After you’ve hooked up your scanner to Windows XP (right-click on the scan-ner icon in My Computer, choose Properties, and click the Test Scanscan-ner button to check that the scanner is connected correctly), the steps that follow show you how to begin scanning anything: photos, letters, lunch receipts, or even the shirt stain you wanted to e-mail to the restaurant that dropped your wine bottle.
Before scanning, always clean the scanner’s glass thoroughly with a lint-free cloth. Even the tiniest dust can show up on the scan. Wipe any dust off the object you’re scanning.
1. Lift your scanner’s cover, place the photo or letter on the glass, and close the cover.
Place the paper in the top-right corner, pushed up against the edges. If you’re scanning a clothing stain, just place the cloth face down on the glass. I explain how to scan only part of an image in Step 4.
If you don’t align your scanned photos or letters against the corner, the resulting scan will tilt to one side, making for weird prints.
2. Open My Computer and double-click your scanner’s icon.
No scanner listed? Open the Control Panel, double-click the Scanners and Cameras icon, and look for the scanner icon in there. If it doesn’t appear — and you’re sure the scanner is plugged into both the wall and your com-puter (and turned on) — then it’s not compatible with Windows XP’s built-in software. In this case, you’ll have to install the scanner’s own software and use it — not Windows XP’s built-in software, unfortunately.
3. Click Next, and the Scanner and Camera Wizard steps forward.
4. Choose your Picture type and click Preview.
Windows XP offers four choices:
•Color:The usual choice for most scans, it’s the obvious choice for anything containing colors.
•Grayscale:Use this setting mostly for scanning black-and-white photos because it picks up different shades of gray. (This some-times works well for scanning text.)
•Black and White:This separates everything into only two colors:
black or white. Don’t use it for photos (even old black-and-white ones). It’s for line drawings, sketches, and other monotone items.
•Custom:Stick with the other options until you’re used to how they work. Only then should you experiment with the Custom area and its individual settings for resolution, brightness, and contrast. The next section, “Choosing the right scanning resolution,” offers help-ful tips about resolution.
When you click the Preview button, Windows scans the image and shows the results on the screen, as shown in Figure 7-10.
See the little lines around the picture and the boxes in each corner?
Windows surrounds your picture with little lines to crop out everything but your image. If the lines miss the mark — or if you just want to scan part of your image (the clothing stain, for instance) — drag the little lines in or out until they surround the portion you want to capture. The handles on each corner make them particularly easy to grab.
Click the Enlarge button (shown in the margin) in the bottom-right corner of Figure 7-10 to see the portion you’re about to scan.
Click the Entire Image button (shown in the margin) next to it to return to the previous view.
5. Click the Next button and then type the file’s new name and choose its format and location.
When the scanner has cropped your image correctly, click the Next button to chose your image’s name and a file format:
Figure 7-10:
Click the Preview button to scan the image and then drag the little boxes to surround the image so the scan crops around the edges.
• Choose the JPG format for most items, including photos. The JPG format compresses the image to save disk space.
• Choose TIF for a photo or image you’ll print or send to a commer-cial printer. The TIF format doesn’t compress the image as much as JPG, resulting in a much larger file. But it saves the highest quality image possible.
• Don’t ever choose the BMP format; the images are gargantuan, and TIF does a much better job. Likewise, the PNG format is used mostly for small buttons or artwork on Web sites.
Save all your scanned images in the My Pictures folder so you can find them easily. If you wish, create additional folders inside your My Pictures folder to store related items.
6. Click Next and then tell the scanner you’re finished.
Windows XP scans your image, as shown in Figure 7-11, stuffs it in the folder you selected in Step 5, and leaves you with three choices:
• Publish the pictures to a Web site. Choosing this option lets you send photos to one of Microsoft’s many advertising-driven Web sites, MSN Groups.
• Send the pictures to an online service for printing. Choosing this option lets you send your pictures (and credit card information) to Microsoft’s partners: Fujifilm, Shutterfly, or Kodak.
• Nothing. Choose this option to close the program and automati-cally open your My Pictures folder, letting you ogle your newly scanned image.
Figure 7-11:
Windows XP scans your image and stores it using the name and folder of your choice.
7. When you’ve finished working, click the Close button.
Unlike printers, scanners can’t be shared on a network.
Always remember to lock a scanner into place before moving it some-place. (Most scanners have a little knob on one side that locks it in place, preventing damage to its internal mechanisms.)