Newbie question: scanning newspapers

D

Dances With Crows

What is the optimum resolution for scanning newspaper print?

Don't know about actual tabloid-or-larger newspapers, but the company I
work for has a huge archive of newspapers on microfilm that have been
scanned in at 300 DPI 1-bit. That has worked well for a lot of things.
If you're interested in the photographs/halftones on the newspapers, you
might want to go grayscale, but the images would be really large then.
 
O

Olaf Ulrich

-mike- said:
What is the optimum resolution for
scanning newspaper print?

Depends on how big you want the newspaper's final image.

Depends furthermore on what you consider 'optimum.' Do
you want the image just to be readable, at minimum storage
requirements---or do you want the image to be a most
accurate facsimile?

Olaf
 
C

CCDee

Most newspapers are printed using 75 to 90 line per inch screens angled (45
or 60 degrees), pretty low rez by today's standards, using a process known
as PMT (originally known as photo mechanical transfer). They have to the rag
they print on is prone to bleed. If you look closely you can see the
individual dots, some are bigger some are smaller. It's actually a two color
process black (ink) on white (paper). Seen from a distance the eye sees this
as a continous tone. Problems (moire patterning) can arise when scanning
because the scanners grid will overlap at certain points causing patterns
and spots to appear. VueScan has a "descreen" option which attempts to
correct for this. Color newspaper photos use CMYK inks (Cyan, Magenta,
Yellow, Black) rotating each screen so the pattern isn't so noticable. The
optimum resolution would be 300 DPI or much much less. With the black an
white you might be able to experiment, scan at high rez as a one bit file,
your scanner might just be able to capture the dots.
 
D

David R

Future advice. You should try be more discriptive with your
questions. In you case the brand name of the scanner could be very
helpfull. Some scanners have settings that are designed for
newspapers and some people have lots of experience with some scanners.
 

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