Many of us consider document scanning to be a simple, everyday activity like betting online casino. Many technical aspects behind the process can affect the final result of our actions. In this guide, I will guide you through the scanning process – from the simplest to more advanced concepts.

What are The Best File Formats for Storing Scans?

Document scans are incredibly useful in everyday office work, but it is important to store them in the right file formats to ensure the best quality and readability. Choosing the right file format can have a significant impact on the durability and ease of use of scanned documents. Therefore, it is worth considering which file formats are best for storing scans.

• PDF – The most commonly used file format for storing scans is PDF (Portable Document Format). This is a popular format known for its versatility and for preserving the original look of the document. PDF is also easy to share and print, making it an ideal choice for storing document scans.
• JPEG – A common file format for scans is JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group). This is an image compression format that is often used to store photos and scanned documents. However, it is important to note that JPEG files can lose quality when saved and opened multiple times.
• TIFF – Another popular file format for storing scans is TIFF (Tagged Image File Format). This is a lossless image compression format that provides high-quality scans and preserves all the details of the document. TIFF is especially recommended for storing scans of documents with a lot of detail.
• PNG – For scanned documents that contain text and graphics, the PNG (Portable Network Graphics) file format may be a good choice. PNG is a lossless image compression format that preserves the quality of graphics and text, making it ideal for storing a variety of scanned documents.

How to Scan Documents

Scanning is one of the most common ways of sharing, transferring, and storing various types of documents, graphics, illustrations, photos, etc. However, the document received is often too large or its quality is poor. During scanning, we have to choose a number of technical parameters that affect the quality and size of the file we receive – this is where a problem can arise if we are not sure what we really need.

Color or Black and White Document?

The basic question we need to answer is: color or black and white scan? Remember that when scanning in color, we get a much larger file than in the case of its black-and-white counterpart. Most business documents can be safely scanned in black and white, even if they originally contain colored elements (e.g. headers, charts, or diagrams).

Of course, some documents should be scanned in color, because otherwise they will be illegible. The optimal solution may be to scan documents in shades of gray, which will increase the readability of the file while not taking up as much space (and therefore – generating lower costs).

File Format and Conversion

The choice of file format depends largely on whether you decide to scan documents in color or black and white.

For black-and-white documents to be converted to PDF, CCITT-G4 TIFF is most commonly used. TIFF is supported by most graphics programs and can be used on multiple platforms.

Choosing a format for color scans is more complicated and depends on the type of image being scanned. The format should be chosen to reduce the size of the image with minimal impact on quality. Screenshots and vector graphics are best saved as PNG files. Other images are compressed using JPEG or JPEG-2000.

Scan A Document for Editing

How to scan documents so they can be edited? It is necessary to use OCR (Optical Character Recognition) technology, which allows you to transform scans into editable text. This process starts with traditional scanning, using a scanner or even a mobile app. Document scans are usually saved as an image file, which is not editable. This is where OCR technology comes in. Once a document is scanned using an OCR-enabled tool, the image is analyzed and recognized. OCR then transforms the image into editable text, usually saving it as a Word document or PDF file.