius to anywhere from 1.2-1.6 but no higher. I would recommend 1.4 because I feel this is the ideal setting.

SAVE YOUR WORK

File --> Save the image at number 11 quality setting in Photoshop.

This process will help eliminate low quality scans and help make this site the best cover site on the Internet! - So please follow them.

This does not mean you are done. There is more to producing a quality image than simply scanning it and applying a few filters.

It may be necessary to replace logos or text (when possible) if it doesn't come out clearly. I am not going to give an example of everything that can be done to a scan to enhance it, but I do want to show you what replacing text can do.

The following is not my scan, but I receive these types of scans all the time. With a little effort on your part, drastic improvements can be made.

The image below contains the original text of the cover that was submitted for approval. Some areas were fairly clear, but as you can see, the text was not.

Below is the portion of the cover that is relevant:





Magnified, the text was barely legible. So replacing the text was a better option and was not difficult. It took all of 15 min.



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DVDCoverArt
Site Master