stanski Posted October 1, 2008 Share Posted October 1, 2008 Trying to scan a photocopied page via Optical Character recognition setup on Epson scanner so I can then import it as a Word document to edit it - does anyone know if this can be done? It imports the scan as a picture not text which is a shame - maybe beause its late and I am tired but I cant seem to suss this? Or cant you do it? Thanks in advance? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clarkie34 Posted October 1, 2008 Share Posted October 1, 2008 Think you need something software called Pictbridge if I remember rightly,usually comes with printer Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stanski Posted October 1, 2008 Author Share Posted October 1, 2008 Thanks - is'nt Pictbridge for direct printing from a device such as a scanner or camera?? will look at this again in the morning when more awake Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris`I Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 Sounds like OCR isnt on. A normal scan will come up as a picture. What software are you using? From my (ancient) use of OCR, you need to plumb the scanner into some software as it takes the image and does the OCR bit and puts it into text. Might be different these days mind, havent used it for years! And yes, Pictbridge is a standard for allowing direct print from devices to the printer Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stanski Posted October 2, 2008 Author Share Posted October 2, 2008 Borrowed mates scanner - Epson Perfection 1660 - the bundled (or is that bungled) software that came with it - has an OCR option - which I have done - yes it scans the doc and picks out the text really well just puts it in TIF format? Have tried assorted options but no joy? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris`I Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 Borrowed mates scanner - Epson Perfection 1660 - the bundled (or is that bungled) software that came with it - has an OCR option - which I have done - yes it scans the doc and picks out the text really well just puts it in TIF format? Have tried assorted options but no joy? Very weird! Will see what google has to offer Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris`I Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 This is about the best I can find: From this help page: http://files.support.epson.com/htmldocs ... ptmz_5.htm Advanced Scanning / Optimizing Scanning Optimizing Text Scanning for OCR Scanning text Improving character recognition Potential text recognition problems This section gives you suggestions and recommended settings in order to improve OCR (Optical Character Recognition) scanning results. (For Perfection 1660 Photo and 2400 Photo only) Scanning text Make sure Text (Background Removal) is selected in the Image Type box and OCR is selected in the Destination box in the Manual mode window. If the recognition rate is not satisfactory with the default settings, follow these steps to change the settings: Improving character recognition In the Manual mode window, make sure Text (Background Removal) is selected in the Image Type box and OCR is selected in the Destination box. Then click the Image Type button. The Image Type dialog box appears. In the Image Type dialog box, select None for B/W Option, then click OK. In the Manual mode window, click the Full Preview button. Then click the Image Controls button to display the Image Controls dialog box. Use the Threshold slider to change the threshold value, monitoring the results of your changes in the Preview window. Adjusting the threshold value can make it easier for OCR to recognize characters. Potential text recognition problems The quality of the text in your original document greatly effects OCR results. The following types of originals can make recognition difficult and should be avoided if possible: * Items that have been copied from other copies * Faxes * Text with tightly-spaced characters or line pitch * Text that is in tables or underlined * Cursive or italic fonts, and font sizes less than 8 points Remember that OCR software cannot recognize handwritten characters. Could be this bit - Make sure Text (Background Removal) is selected in the Image Type box?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stanski Posted October 2, 2008 Author Share Posted October 2, 2008 Thanks Matey - yeah thats off Epsons web site - I did all of that last night but when it scans it it does'nt take the text just as text it still takes the whole thing as a scanned image of the text ?? Probably something daft I am missing here - not for the first time either? uploaded it to photshop to try to copy the text out and into Word but it did'nt want to play? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris`I Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 Got me stumped I'm afraid. Without sitting in front of the thing and seeing what option there are, I woudnt know where to start! I take it there is nothing in the output area of config that specifies TIF? Obviously if its outputting to TIFF you will never get the text from it as its an image file! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris`I Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 Been trying to make my way through this and these are the settings I can find that appear to apply to OCR: Image Type - Text (Background Removal) -B/W Option - Text Enhancement Technology (TET) Destination - OCR Now once you hit scan, what does it do? It should scan it, but I guess then start another App which does the OCR bit? I.e. the scan should pick up only text, but then another app takes that image and puts it into Word or whatever? From what I can see, all this is doing atm is modifying settings for the scanner so that it only picks up text, it doesnt actually put it into a text file, it keeps it as an image. What you need is another bit of software which takes the image and puts it into a text file (Word etc) that you can then play with. Do you have another bit of software from Epson that does this? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris`I Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 Try this with your tif image Stan: http://www.ofzenandcomputing.com/zanswers/1017 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stanski Posted October 2, 2008 Author Share Posted October 2, 2008 thanks mate - will have a dabble tonight - your right - it picks up the text from the scan and is supposed to send to an application - it does'nt seem to have an option for Word but I remember PDF being there - I do have a PDF editor so will try that tonght - thanks again for your time and help on this - its about 20 pages to copy and change after! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris`I Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 thanks mate - will have a dabble tonight - your right - it picks up the text from the scan and is supposed to send to an application - it does'nt seem to have an option for Word but I remember PDF being there - I do have a PDF editor so will try that tonght - thanks again for your time and help on this - its about 20 pages to copy and change after! Good luck Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GC350z Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 For the record that worked a treat. I've been racking my brain trying to remember how I did it with an Epson and I think there was set software that came with it but Stanski solution works much better than the Epson stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stanski Posted October 2, 2008 Author Share Posted October 2, 2008 will let you know tonight - if I can get it working - ta again folks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stanski Posted October 2, 2008 Author Share Posted October 2, 2008 cool managed to do it - use Adobe to convert it to PDF - as its a picture it asks you - do you want to convert to text - scans the page and Martin's your Auntie - its there - clever stuff! Thanks very much for your assistance on this one . AsI keep saying all life and knowledge is here on the forum ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris`I Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 Glad you got it all sorted Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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