e-mail a hand-drawn sketch

I have more than 43 years of FUN DESIGNS under my belt, so I'm designed-in just about everywhere ;-)

...Jim Thompson

Hi Win, I have 'four' different solutions to this! First, I had an HP SCSI scanner (now in my garage) that only has drivers for Win95... not good.

Then, I got a CanoScan scanner. It is an earlier verson of the nice unit Sphero refers to. My wife uses it extensively to OCR documents for her screen reader. it is light, portable, and easy to store out of the way. Ours came with the OCR software and everything, so has been a workhorse for the last few years.

I also have a Compaq S200 scanner (came free with my PC... 8-) ) that I use on that machine. Big, clumsy, but does a little better job on some things like textbooks (it has better depth of field for getting the spine...) and it was free...

Now, I have an old laserjet 3100 all-in-one machine for these things on my work machine. Works great as either a fax or as a single sheet scanner. Also, a nice printer. Just wish I hadn't gotten it second hand, so I had all the paper guides and such...

Charlie

Five? What do you need the +5V supply for? Four will do.

Winfield Hill wrote: [...]

I've got a decent-quality Wacom digitizer tablet, but hate it for schematics. Time-lag and limited resolution make for jaggy, pixelated capture, and somehow the tablet doesn't ever quite see things the way I think I'm drawing them. End results are hard-won, yet less than impressive. Paper and pencil--easy, clean, & fast.

As for scanners Win, might this be your cup-of-tea?

I love my older copies of Visioneer's 'PaperPort' document management software (though fret that its virtues may not've survived their subsequent aquisition by ScanSoft intact).

Regards, James Arthur

I read in sci.electronics.design that Winfield Hill wrote (in ) about 'e-mail a hand-drawn sketch', on Thu, 25 Aug 2005:

Scan to GIF or PDF and send as attachment. I've never had any problem with that.

I read in sci.electronics.design that Winfield Hill wrote (in ) about 'e-mail a hand-drawn sketch', on Thu, 25 Aug 2005:

Screwy!

What you need is a scut bunny.

John

Jim, do you have one of those, or know their quality?

I purchased Visioneer's previous product, a miraculous- looking handle-wand scanner, but it was a 1-bit no-gray- scale disaster. My attitude was not helped by a lack of any mention of its 1-bit nature in the product info, and an inability to try it at the store. A big disappointment.

You know, once burned...

Also, what automated capabilities does the XP100 come with?

I have one of their earlier flatbeds, not the Strobe XP. Mine is an earlier model, parallel-port interfaced(!), still faithfully chugging away. The interface makes it slow, but the image quality is very good. For pc board layouts I sometimes get tiny SMD parts' footprints directly by simply scanning them on the flatbed. No measurements, no errors.

I can't vouch for the Strobe's image quality or speed--I simply haven't looked. I suspect they're good--a demo of one of their very early models, circa 1996(?), dazzled. The scanner in question touts 10 seconds per page scan speed--that's pretty decent.

I also looked greedily, waayyy back, at that handheld of theirs, but did determine beforehand that is was only a one-bitter, which put me off buying it.

I'm pretty sure the outfit--scanner + PaperPort--will e-mail scans. Though the XP 100 page says it comes with PaperPort

I just tried it: v5.3 lets me drag-n-drop a scanned thumbnail from the PaperPort desktop display onto a 'link' icon it made for my ISP. Doing this, it reports that it's creating an attachment for e-mailing, starting internet connection, fires up my e-mailer..., but I stopped it there, as that computer isn't presently connected.

It looks like their manuals are be available on-line; those should answer any lingering questions.

What I especially like about PaperPort is its rapid handling of multi-page documents. Unlike the other packages I've tried, you can actually flip pages, almost like a book. The software is 1/3rd the size of other bloatware, the OCR is basic, but fast and accurate (note: does not preserve columns/formatting)... There are a number of other nice touches, and, refreshingly, the darn thing actually works.

Regards, James Arthur

Why don't you try it and report back. What's involved if you need to edit the scan a bit, e.g. crop the image? Does it work?

Just wondering how many US/EU habitations **aren't** infested with a Thompson device somewhere

martin

"...HTML formatted mail document." Barf!

I guess I don't see the problem. I can scan to a PDF in about 15 seconds, then attach it to my E-mail, or Agent post.

...Jim Thompson

How long, from the moment you hold the paper in your hands, until you hit SEND. Much more than 15 seconds. And how many operations, clicks, etc.? That's my question.

Win, My curiosity piqued, I poked around a bit on the Visioneer Strobe XP 100 scanner.

I selected the XP 100 'cause it was Google's first hit, but apparently it's been superceded by fancier models. (The fanciest new versions scan top and bottom of the page in one pass.) Older models are cheap on eBay.

Convenience-wise, you don't even have to turn it on. Just jab in your document, & the scanner wakes up and scans it. Scanning line-art at 200dpi--perfect for hand-drawn docs--is super-fast (

Well. If I did a hand drawing, which I rarely do anymore, but total time to a PDF would be hand-drawing time + 15 seconds.

If I draw from within PSpice Schematics, the more likely scenario, I can print to a PDF quicker than you can print to a hardcopy.

So the time involved is really not much more than the time for creating the sketch, however you do it.

Now, granted, I've owned Adobe Acrobat since v3.0. Best investment I've ever made in software.

Maybe you need a secretary ?:-)

...Jim Thompson

I read in sci.electronics.design that mc wrote (in ) about 'e-mail a hand-drawn sketch', on Fri, 26 Aug 2005:

He doesn't have to eat now.

I read in sci.electronics.design that Winfield Hill wrote (in ) about 'e-mail a hand-drawn sketch', on Fri, 26 Aug 2005:

Ah, well, you have now re-defined the problem. You a newbie or something? (;-)

Yes, it could be automated that that would be a Good Thing.

You know what will happen' Kleversopht will produce a freeware app, which will be a big success, whereupon AD*BE will take them over and charge USD250 for it.

On my network connected Brother MFC-8820DN I could put the page(s) in the document feeder, enter the email address (the hardest part) and press the start button. The scanned pages get emailed as a multipage tiff attachment no PC involved.

Putting the email address in the quick dial list would make it a two button press operation.

Brother do some cheaper network connected inkjet multifunctions which may have the same capability.

If your using a M$ email client, I'm guessing you can import a picture directly via the TWAIN interface (Insert|Picture|From scanner or camera) to your HTML formatted mail document.