Image Capture for InDesign: From Scanners to Cameras

From the first cave paintings through to film photography, images were something that you mostly looked at. Getting an image into a computer is a fairly recent need.

Interestingly, there was a digital image before there was a digital camera. This came from the first image scanner invented in the late 1950s (a drum scanner) with the intent of converting an image into something that a computer could work with. By the 1990s flatbed scanners were being developed which were much easier to use (and cost much less than drum scanners). This coincided with the WYSIWYG platform that Apple was developing making it easier for Mac users to add actual photographs to their MacWrite documents.

Simply, to get an image (sketch, photo, drawing, etc., into a computer, you need to digitize, or capture, that image. This can be done with either a camera or a scanner. The camera can do it faster, the scanner can do it better. Which one you end up using depends on your needs, expectations, time, and what you are willing to accept.

Gary presents how to:

• Where and how it is best to go for speed (e.g., getting the greatest quantity of images captured in a given time)
• or for quality of the image both in resolution and appearance (either of which require a lot more time per image).

Gary also discusses:

• The “truth” of scanner’s real resolution capabilities.
• Show’s his process for photographing slides (and the type of equipment he recommends).
• How to deal with scanning images that have texture
• How to scan documents to obtain the best OCR.

You will learn:

• The best ways to retrieve elements from a Library to use them in your designs
• How to store repetitive text in Libraries and link it to your layouts
• How to back up Libraries for safekeeping
• … and much more

About the Presenter

Gary Coyne

Although retired now, for over 40 years Gary Coyne was a scientific glassblower. That is, he made, and often designed, glassware for scientific research (the kinds of things you see in the background of science fiction movies, but Gary made his items for actual research, not the movies). Gary spent the last 32 years of his career in the Chemistry Department at CSULA.

When the Mac came out in 1986 Gary quickly became a Mac nerd and became the Chemistry Depts, Go-To guy for the professors and staff who needed help on their Macs. When Apple released their scanner in 1988, Gary bought one and has owned a scanner ever since.

In the late ‘90s Gary was using and beta testing GoLive Cyberstudio. When Adobe bought that program, Gary followed and became a beta tester for Adobe GoLive. Soon he was beta testing many other applications such as Photoshop, Acrobat, Illustrator, InDesign, Lightroom, and other applications.

Now retired, Gary spends his days woodworking, biking, and spending too much time on his computer and scanner.