Any camera setup is going to take up a lot more room than a plain scanner,
though.

It really depends on what you're looking for, what shape your materials are
in, your budget, and what potential you have for future projects. If you've
got loose leaf or are allowed to disbind, you can get a Canon sheetfed that
will do what you need for ~400 bucks. Some of them even have OCR built in.
That's what we used for dissertations before our grad school went to
born-digital.

If you have bound stuff that you don't mind putting on a flatbed, and want
a scanner that you can use for other projects afterwards, we've had great
success with Epson - we just bought a second 11000XL. But those are a heck
of a lot more expensive. We use ours mostly for scanning (non-rare) brittle
books that have been identified for deaccession due to condition, and that
are in too bad shape for our vendors to be willing to deal with.

We have a couple of camera setups as well (one book scanner and one camera
stand), and the main concerns I'd point out about those are larger size
footprint, the cost of the cameras, and sometimes the need for more
software just than photoshop to post-process the files that the camera
outputs. We only use our cameras for rare book or fine art projects that
need special care and handling anyway (both physically and electronically).

On Thu, Sep 1, 2016 at 5:12 PM, Joe Hourcle <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:

> On Thu, 1 Sep 2016, Andrew Hankinson wrote:
>
> Do you need a scanner? Cameras have pretty high resolution these days, are
>> instant capture and if you get a rig with two you can capture an opening
>> with one shot. They're also probably faster to operate unless you are
>> disbinding and using a sheet feeder.
>>
>
> If you're going to go that route, you still want to make sure that there's
> a platen to flatten things out.  (OCR is more difficult if you have to deal
> w/ the curvature of the pages).
>
> If you're handy, or can rope someone in who is, see:
>
>         http://www.diybookscanner.org
>
> If you're not quite so handy, but okay with assembling IKEA furniture:
>
>         http://store.diybookscanner.org
>
> I have the previous model (less aluminum, more wood), but from the current
> manufacturer, so I assume the electronics package is similar.
>
> My only issue was in getting the electronics all happy.  Once you get a
> clean bootup, it's fine, but occassionally one of the cameras don't get
> seen by the computer, and I have to restart it.  (I'm not sure if there's
> something that I should be doing to make sure parts come up in a specific
> order; I should probably go back and test the next time I have a batch of
> things to scan)
>
> Oh... and I somehow mixed up which camera was 'right' vs. 'left'.  I think
> I had assumed right side of the scanner, but it was actually the camera on
> the left side that images the right-hand page.  (or maybe it was visa-versa
> ... take a test picture before you go to the trouble of aligning the
> cameras, so you don't have to pull everything apart so you can get to the
> SD cards out to swap.  (or swap the whole cameras, like I did).
>
> okay .. three issues ... they had just switched to a higher resolution
> camera, and that might've been the issue ... but it took me a bit of
> stumbling through the menus to get the cameras to go into the mode
> necessary to do the alignment.  I think I had to disconnect the USB cable
> or they wouldn't do it.
>
> ... and it's possible that there's FAQs online about these things, that I
> didn't look at as I just wanted to get it built & play with it.  (and scan
> some books)
>
> -Joe
>
>
>
>
> On Sep 1, 2016, at 8:40 PM, Matt Sherman <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi all,
>>>
>>> We are doing some digital preservation of our legacy theses and my
>>> boss wanted to get a newer second scanner to move along the project.
>>> As such I was wondering if anyone had suggestions for a good bed or
>>> book scanner that could help make some good quality scans, preferably
>>> ones we could OCR, that doesn't require a lot of space or a darkroom?
>>> I typically have used what my employer already had and as such haven't
>>> had to buy equipment before so I wasn't sure what a decent one would
>>> be.  Any suggestions would be welcome.
>>>
>>> Matt Sherman
>>>
>>
>>


-- 
Christine Mayo
Digital Production Librarian
Thomas P. O'Neill, Jr. Library
Boston College
[log in to unmask]