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A flatbed scanner, anyway, spreads its resolution over its whole plate area. So if you want to scan something smaller than that full-size, you're getting a frac
by culot 9y ago
A flatbed scanner, anyway, spreads its resolution over its whole plate area. So if you want to scan something smaller than that full-size, you're getting a fraction of its resolution.
Want to flatbed scan a 2" tintype or even a 4x6 photo? You'd probably be better off using a camera instead, as you can fill the cameras imaging sensor with the subject. You can also control the lighting conditions better with a camera setup, so you don't get the obligatory flatbed scanner reflections.
- jrockway 9y agoThat is not really how it works. Yes, a camera has a fixed array of dots and to extract the maximum amount of information from that sensor, you have to maximize the number of pixels covered by your image. A scanner essentially just moves a single pixel over the source material. The resolution is limited not by how much of the flatbed you cover, but by how small that single pixel is and how precisely it can be moved. (And even the size of the sensor is fungible, if you can move it precisely you can oversample.) Scanners have their downsides, no doubt, but raw resolution is their upside. The downside is the time it takes for a scanner to make an image -- that is why we carry around ultra-expensive silicon wafers for photography, and not a single light-sensitive element that moves around under the lens's image circle.
- hrktb 9y agoI think hat the parent is saying is that you can adjust the lens of the camera to have the subject better fit the whole frame. For a scanner you’d need a specific adaptor and there aren’t so many readily available.