This option allows you to save changes to the current settings under a new file name.

The Save Settings As?dialog box provides options for batch and multiple scanning modes. These are given as check boxes, located at the lower right hand corner of the dialog box.

To save the settings under a new file name:

1. Make the desired changes to your current settings.
2. Select the "Save Settings As? option from the Settings menu. The Save Settings As dialog box will appear.
3. Enter the new name for the settings in the Filename folder or select a filename from the list box.
4. Select the appropriate directory.
5. Select "OK" to create the new file.
6. Select the "Cancel" button to abort the selection.

This option automatically reloads and implements the default settings.

To reload the Default Settings:

1. Select "Default Settings" from the "Settings" menu.
2. The "Default Settings" will automatically be implemented, overwriting any changes you have made.

Choose "Save As Default" to create a settings file using current settings as a custom default settings file.

To reset MagicScan settings to the manufacturer's default settings, select "Reset Settings".

Monitor Gamma calibration allows you to selectively adjust the brightness in the midtone areas of your monitor display colors so that they will closely approximate the color detail of our original images.

Monitor Gamma calibration corrects for differences in monitors due to age or different manufacturing processes. It should be set periodically to compensate for changes in a monitor during its lifetime. This command allows you to selectively adjust the brightness quality of the midtone areas of your monitor display so that they closely approximate the color detail of your original images. Monitor (gamma) correction is necessary due to differences in the color display characteristics of monitors.

1. Open the Settings menu and choose "Monitor Gamma?. The Monitor Gamma dialog box will be displayed.
2. Ensure the "Keep R,G,B Gamma Values the Same" check box is checked (default), in order to keep the value in each channel the same. Therefore, adjusting the Red value will automatically make the Green and Blue values equal to the Red.
3. Click the "Keep, R,G,B Gamma Value the Same" check box to remove the check mark, this will allow you to adjust each channel individually.
4. Shift the sliders to adjust the gray level. You must try to match the banded areas with the Gray box in order to achieve the best possible gamma for your monitor.

The best approach for correcting grayscale gamma values is to eliminate, as much as possible, any differences in the shading of the Gray sample by using any or all of the scroll bars provided on the right of the color samples. When the Gray sample has a uniform appearance, click "OK" to complete grayscale monitor gamma correction.

You can also experiment by changing gamma values for individual color samples. Click on the "Default" button to return to the default monitor gamma settings. Click the "Cancel" button to quit the Monitor Gamma dialog box without making any changes.
 

Allows you to set the maximum area to be scanned. Upon selection of this option, a submenu appears. Please select the desired size.

Select the units of measurement for the image from the "Units" submenu. It includes - inch, cm, mm, pixel, pica, and point.

This option allows you to make some pre-scanning conditions. When you select this command, the Preference dialog box is divided into two sections: General and Scan Quality.

From the dialog box, confirm or change the following settings:

General:

Keep Preview Image - Selection of this check box causes the preview image, which was created from the last preview, to be re-displayed the next time MagicScan is started.

Keep Current Settings - Selection of this check box causes all selections and control settings, which were in effect at the time of the last scan, to be retained and re-established the next time MagicScan is opened. If "Keep Current Settings" is not checked, the factory preset selections and settings will appear the next time MagicScan is opened. (Factory preset selections and settings may also be obtained at any time by choosing "Reset Settings" in this Settings menu.)

Enable Tip Help -Selection of this check box activates the Tip help. Move your cursor onto any of the controls and click the left mouse key. Tip help will then show a description of the control item under the cursor. If "Enable Tip Help" is not checked, the tip help won't be active.

Scan Quality

Quality Scan - Choose Quality Scan to provide precise scanner calibration with a correspondingly longer scan time.

Speed Scan - Choose Speed Scan for quicker scans.
 
 

This setting is used to bring the scanned document on the object glass into focus for scanning.

This function ensures focus accuracy when you scan an image. To use it, choose "Auto Focus" from the Settings menu. A dialog box appears and there are two options.  If you choose the "ON" option, it will take a little longer to complete the scan because the scanner goes through its normal calibration along with an additional direct media focus.  If you choose the "OFF" option, the scanner will not do an auto focus while scanning images.  Auto Focus works best when used on images that are placed directly on the glass.

Note: You MUST have a PowerLook 3000 scanner with firmware v. 1.7 or higher and be scanning with MagicScan v. 4.2 or higher.
 

This option allows you to configure the lenses within the scanner. It only appears in the settings menu when dual lens scanners are installed.

This option allows users to control high and low power lens settings. The default settings should be suitable for most situations. In this setting, the scanner will take account of the selection frame, and then switch automatically between the scanner's high and low-powered lenses as needed for best optical performance.

Automatic switch:  automatically switches between the high and low power lenses, according to driver settings.
High power lens: allows maximum resolution.
Low power lens: allows maximum area.

There are two ways to set basic image controls in MagicScan:

• By manipulating the controls in the Control Window
• By choosing the Image menu commands

Scan Mode

Original

Resolution

Filter

Descreen
 
 
 
 

Scan Mode specifies the mode that the image is to be scanned in. MagicScan provides the following scan mode for you to use.

Color RGB

Your scanner captures 24 bits (or 30/36/42 bits) of color image information for every dot(pixel) in your scanned image. Therefore over 16 million colors are possible. This image type uses the same color synthesis scheme used in computer monitors and televisions. RGB simply stands for Red-Green-Blue; these are the additive primary colors. Additive here refers to the addition, or mixing, of light of different colors: mixing equal proportions of fully saturated red, green, and blue light produces white light. This is the way that your color television or color monitor produces white. Disk space required for saving 24-bit true color images is considerable. For instance, an A4-size 300-dpi true color image may require 24 Megabytes (MB) of storage space.

