Salud ColeCtiva. How to digitalize documents A guide created by the editorial team of Salud Colectiva. Initial Recommendations

Transcription

1 A guide created by the editorial team of Salud Colectiva Initial Recommendations 1. Do not increase the resolution of an already scanned document or photo. Not only will this not improve the quality of the image, it will in fact worsen the overall quality. If the image is not originally captured with appropriate resolution there is no way to improve the quality later. 2. If you were asked to resubmit the images it will be necessary to scan them again using the steps described below. 3. The quality of the image is very important to the results of the printing process. If the images do not meet the quality standards of the journal they will not be published, as they will be blurry or illegible to the readers. 4. The editorial team is available to respond to any doubts that may arise regarding this process. To contact us, please write to

2 Step 1: Digitalizing the document In order for a digitalized document to be published with positive results, it must be scanned with a resolution of 300 pixels per inch at 100% of its original size. The programs for scanning documents and photos vary from scanner to scanner. Within the scanning options, look for the one that establishes the resolution with which the scanner will capture the image. This option tells the scanner how much information it should capture. In this case you must select 300 pixels per inch of the document. You can also choose whether to scan the document in color or in grayscale. Either option is valid for submission to the journal. With these options selected, you must now scan the document or photo. Once scanned, if we look at the option "Image Size" in an image editing program, we can find information similar to that which appears in Figure 1.

3 Figure 1. Image size information in a file of 20,17 X 26,52 cm, scanned at a resolution of 300 pixels per inch. The section "Pixel Dimensions" in Figure 1 expresses the amount of information captured by the scanner. Each of these pixels contains information about the scanned document. If the document had been scanned at a resolution of less than 300 pixels per inch, there would be a smaller number of pixels and therefore less information. If you attempt to increase the resolution using an image editing program, the program "invents" the missing information, making the image quality even worse.

4 Step 2: Saving the document Given that the document must be sent via , you cannot save in the formats most appropriate for printing (such as TIFF); rather, you must use a format that compresses the document, making the file size smaller. To make sure that the compression does not reduce the quality of the image, you must choose to save the file as a JPEG of maximum quality (Figure 2). Figura 2. Options when saving a file in JPEG format

5 A document of average letter size, scanned at 300 pixels per inch in grayscale and saved as a JPEG of maximum quality will result in a file size of approximately 2 megabytes per image. The following two examples demonstrate the different scanning processes which result in better or worse image clarity. Example 1: Optimum resolution Example 2: Poor resolution If you follow the steps described above, you should achieve an image resolution similar to Example 1. However, if you scan the document at a lower resolution and attempt to modify the resolution after scanning, it will lose clarity and the edges will become blurry, as in Example 2. If you encounter any difficulties in this process, do not hesitate to contact the editorial team at: revistasaludcolectiva@yahoo.com.ar