OCR Trace - How to sharpen focus of scanned image?

[Guest_imported]

Hi, I a trying to create a decal of my own signature using Corel Draw 6 but the results are a little disappointing. I have scanned the image in as a BMP file - very simple black writing on a white background which looks ok but not quite perfect. The letters are bit fuzzy around the edges, as if I had signed using fountain pen on blotting paper (I'm exaggerating a bit) and I thought I could tidy this up using OCR Trace but it is not obvious to me how to achieve this - can anybody outline briefly what I need to do. I basically want sharp edges and an even fill on all the letters in the signature. The signature is of course made up of thin and thicker, straight and curved lines ... is it possible to do what I want.

 

[viol8ion]

This is dependant on the abilities of your scanner... You need to increase the LPI and resolution for the scan... for line art such as signatures 1200 dpi is not too extreme (though this would be overkill for regular scans).

You may be out of luck if your scanner is the typical consumer model and defaults to 300 DPI and 150 LPI. When in doubt, deny all terms and defnitions.

http://www.wuli.com

 

[attrofy]

One other option if you are limited in your scanning capabilities is to take your image, and manualy trce around it with the bezier tool. This would allow you to vary almost every aspect of the outline. It has been a while since using version 6, but I believe it is almost as simple a process as it is now. It is really just a matter of zooming way in, creating nodes at various points around your image, and bending the lines to outline you signature. Since it is your signature, you should be able to "interpret" areas where the bitmap is too jaggy.
Since you are making a decal, I assume your signature (output) is going to be quite large??? An easier method for the initial scan might be to try using a medium point "Sharpie" on good paper, and make your signature a little larger than normal. If this still creates too thin of a line, maybe take a "Marks-a-lot" (permanent) marker, and make a huge signature (closer to the actual size of your final output). This will give you much wider lines to trace, and a much crisper image since it will be bigger.

Hope this helps.

Russell
P.S. no manufacturers were compensated with the flagrant use of copy writted trade names in this post. Nor were any pens harmed in the creation of this thread.

 

[MRJDESIGN]

Scan the image as usual with 300 DPI in COLOR ( better than line art or anything greyscale)
Open the file in Corel photo paint and select RESAMPLE IMAGE

change the resolution to 600 x 600 dpi.

This will increase the size of the file as well and the image constrain.

Then use a program like HyperSnap 3 to resize it back to a normal acceptable size and youll see most of the outline raffle disappear.

HyperSnap 3 is free provided you get a freebie license from their web site valid for 7 days at a time.

Both hypersnap and corel seem to provide better output resolution if you keep JPEG's at 100% (no compression) and resize them first in BMP or TIF formats.