Nathanael Lawrence
New member
Greetings all,
I am looking to jumpstart a project that I've been thinking about for several years now: namely the digital restoration and archival of roughly 30 years of my high school's yearbooks. I did find one semi-related thread on the boards [here|http://printplanet.com/discuss/thread.jspa?messageID=9472-], but my situation is slightly different.
I do not have any halftone film. In talking with several of the men who were involved in the journalism program, it seems that there is pretty much no original content has been archived, so I am forced to work from the prints themselves.
The prints are nearly entirely black and white halftone prints. I am unsure of the DPI but that may, in fact, change between volumes. I have begun work scanning the earlier volumes several times in the past few years with disappointing results. As I'm sure you are all aware, scanning documents from decades ago results in plenty of 'noise' in the form of paper pulp, dust, creases, original printing errors, etc that are fairly difficult to remove without blurring or otherwise destroying the original detail.
I began to dream of software that understood the basic pattern of halftone grids, analyzed a raster scan, and created individual vector rectangles or ellipses for each dot of ink based on their position within the grid combined with their diameter or radius. I was also hoping for the ability to edit each individual dot as necessary until a pure copy of each photo could be realized.
In my search for this dream software I finally stumbled upon the term copydot and was momentarily ecstatic, thinking that I had at last found what I was looking for. I had the suspicion that it resulted in raster files, but I thought that that might even be acceptable, so long as the software resulted in pristine pure black squares for the corresponding dots of ink.
The more I have looked into it, the more it seems to me that copydot scans are nothing more than 1-bit scans of a halftone film or print. Is that really all there is to it? I mean... I can make high resolution 1-bit scans on my measly little Epson Perfection 4490 at home, but the resulting image is constructed of nothing even remotely resembling pure and perfect squares. In snooping around looking for software solutions after realizing that buying an actual copydot scanner was out of my league, I ran across a few promising looking things such as [RepliDot|http://www.layoutme.com/html/replidot.htm] and Kodak's acquired [Creo Copydot Toolkit|http://graphics1.kodak.com/us/produ...opydot_solutions/copydot_toolkit/default.htm].
These seem promising. What can you all tell me? In the case of RepliDot, I do not have a Mac or a Photoshop liscense, and in Kodak/Creo's case I have not been able to run their demo version on Vista as of yet. I am more than ready to hire professional help, but I would like the inside scoop on the absolute best method for restoring these types of old halftone prints.
To sum up, my goals are thus:
*1. Create an absolutely pure digital master of the page as it is printed now - down to the individual dot of ink.*
All artifacts should be removed at this point and any discrepancies caused by uneven paper surface corrected.
Mint copies of the yearbook should be able to be printed from this master for those that wish to add a fresh copy to their library.
*2. Descreen each photo based on the purified master halftone image.* Absolutely do not descreen the photos from an artifact filled scan.
This will allow me to put the yearbook archive online for the benefit of our alumni body.
My design philosophy for the website is that it ought to look good enough to display on an HD monitor in an art gallery so, yes, I need the absolute maximum quality that is possible to be salvaged from these prints.
Here, then, are my questions:
*1. Are all files resulting from copydot scans raster images?*
*2. What is the copydot scanner (and any software directly involved in the scanning process) doing that my weak little toy Epson Perfection 4490 + Paint Shop Pro can't do?* (In essence - what makes it a copydot scan?)
*3. What is your preferred tool for editing artifacts out of a copydot file and correcting any alignment problems?*
*4. Is there a better option for restoring this sort of old print to a pure digital master? If so, what might that be?*
*5. If copydot scanning is my best option, what sort of specific things should I ask potential print firms about? (Technical specs, etc.)*
If you made it this far, my hat goes off to you. I hope somebody out there is up to the challenge.
I am looking to jumpstart a project that I've been thinking about for several years now: namely the digital restoration and archival of roughly 30 years of my high school's yearbooks. I did find one semi-related thread on the boards [here|http://printplanet.com/discuss/thread.jspa?messageID=9472-], but my situation is slightly different.
I do not have any halftone film. In talking with several of the men who were involved in the journalism program, it seems that there is pretty much no original content has been archived, so I am forced to work from the prints themselves.
The prints are nearly entirely black and white halftone prints. I am unsure of the DPI but that may, in fact, change between volumes. I have begun work scanning the earlier volumes several times in the past few years with disappointing results. As I'm sure you are all aware, scanning documents from decades ago results in plenty of 'noise' in the form of paper pulp, dust, creases, original printing errors, etc that are fairly difficult to remove without blurring or otherwise destroying the original detail.
I began to dream of software that understood the basic pattern of halftone grids, analyzed a raster scan, and created individual vector rectangles or ellipses for each dot of ink based on their position within the grid combined with their diameter or radius. I was also hoping for the ability to edit each individual dot as necessary until a pure copy of each photo could be realized.
In my search for this dream software I finally stumbled upon the term copydot and was momentarily ecstatic, thinking that I had at last found what I was looking for. I had the suspicion that it resulted in raster files, but I thought that that might even be acceptable, so long as the software resulted in pristine pure black squares for the corresponding dots of ink.
The more I have looked into it, the more it seems to me that copydot scans are nothing more than 1-bit scans of a halftone film or print. Is that really all there is to it? I mean... I can make high resolution 1-bit scans on my measly little Epson Perfection 4490 at home, but the resulting image is constructed of nothing even remotely resembling pure and perfect squares. In snooping around looking for software solutions after realizing that buying an actual copydot scanner was out of my league, I ran across a few promising looking things such as [RepliDot|http://www.layoutme.com/html/replidot.htm] and Kodak's acquired [Creo Copydot Toolkit|http://graphics1.kodak.com/us/produ...opydot_solutions/copydot_toolkit/default.htm].
These seem promising. What can you all tell me? In the case of RepliDot, I do not have a Mac or a Photoshop liscense, and in Kodak/Creo's case I have not been able to run their demo version on Vista as of yet. I am more than ready to hire professional help, but I would like the inside scoop on the absolute best method for restoring these types of old halftone prints.
To sum up, my goals are thus:
*1. Create an absolutely pure digital master of the page as it is printed now - down to the individual dot of ink.*
All artifacts should be removed at this point and any discrepancies caused by uneven paper surface corrected.
Mint copies of the yearbook should be able to be printed from this master for those that wish to add a fresh copy to their library.
*2. Descreen each photo based on the purified master halftone image.* Absolutely do not descreen the photos from an artifact filled scan.
This will allow me to put the yearbook archive online for the benefit of our alumni body.
My design philosophy for the website is that it ought to look good enough to display on an HD monitor in an art gallery so, yes, I need the absolute maximum quality that is possible to be salvaged from these prints.
Here, then, are my questions:
*1. Are all files resulting from copydot scans raster images?*
*2. What is the copydot scanner (and any software directly involved in the scanning process) doing that my weak little toy Epson Perfection 4490 + Paint Shop Pro can't do?* (In essence - what makes it a copydot scan?)
*3. What is your preferred tool for editing artifacts out of a copydot file and correcting any alignment problems?*
*4. Is there a better option for restoring this sort of old print to a pure digital master? If so, what might that be?*
*5. If copydot scanning is my best option, what sort of specific things should I ask potential print firms about? (Technical specs, etc.)*
If you made it this far, my hat goes off to you. I hope somebody out there is up to the challenge.
