And boy is it hard work! Just lifting and turning the heavy volume itself is tiring. Just scanned p. 165. I find that I have to play games with myself, to avoid giving up. So at the moment I’m saying, “only a couple more to 170; you can pause there.” When I get to 170, of course I have 171 open. So I tend to just scan the extra page — just turn the book and lower it on the scanner. Then, “well, may as well do a couple more.” And so on.
We tend to take for granted how all those books on Google and Archive.org got scanned. But it was hard, slow, back-breaking work. When we grumble about missing pages, perhaps we should think of some low-paid person, very tired.
P. 173 done. Maybe I’ll just do as far as 180…
UPDATE. p.269. Wonder if I can get to 300 tonight?
UPDATE2. p.361. But I’m missing One Tree Hill! Still, when the pages are turning and the pain-level is low, you have to keep rolling.
Just remember that you are doing a great service to the cause of human knowledge.
Thank you for the kind words! Given up for the night now. I’ll resume tomorrow.
One diversion I use when scanning is to listen to Audiobooks (human read). Project Gutenberg has a fine collection:
http://www.gutenberg.org/browse/categories/1
I usually download a particular work, such as Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, and listen locally.
To do that, click on where it says “base directory” and retrieve the files from there.
It’s a nice idea, and doesn’t involve the hands. I’ve spent the evening reading blogs, in between turning the book, and it passed pleasantly and quickly.
Roger,
A big accelerator to the scanning process–for me at any rate–are some scripts I wrote to automate various aspects of it, especially mouse clicks. Your countryman, Jon Bennet, created a wonderful Basic-like software called AutoIt and gave it away to the public. It has since become hugely popular for automation tasks especially.
I worked 20+ years as a computer programmer, but I think anyone could learn AutoIt in a day or two. It comes with examples, and a terrific helpfile. There is also a remarkable forum.
http://www.autoitscript.com/forum/index.php?
You can download the product at:
http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/
Thanks for the tip – I may look into this. What I need most is some way to automate lifting and turning the book!
Maybe it would be easier to lift the scanner, and let the book just lay there. 🙂
The solution is to employ some beautiful young ladies to do it for me — if I had enough money to afford them!