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Topic: Best way to scan CD covers (Read 12052 times) previous topic - next topic
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Best way to scan CD covers

What resolution is recommended? Do most people just can the front cover? How do you associate them with FLAC files?....

Best way to scan CD covers

Reply #1 –
i'm not sure what/how your scanning, but here's what i do ...
1) use photoshop ...
2) depending on what your trying to do (print covers w/ printer vs. display a little icon size image on your screen) determines the resolution you will use.  to get good quality prints, you're gonna want to use 300 pixels/inch ... a cd cover is something like 4.5 in square (get a ruler and measure), so your target output image will be inches x 300.  i recommend scanning as large of a shot as you have memory and system resources to handle and then drag that image into a seperate photoshop image.
3) scan your image on a 45° angle ... then after scan use the freerotate tool to realign it.  this helps eliminate some grain.  after it's been rotated, the despeckle filter to take off the rest of the grain.
4) if your printing, prep a *.psd file of the appropriate resolution (as mentioned above).  make sure the pixel/inch field is set to 300.
5) if your making an icon, prep a *.psd of the size of the icon you want to use (like 128x128, etc.)
6) drag the big image into your smaller image.  use the the resize tool & presto.

7) you can't associate the icons with flac files as far as i know.  you may be able to write registry keys for files with an extension like *.weezerblue for files from the BLUE ALBUM by Weezer and name your file "MyNameIsJonas.weezerblue" instead of "MyNameIsJonas.flac" ... but i think that causes the flaclib to crash the media player you're using, so i'm not going to recommend doing that.  also if you don't know how to hack the registry, DON'T !!!

Best way to scan CD covers

Reply #2 –
If you need the actual dimensions to fit a standard jewel case, here's what I've always used:

  front cover only = 1417 x 1417 @ 300dpi
  booklet (front & back) = 2835 x 2835 @ 300dpi

  tray = 1783 x 1388 @ 300dpi (2 spines = 75 x 1388 @ 300dpi / 1 back = 1633 x 1388 @ 300dpi)

    - M.

Best way to scan CD covers

Reply #4 –
For a decent printout, 300 dpi is my personal minimum recommendation - if I use HQ paper for printing, I sometimes scan CD artwork @ 600 dpi.

You can use almost any programm for scanning but only few offer good moiré removal and despeckling filters ... I prefer Paint Shop Pro (easy to use and even easier to understand) because Photoshop is way too complicated for beginners in my opinion.

I do it the following way:

1. Scan the unfolded booklet @ 300/600 dpi, aligned to the edges of my scanner
2. Scan the inlay (with a transparent tray, I also scan the inlay's backside) @ 300/600 dpi, once again aligned to the edges of the scanner
3. Scan the printed CD side @ 300 dpi.
4. Cut the scans down to picture dimensions
5. Apply some contrast filter or colour saturation if needed (depends on your printer)
6. Resize the pictures

Metric dimensions are:

121x242 mm for the "normal" unfolded booklet
118x151 mm for the inlay

7. Apply Moiré removal/despeckle/noise reduction
8. Save the scans (I prefer lossless JPG or JPG at lowest compression)

As an alternative, you can cut a copy of your booklet's front (121x121 mm) and scale it down to 150 dpi ... save it as "folder.jpg" so you have some nice pictures in fooTunes, file tags or Windows explorer.
The name was Plex The Ripper, not Jack The Ripper

Best way to scan CD covers

Reply #5 –
Quote
8. Save the scans (I prefer lossless JPG or JPG at lowest compression)

Lossless JPG? You mean HP's LOCO?

Or JPEG2000?

Standard JPEG (JFIF) does have a lossless mode (JPEG-LS), but it's nearly not supported anywhere.

Best way to scan CD covers

Reply #6 –
I'd add that descreening at the scanning stage is essential (you need a good scanner and driver) unless you want to scan at insanely high resolution. If the image needs descreening, sharpening afterwards helps.

I find that my scanner doesn't quite scan to the edge of the glass, so I put the inlay in the middle.

As JeanLuc said, an obvious rotation from horizontal, which you later correct properly with a rotate tool, is much better than a slight rotation which you either ignore (bad) or try to fix with a rotate tool (which doesn't work as well for very small angles).

Usually I don't bother with any processing, unless there are areas on the cover which are meant to be 100% black or white. If they look dirty on the scan, I'll tweak the level equalisation (in Corel PhotoPaint) to bleach them out.

Cheers,
David.

Best way to scan CD covers

Reply #7 –
Thanks for the replies. Im going for a balance between size and quality, with emphasis on size with acceptable quality. Ill probably only scan the front cover. It would be nice to be able to print them later if I wanted but this is not as important as I probably never will and the idea is that I will have the album art to associate with the music for building a media server with a menu or maybe future "mp3" players with color display of album art while song is playing.

Best way to scan CD covers

Reply #8 –
I use a method which doesn't give an objective 1:1 copy of the cover (lol) but it gives pretty good results.

First, I scan the cover normally at my scanner's highest resolution (600dpi).

Then in Paint, I crop the image so the ugly edges of the cover are gone and the image is roughly square (or in the case of CD's which don't have a normal jewelcase, whatever the proper aspect ratio may be).

Then, I use Paint Shop Pro to resize the image down to something smaller to store on the target media. This would be something like 500×500 or 1000×1000 for a typical insert, or 570×500 or 1140×1000 for something in a cardboard case like Rob Zombie's "Past, Present And Future."

Best way to scan CD covers

Reply #9 –
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If Amazon carries the CD you want the cover for, try my album cover finder.

http://www.slothradio.com/covers/

Hey slothdog, nice service! 

Any way you could add buy.com and walmart.com to the service?  Both of those sites offer larger resolution images (around 500x500).

Best way to scan CD covers

Reply #10 –
Quote
Quote
If Amazon carries the CD you want the cover for, try my album cover finder.

http://www.slothradio.com/covers/

Hey slothdog, nice service! 

Any way you could add buy.com and walmart.com to the service?  Both of those sites offer larger resolution images (around 500x500).

Not currently.  Amazon has a nice web services API, those don't.

Best way to scan CD covers

Reply #11 –
Sloth, ever considered working with clipper or something and adding cover support to something like The Godfather? Or just allowing your page/service to scan a directory and find the correct covers and then save them in the album folder as "artist - album.jpg"
 

Best way to scan CD covers

Reply #12 –
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I'd add that descreening at the scanning stage is essential. . .

Yeah... I would do this too, but my scanner's software is braindead and if you tell it to descreen, it'll force the scan to be done at 150dpi.