Scanning has begun for Naomi's Album

At last I hear you say!! The replacement equipment has arrived so it's time to 'get back to work' and finish off the remaining projects.

I have started Naomi's album (see links at the bottom of this BLOG entry) and will try as best as possible to maintain a chronological order for the items. Naomi's contribution is for the 1977 (Genesis production) period. As mentioned previously, a number of items are dimensioned to the obsolete foolscap format. I opted for a new A3 scanner to minimise the time & effort that would otherwise be required for stitching images together if I used my existing A4 scanner. I chose a Mustek A3 scanner based purely on price - most A3 scanner options seem exorbitantly priced ($,000's) compared with A4 scanners.

Alas at the time of ordering, something about the Mustek brand was nagging away at me but I couldn't recall what my experience with it was. Now that I have got it & used it, that memory has come back. My father had a Mustek scanner some 10+ years ago and he had regular problems with it, particularly in winter. Years ago I could just about have disassembled the scanner blind folded! The 'quality' problem with this scanner is different and there isn't an adequate way of compensating for the colour cast problem. The scanned Acceptance Letter shows the graduated colour cast problem through the length of a scan. The album image you will see is after some work has gone into reducing the effect. It would have been more preferable if the colour cast was even across the image as it would have been easier to compensate for that. Fortunately most of the material in the foolscap format doesn't need to be in colour. The grey scale image is less affected by the sensor alignment problems. I have converted the remainder of the images I've scanned with the A3 scanner back to grey scale. It will mean that it will be 'slower going' in completing Naomi's album.

Naomi's Album entries:

• Acceptance Letter - Queensland Theatre Company
• Information for Parents - Queensland Theatre Company
• Orientation Weekend Information For Parents
• Orientation Weekend Information
• Schedule of Rehearsals & Performances

The album will be updated as more items are scanned.

Foolscap - the betamax of paper ...

Just a quick note about 'activity' for this week.

My "computer stuff" has arrived so I will be back into the DDYT project this week - however I have some heavy work commitments through to Friday so I may not get time to have it presentable for the BLOG/Album until the weekend.

A lot of the material to be prepared is on foolscap size pages which doesn't fit neatly with an A4 scanner. I've decided not to waste time with the tedious alternative of stitching images together and gone for an A3 size scanner (which I have now set-up). I have started the raw scans for some of Naomi's memorabilia. There is some tidy-up needed on the images before they are ready for the Album and I won't have time to do the work needed until Friday/Weekend (so no need to 'check-in' again until then).

I hope to catch up with Jeff later this week to see whether the video has been transferred across to disk and suitable for me to begin the video editing process. Will keep you posted on progress.