Scanning Facilities
SDS Heritage has every type of scanner/digitising device required to cope with your archive. Our main scanning bureau has the capacity to electronically convert large volumes of material (up to 80,000 sheets of A4 black and white paper per day), but we are equally as very experienced in handling rare and precious archived material (be it paper, parchment, canvas or fabric)...
SDS Heritage also possess various colour and large format paper scanners, as well as overhead planetary digitisers. This enables us to electronically convert any paper archive, regardless of age, size, condition and binding obstacles, into seamless and cohesive databases.
This is achieved without altering the original documents or causing additional wear and tear (essential for rare and priceless archives). We have the ability to colour scan maps (in millions of colours) up to and over the actual physical paper size of A0. All forms of Microfiche, including aperture cards, combination Fiche, 16mm and 35mm roll film can also be captured on site at our offices.
With a scan area of 1270 x 915mm, our Overhead Planetary Scanner has a sophisticated motorised Book Cradle, designed specifically to protect precious books.
Our bureau has a range of large format colour scanners, which can scan up to A0 size, and as long as 10m in length – ideal for scanning plans
Planetary Specialist Scanners
Our specialist overhead or planetary book scanners can be used to scan all kinds of books, and can facilitate many different sizes, thicknesses and types of bindings. It is especially easy on battered old books or rare and priceless books.
Face Up Scanning
These scanners feature a unique v-shaped book cradle and transparent plate to help protect bindings. Scanning is performed without laying books out flat and applying undesirable or unnecessary force to their bindings.
Auto-Centering Cradle
As the pages are turned the centre of your book gradually shifts from right to left with the bulk of the weight (a well-documented problem known as ’margin crawl’). Manual intervention is normally required to reposition the book to prevent inconsistent margins, or even incomplete pages when scanned. However, the sds Heritage’s scanners eliminate this problem with their unique v-shaped cradle and transparent platen that combine to correctly position the book before each scan. This produces consistent borders and margins with every page.
No Page Curvature
Conventional or overhead scanners produce curved page images and rely on software to correct curvature problems. This approach is inefficient and unreliable, often producing poor or unusable results. However, the combination of the v-shaped book cradle and transparent platen, together with overhead SLR cameras guarantee sharp, flat-looking pages are captured every time, with no stress on the physical book whatsoever.
Other Specialist Book Scanners
For more modern magazines, books, journals and publications, SDS Heritage has a range of special flatbed scanners (A4 and A3), which key features include scanning right to the edge of the scanner. This allows for any book to lie completely flat on the scanning glass. The result is a perfectly scanned image with no spine shadow, and no distortion in the lines of text.
We also have a range of A0 colour scanners, which are ideal for processing maps, deeds, oversized photographs and pictures.