Czur-scanner-build-your-own-digital-library-Indiegogo-1_thumb.pngA poster on Slashdot is seeking input on the latest developments in home book scanning. At the time of writing, his post has picked up 94 replies, so it’s a good compendium of insights and personal accounts on where we’re at in scanning books.

The Slashdotter references David Rothman’s earlier post about a new home scanning system, the Czur scanner from CzurTek (see pic above), but as he says, “like any crowdfunded project, the proof is in the pudding, and the pudding hasn’t yet arrived.” And the guy has an immediate problem to deal with, to wit, a shelf full of books and other paper including “family bibles, notebooks, and photo albums, as well as some conventional — published, bound — books from the late 19th and early 20th Century.”

The feedback includes, from another anonymous user, “what we use at my university library to scan some of the rarest and most delicate books on the planet, is definitely achievable at home. It’s simply a table with interchangeable wedge shaped foam pieces, and a rack above with two cameras pointing down. Since the book is on a v cradle, the pages lay flat. You can change the angle and position of the cameras to point squarely at the pages. There’s a pedal that will snap a picture with both cameras at once, so once you’ve got it set up, all you need to do is flip the pages and hit the pedal.”

Other respondents link to various sites and resources, including http://www.diybookscanner.org/. By the time you read this, there’ll probably be even more insights and tips. So why not go on over to Slashdot yourself, for an … ahem … snapshot of the state of the art in DIY book scanning?

 

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