You definitely had the experience of staring at your history notes and/or art sketches and thinking about how to digitize all of them painlessly. The immediate response of the student would be looking through the App Store trying to find some help there. However, it usually ends up with downloading of some shady applications full of annoying ads and tricky subscriptions. However, you do not need any application at all.
You already have the powerful scanner hidden in your iPhone or Android device. Both Apple and Google included this technology in their operating systems years ago; however, they did not bother to make it pretty. It will save you storage, money and the interface learning of some third-party application. Let us see how to find this scanner.
Apple Ecosystem
If you are an iPhone user, you should pay attention to the Notes application. This app gained a lot of reputation for being dull; however, in reality, it is one of the most powerful productivity tools you could imagine. Using it, you can scan the document in just a matter of seconds.
First of all, open the application and create a new note. On the bottom of the screen, you will find the camera icon. Tap it and choose "Scan Documents" from the list. Then, the camera screen will pop up, and you just need to hover your paper homework in front of it. The software will detect the edges of the paper and capture the image automatically.
After the image was captured, you can edit its corners in case if there were some problems with the edge detection. Additionally, you can use some features such as filtering in grayscale or in color. It will help you to increase the readability of the text. This image will be saved automatically in the PDF format.
Next, just tap the share button and send the file to Google Classroom or Canvas directly. This process will be way faster than making a regular photo and editing it afterward.
Android Feature
However, the Android users also have an opportunity to use this document scanning feature. It is hidden in the Google Drive application and works extremely well in Samsung, Pixel and OnePlus devices. This is the advantage since it integrates directly with the cloud storage.
Just open the application and click the plus button which is located in the bottom right corner of the screen. Then, choose "Scan" from the menu. As you see, it works exactly the same way as the application described above. You just need to take a photo and it will be automatically cropped by the software. Additionally, it will eliminate all the shadows and glares caused by the flash.
Since it is saved directly to the Google Drive, your document will become available for instant use on your school Chromebook or desktop computer. You will not need to email it to yourself or connect your device via the USB cable.
Reasons to Refuse from Third Party Applications
However, there is a huge number of scanning applications and most of them try to fool you. Generally, they offer some "free" scanning of the document with a giant watermark on it. If you want to delete this watermark, you need to pay some monthly subscription. It is definitely not worth it if you have a free application built in the phone.
Regarding the security issues, there is also something you should think about when you are downloading some random application from the Internet. You give it access to your camera and file storage; however, you never know where exactly this data is stored. Native applications developed by Apple and Google are more secure since they are sandboxed in the operating system of the company and supported by it. Your privacy is worth more than some fancy filter.
Besides, these applications use more of the resources of your device than the native applications. They work in the background analyzing your usage and sending you ads. You do not need any bloatware that slows down your phone.
How to Get the Best Results
However, no matter what application you are going to use, if you do not prepare the document properly before the scanning process, you will get the garbage instead of the perfect result. The lighting is the most important thing you should consider here. You should use the natural light from the window instead of the lamp since it will provide the even illumination without any shadows.
However, if you still need to use a lamp, you should place it in such a way that you do not throw any shadows on the text. These shadows can confuse the edge detection algorithm of the software and it will crop your homework or diagram incorrectly.
Also, it is important to use the contrasting background. You should place the white paper on the dark background such as wooden table or dark folder. The contrasting background will help the camera to detect the document boundaries immediately. If you put it on the same-colored background, the software will have some troubles finding the boundaries of the paper.
How to Edit and Annotate
However, scanning is only the first step of the process. You may need to sign the permission slip or highlight some important terms for the future test. The great news is that you can do it on the native applications.
First of all, you should open the scanned document on your iPhone and tap it. After that, you need to tap the share button and choose "Markup." You can sign your name and draw arrows to the important parts of the document. Also, you can add some text if needed. It is very useful if your handwriting is terrible today.
The Google Drive also allows you to do the same thing. You just need to open the scanned PDF document and tap the edit button. It will allow you to highlight the text in different colors. It is very useful for studying purposes. You can mark the vocabulary words in yellow color and definition in pink one. Thus, you will create your interactive studying materials.
How to Organize
However, now that you are going to scan all these documents, you need to organize all of them somehow. Just putting everything in the general folder such as "School Stuff" is a surefire way to lose all these documents during the finals. So, you need to create some folder structure that will reflect your class schedule.
First of all, you should create the folder named "Junior Year" or "Semester One." Inside of it, you should create folders for every subject you learn. These folders should be named Math, English, Chemistry and Art and so on. Every time you scan some document, name it immediately. "Chapter 4 Homework" will be much more helpful than "IMG_4523."
This is also the good practice to name the file. You should spend five seconds doing it now in order to save five minutes looking for it later. Believe me, you will thank yourself later.
Possible Problems and Solutions
Sometimes there may occur the situation when the scanner fails to detect the edges of the crumpled paper. In that case, you should use the manual mode. Most of the native scanners allow you to tap the shutter button yourself and then crop the document in the way you want.
Another possible problem is the blurred text. It usually happens because you move your phone while taking a photo. It means that you should breathe in and put your elbows against the body. Treat it as the sniper shot, but for geometry homework. Also, if your phone supports it, you can use the volume buttons to take a photo. It will reduce the shaking caused by pressing the screen.
Conclusion
Stop paying for apps that do the same thing for free in your phone. The scanners embedded in the iOS and Android OS are fast, secure and well integrated with other services of the phone. They can scan any document you want and produce the high-quality PDF files that you can easily annotate, share and organize. It is one of those tech tricks that make you feel like a genius after using it. Go and scan your pile of documents on your desk right now. You will feel so much better after it.
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