How can one edit a scanned document?

[bellbram]

I have some hard copy but not the file from which it was printed.  I have scanned it in to my G5 (OS10.4. and woud like to edit it.   Have tried copying the scanned document into various wordprocessors (AppleWorks, Word & Mariner Write) but just can't get in to the document to edit it.

Anyone out there know how?

[jwboyd]

The Image Zone software that came with my HP scanner has a "Scan Document" button that feeds the scan directly into TextEdit. I usually open that plain text document in MS Word for editing. Normally only minor cleanup is needed.

[bellbram]

Thanks jwb, but I'm using an Epson scanner and it dosn't seem to have that facility.  The only options are to scan as jpeg pdf or tiff.  I can direct the scan to be saved to a variety of applications, but not to TextEdit, 'cos in the dialog window for Applications, TextEdit is greyed out.

[RNKIII]

Peter,

Usually a scanner comes with a CD of 'extra stuff' (technical term )... that sometimes includs OCR / Optical Character Recognition software.  I know both my Canon scanner and my HP AIO have it.  It does take (usually) a multi-step process to do the conversion.

This would allow you to scan the document into a word processing format / application that could then be edited.

Right now if you are just scanning / copying the document that is all you can do is 'look at it' you can't do anything with/to it... it is just a 'picture' of the document.

Best of luck and hope your 'searches' are proving fruitful.

Bob K   rnkiii

[kimmer]

You need that ICR software. I use ReadIris Pro. Works great. I'm pretty sure Amazon sells it at a decent price, and probably other places as well.

[krissel]

You might give this online demo a chance.


http://www.simpleocr.com/Demo/

http://www.simpleocr.com/

[bellbram]

Thanks all for responses.

Bob: Unfortunately my Epson Photo RX420 does not have any 'extra stuff'.

kimmer: Had a look at ReadIrisPro, but it seems a tad expensive and I'd rather find something a bit cheaper as I only want to use OCR very infrequently.  Had a look at the Demo version and it looks pretty complicated to me.  Maybe beyond my limited IT capabilities!

kris:  Downloaded the demo version of Simple OCR which will only take very small files (under 200K).  Anyway to test it I created an 80K TIFF file using AppleWorks.   This is what the TIFF file actually had —  "This is a test sheet for OCR by Simple OCR".  

The result of the Upload was :  " -'C h ' 1 s j ' s a '1- ia = ,1- n h = e t f o r O C Q L-. q : z Q :, e '*' a r n '' e 'Nk z C D . . . wvuou u u I % &.# y U . I l : ja I we I & "

Not quite what I wanted!!

Suggestions?

[RNKIII]

Peter,

Have you tried the Epson site to see if they might have anything available that would work with your particular machine??

It may be that their 'tech support' could suggest something also??  


Bob K.   rnkiii

[bellbram]

Bob,

Thanks for the suggestion.  Epson say they have  nothing to offer and suggsted
SimpleOCR.   I told them the tale of the gobbledegook I got and they said they always really recommend Abbey Finereader.   I had a look at the download site and decided that I'd rather keep the money in the bank!

So, being something of a cheapskate, I'm no further forward, but I'm really not prepared to lash out around £100 for something I just want to use once or twice.

Guess I'll just have to get down to copy-typing.

That's unless some other TeeEss genius has a good idea  

[Xairbusdriver]

QUOTE

...nothing to offer...

A little less than what I'd call product support! Although I've never had an Epson scanner, it's surprising that they didn't include something with it.

Our Brother MFC came with some rather crude scanner software but it works fine on the OCR front. Keeping the files small may also decrease the reliability of the OCR software. I scan our stuff at 200ppi and it seems to be pretty accurate. Using smaller resolutions may make it harder for the software to "see" the letters accurately.

Too bad the SimpleOCR didn't work well enough to be usable, I too, have declined the 'temptation' of buying Iris, although they still send me emails touting its superiority. For that price, it should be 110% accurate!

OCR has always been a difficult application to get working, and the extremely large variety of font families don't make things easy, either. The Brother stuff occasionally sees specks on the paper as 'periods', "th" sometimes becomes "(h". Thankfully, the word processor that gets the 'product' can see these as spelling errors. But with any software, I suspect there will always be a need to proof read.

If you do this only once in a blue ( or other colored ) moon, perhaps you can prevail on another household member to type as you dictate ( that may be as close to being a 'dictator' as you'll ever get, anyway! ).

[RNKIII]

Peter...

Think about this...

You could send me a scanned copy via email attachment.
I would then print it out, and OCR that copy into a word processing document format of your choice and send it back to you as an attachment on a return email.

Might be a method that would work if you don't have too large a document either in format or content..

Let me know, I'd be glad to help if possible.

Bob K.   rnkiii

[Gregg]

What about turning the scanned document into a pdf file? Is that possible?

I've had success copying and pasting from a pdf to AppleWorks or Word.

[tacit]

QUOTE(Gregg @ Feb 27 2007, 05:07 PM) [snapback]120362[/snapback]

What about turning the scanned document into a pdf file? Is that possible?

I've had success copying and pasting from a pdf to AppleWorks or Word.

There are many kids of PDF files.

A scanned image that is saved as a PDF contains no text. It only contains a picture. You can not copy a picture from a scanned image in a PDF and then paste it into a word processor as text. Only a PDF that contains text will let you copy the text as text.

No matter how you slice it, a picture is not text. It must be processed and "understood" by an OCR program in order to become text.

[bellbram]

Jim :  Well, there are 3 other household members: My dearly beloved (aka "She Who Must Be Obeyed"); Rufus the Dachshund and Tia the cat.  

The cat regularly practices typing and is constantly jumping on the desk and walking over the keyboard.  She's quite good at depressing the keys, but just can't spell. (Though she'd do a better job than SimpleOCR!)

Rufus is too long in the body and short in the legs.

SWMBO might not take too kindly to the suggestion, though I may summon up the courage to ask.   Time was, when the dear girl was my secretary anyway!


Bob:  That's a mighty kind offer.  I'll drop you a lne and we can 'chat' about it.


Gregg:  I've tried that, and whilst I can copy the pdf text into a WP, it goes in to a kind of box surrounded by dotted lines, but does not permit of editing.

Thanks again to you all for your suggestions.

[bellbram]

This is confession time.  I have boobed — again.

I needed an OCR app — or thought I did — because I had lost the original file from which I had made a hard copy, and wanted to make several additions and amendments to it.   Not having the original — created with MarinerWrite — meant an awful lot of added typing.

BUT, just a few moments ago, by chance, I discovered the lost file which was lurking in the depths of a partition on my external HD.  I have no idea why the alias on my DT couldn't find it, not why Spotlight couldn't either.

Anyway, I have it now so no longer need an OCR app.

I feel a complete nitwit for puttingyou all to the trouble of trying to help me and my face is very red    and   again.

Thank you all.  Sorry you've been troubled