Scanner shows better details
SOME professionals working in pre-press and also publishing companies may sigh and even complain to their bosses that the colour scanners they use for desktop publishing can not produce good images.
In the market, it is not difficult at all to find that there are a lot of different types of colour scanners - hand-helds, flatbeds and drum scanners.
If you want to get better scanned images but do not want to spend a huge amount of money on a high-end drum scanner which can produce top quality, then, flatbed scanners will be suitable.
Of all existing colour flatbed scanners available in the market, you may like to consider a new, affordable colour flatbed - Umax Gemini D-16 Dual Lens Colour Flatbed Scanner.
This scanner has dual lens technology to extend true optical resolution.
You can achieve a maximum optical resolution of 800 dpi, and this extended resolution allows you to capture more detail.
It can also detect highlight and shadow details accurately for flawless image reproductions with its 30-bit colour, high dynamic range and high optical resolution rate.
Users should be pleased with an optional feature of the Gemini D-16. That is, it can offer transparency scanning capability.
But, you have to buy the transparency adapter before you can use this optional feature.
Mounting the transparency adapter is easy because it does not require any tools.
With the transparency adapter mounted, you can use the flatbed scanner to scan films, slides and transparencies up to the full-size scanning area: 8.5 x 11.7 inches.
Sad to say, the scanner's warm up time is painfully slow: you have to wait for at least one minute before you can get into the interface.
Moreover, you cannot control the percentage of the scanning size; but you can adjust the size by typing in numbers.
To illustrate, say you have an one inch by one inch image.
If you want to scan up to 200 per cent, you are not allowed to type in 200 per cent but you can type in two inches by two inches.
Colours produced by the Gemini D-16 are acceptable. But without calibrating the scanner, the image scan can be really dark. For high resolution scans, colours produced are not sharp enough. You may also notice that there is a slight change in colour.
The MagicScan scanning software comes with the colour flatbed scanner. This software provides a smart and user-friendly scanning interface.
You can retouch photos within the MagicScan interface. Apart from that, there are also several things that you can do, such as zooming in and out, defining type and amount of data captured, and customising resolutions.
The best thing about the Gemini D-16 is its fast scanning speed. Say, it takes about 10 seconds to scan a piece of colour 3R photo, and a 400 dpi colour scan for a letter-sized image takes only 20 seconds.
In addition, it is capable of high resolution scans of up to 9,600 dpi.
All in all, the Gemini D-16 can help users produce acceptable-quality scanned images.
However, you want to scan extremely high resolution images for supreme quality publishing, this scanner might not be the right answer.
Rather, you still have to go to drum scanners which will cost a lot more.
The Umax Gemini D-16 Dual Lens Colour Flatbed Scanner which is compatible with both PC and Macintosh computers is distributed in Hong Kong by PacRim Technologies Ltd.
Telephone 2832-9322 for more details.
The suggested retail price is $11,270. Those who also want to get the Umax Transparency Adapter D-16 along with the scanner can buy it for a suggested retail price of $4,500.