Color CMYK

By choosing Color CMYK, your three-channel color RGB images will be converted to four-channel CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black) color images using a special color transform process. The CMYK color space is the one used by most color printers. When the scan is complete, the image will be passed to the image-editing application and your images will be ready for printing on your color printer.

If you choose to save a CMYK image, it must be either a .TIF or .PSD format file. Since most monitors display colors in three-channel RGB, an RGB "simulation" of your CMYK image will be displayed in the Main window of the image-editing application.

MagicScan performs these conversions and simulations according to printer profiles. To achieve the most accurate conversion and simulation possible, you should choose a MagicScan printer profile that describes your printer most closely.

Note: This scan mode is available only when Magic Match or IPM is invoked.

CIE Lab

Comission Internationale de L'Eclairage. This commitee has been standardizing color definitions since 1931.

A given color can be composed of the additive colors red, green and blue. However, when different observers try to compose the same given color, adjustments have to be made to the amounts of red, green and blue mixed in order to achieve the same effect. The CIE commitee defined the Standard Observer as one who sees saturated red, green and blue at wavelengths of 700, 546.1 and 435.8 nm respectively. When these colors are added from equal energy sources, standard white light will be seen.

Color spaces, such as RGB and CMYK, are device dependent. That is, you may obtain different RGB values from scanner to scanner using the same target object. A device independent color space is necessary in order to communicate color between different devices. Usually, the CIE Lab is used as an intermediate color space. The scanner's RGB color modes are transformed to the CIE Lab mode, which represents a unique set of colors in nature. The CIE Lab colors are then passed to a connected device where they are converted into the RGB or CMYK mode for that device and the result subsequently displayed on a monitor or printed. This method can be cumbersome as it involves a lot of memory and time consuming matrix transformations.

The CIE Lab consists of three components, L, a, and b. L represents the luminance of a color which ranges between 0 and 100. The larger the value, the brighter the color is. Values a and b represent the "color" components of a color including the hue and saturation. These values range from -128 to 128. a indicates the amount of red (+) or green (-) component in a given color, and the b indicates the amount of yellow (+) or blue (-) component.

Note: This scan mode is available only when Magic Match is invoked.

sRGB

Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft have proposed the sRGB (standard RGB) color standard in order to define a set of color values that will be interpreted by different image devices without ambiguity.

Normally, RGB stands for the primary colors red, green, and blue. These colors can be added together to produce different colors. The RGB color system is used to render color in monitors and slides, as opposed to the CMYK system (not discussed here) which is used to render printed colors. Adding equal amounts of saturated red, green and blue will generate pure white. And the absence of any of these primary colors will generate black.

Although the CIE Lab color system gives an unambiguous way to identify color, it is difficult to display or print using this system for many application programs do not recognize it.

It is hoped, if you scan a target using the sRGB mode, then send the scanned image to an application or device that does not support sRGB, the colors should still be reproduced satisfactorily without too much loss using common RGB data.

On the other hand, if you send the image to an application or device that supports sRGB, you will get a faithful depiction of the colors in the original with a negligible loss in color fidelity. This is because all devices using the sRGB standard will consistently associate one color with the same value and vice-versa. The standard will ensure that color information is communicated faithfully between different devices such as scanners, monitors, and printers.

Note: This scan mode is available only when Magic Match is invoked.

Gray 256 scales

Images scanned in 8-bit grayscale will show up to 256 shades of gray. If color is not necessary in the final scanned output, but high quality copies of photographs or other continuous tone originals are desired, grayscale mode is a good choice. Disk space required for saving grayscale images is approximately 1/3 of that required to save 24-bit true color images.

256 grayscale provides accurate representation of black and white, and gray shades intermediate between black and white, for each individual pixel. It actually provides just 256 shades, representing white by the value 255 , black by the value 0, and the 254 progressively lighter intermediate shades of gray by the 254 values from 1 through 254.

The number 256 is the eighth power of 2, so exactly 8 bits of data are required for each pixel in order to encode the 256 different shades of gray. But the cost is that 8 bits of data are required for every pixel: a grayscale image file will be 8 times as large as a lineart image file if all other parameters are equal. It uses more memory and hard disk space than lineart and halftone images. However, grayscale images are smaller than color images.

Lineart B/W

Images scanned in 1-bit lineart show only black or white, no other colors or grayscales. Lineart mode is generally the best choice for printed text or pen-and-ink drawings. Since only 1-bit of black or white information is required for each pixel, disk space required for saving lineart images is only about 1/8 of that required to save 8-bit grayscale images.

256 colors

Adaptive 256-color palette image. By selecting this option you can scan the image into a 256-color mode.

RGB color images are 24-bit color representations of the original. Because each pixel requires 24 bits to store color information, 24-bit color images require more memory and disk space. Color images can be sampled down to 16 bits, 8 bits and 4 bits to reduce the image size. A 256 color image may display up to 256 colors instead of million of colors. In comparison with 24-bit color images, 256 color images take up less memory and hard disk space.

This button allows you to rotate the scanned image to any angle and to re-align a skewed image placed on your scanner's object glass.

Choose this tool and click on the preview window without releasing the mouse button, an icon will appear to help you rotate the image to the desired angle. When the grid line matches the edge of the image boundary, release the mouse button.

Note: Double-clicking on this tool again will revert the image to its original state.