Scanner Options Abound

Today, Apr 2004 by Spencer, Harvey

Kodak Showcases New Products at Annual Conference

Every year, Kodak hosts a meeting for its reseller channel. This year, the 75th anniversary of supporting image products (Kodak's first microfilm camera was released in 1928), it was held at Disney's Yacht Club Resort in Orlando and has attended by approximately 500 resellers. The theme predictably was 'T he Magic of Kodak!' and the highlight of the conference was the unveiling of a new range of mid range scanners named the i600 series. There are three models in the range, all color capable without speed loss - the i620, i640 and i680 which scan both sides at 80, 100 and 120 pages per minute respectively at 200 dpi and start at $20,000 list.

I normally qualify speeds, as scanner manufacturers have an annoying habit of rating their speeds assuming landscaped scanning - meaning the user has to rotate the images, which is time consuming, and-if color JPEGs have been used-can lead to a loss in resolution. So most users scan in portrait mode. But these scanners rotated the images 90 degrees in realtime and also deskewed them with no noticeable loss in performance - even in color and even with multiple images being output! So the rated speeds seem like true scanning time. They also have the ability to output a dual stream of color or grayscale images at the same time as black and white bitonal ones. This benefit became very clear to me when they demonstrated their new version of their image capture software creating searchable PDF images - the bitonal image was used for the OCR while the color image was preserved for viewing - all completely seamlessly. I would of been less impressed by this if their internal thresholding was less good - but backgrounds were completely eliminated while the characters were nicely sharpened, so the OCR will be of high quality.

The problem with searchable PDF's is that the user looks at the image - the searchable text is hidden behind. So the user cannot see what text has been converted or what it was converted to. So a bad OCR conversion can result in a user not being able to find a document. I've found that many products purporting to create searchable image PDF's which are offered by a variety of vendors lure one into a false sense of security but have very poor OCR - but based on this technology which uses IRIS as the enginethe Kodak solution should deliver a high degree of accuracy.

The i600 series is a well thought out series of mid range production scanners and has incorporated lessons learned from Kodak's previous scanners as well as some new thoughts, which we can expect to see migrate to other scanners. Some examples. From their i200 series, a new rubber compound on the autofeeder and Xenon lamps to illuminate the image; from their i800 series, a gap release for thick documents and dual lamps ensuring that shadows are not created from indentations in the paper. The new ideas, which I have not seen before, include a completely sealed camera that cannot get dust in it, edge feeding capability supported by 3 double feed sensors - which is handy for checks; grayscale output; and cooling fans on the ends of the lamps, helping to ensure that the image does not change in color or density or pick up noise over the course of heavy, long term usage. A 500 sheet top-sheet feeder that paper to be added while scanning, standard pre-scan ink jet endorser (unfortunately not the new high capacity one from Hewlett Packard), color downloadable tables (at last) and a firewire interface complete with board and cable in case you do not have it in your PC, finishes the package. I understood shipping would be early in the 2nd quarter - which suggests you will be able to get units shortly after the official release at AIlM.

Also shown was a new higher end model in the i200 series range which was released and shipped in January. The i280 at 62ppm featured a new long document capability which was interesting, as well as a relative cropping capability designed to reduce image sizes on awkwardly shaped documents. Kodak claimed that long document capability could scan pages up to 20 teet long, in color if necessary. This is needed for well logs and medical charts. Previously this was only available in black and white on old video interfaced Fujitsu scanners together with the duNord interface boards. The Kodak solution works by effectively chopping them up into smaller 'pages' and then dynamically pasting them together.

Well those were the exciting parts from the conference, and it was nice to see Kodak being aggressive again with its new scanner products. I believe that the i600 in particular raises the bar and Bell & Howell has a fight on its hands. The resellers seemed collectively in a good mood and most seemed to have had a good year in 2003 - which fits with the research we did for the new report on Capture that Strategy-Partners issues.

AT PRESS TIME:

The Scanner Market Heats Up

In addition to Kodak, several other scanner manufacturers are making product announcements. As we go to press, Scan-Optics has announced its "SO" line, IBML is unveiling its Image Trac III and ImageTrace IV, and BancTec has introduced the Docuscan 9000 scanners. Look for details at www.tawpi.org and at TAWPI's Forum & Expo in Chicago.