tsnirone
asked on
HP LaserJet 300 colorMFP M375nw - how to make scanned PDF darker
Is there any way to make the scanned PDF documents darker on this printer?
ASKER
Thanks for your reply! :)
Its adjusting darkness of scanned images that is the problem, sorry for being unclear.
I will see if the scanning-utility got installed on the client-pc later today and get back asap.
Its adjusting darkness of scanned images that is the problem, sorry for being unclear.
I will see if the scanning-utility got installed on the client-pc later today and get back asap.
ASKER
Sorry for the delay!
You are right. The locally installed scanning utility does have the ability to adjust darkness. Unfortunately, this turned out not to help this user. The thing is that this user scans a LOT of documents and send them to another application that converts the PDF's to TIF (the printer can only scan PDF or JPG). In this process of converting (using this program) the quality of the scans gets really bad. We've tried every possible setting one can access through the web-interface and directly on the printer's lcd panel.
Using the scanning utility you have 3 options, Color, Graytones and Black/White. During my tests I did one scan where I used the scanning utility and selected Black/White and the PDF got converted to TIF just fine (great quality!!)
The main problem is therefore two things.
The user is not willing to use the scanning utility since this will mean that he has to walk between the scanner and his pc between each "batch" of scans he will be processing. Since he is (as mentioned) scanning a LOT of documents this is not acceptable for him.
The other problem is that if you scan to email or network using the printer itself it will use profiles defined using the web-interface. In this web-interface you can choose either Color or Black/White. However if you choose Black/White what it really will do is scan in graytones (!?) (yes, I've made sure). If the profile actually used Black/White and not Greytones it would work just fine.
So, the question now is if there is any way at all to make profiles on the web-interface to "force" the printer to actually scan in Black/White when Black/White is selected (and not Greytones as it is now)
You are right. The locally installed scanning utility does have the ability to adjust darkness. Unfortunately, this turned out not to help this user. The thing is that this user scans a LOT of documents and send them to another application that converts the PDF's to TIF (the printer can only scan PDF or JPG). In this process of converting (using this program) the quality of the scans gets really bad. We've tried every possible setting one can access through the web-interface and directly on the printer's lcd panel.
Using the scanning utility you have 3 options, Color, Graytones and Black/White. During my tests I did one scan where I used the scanning utility and selected Black/White and the PDF got converted to TIF just fine (great quality!!)
The main problem is therefore two things.
The user is not willing to use the scanning utility since this will mean that he has to walk between the scanner and his pc between each "batch" of scans he will be processing. Since he is (as mentioned) scanning a LOT of documents this is not acceptable for him.
The other problem is that if you scan to email or network using the printer itself it will use profiles defined using the web-interface. In this web-interface you can choose either Color or Black/White. However if you choose Black/White what it really will do is scan in graytones (!?) (yes, I've made sure). If the profile actually used Black/White and not Greytones it would work just fine.
So, the question now is if there is any way at all to make profiles on the web-interface to "force" the printer to actually scan in Black/White when Black/White is selected (and not Greytones as it is now)
Does the scanner have a "line art" setting or perhaps a "text" setting or similar? These will scan black and white instead of greyscale.
Irfanview is a great (and free) program for things like this. It has a batch mode for conversions of multiple files. It handles JPG, TIFF, PDF and many other formats. Get it from
www.irfanview.com
In this process of converting (using this program) the quality of the scans gets really bad.If that is the case, it seems the problem is with that program. Have you tried another PDF-to-TIFF converter? Which one are you using? Have you tried scanning to JPG and converting that to TIFF?
Irfanview is a great (and free) program for things like this. It has a batch mode for conversions of multiple files. It handles JPG, TIFF, PDF and many other formats. Get it from
www.irfanview.com
ASKER
Thank you for your suggestions hdhondt! :)
Using the web-interface to the printer (which is the only thing usable for this user) one can only adjust dpi and choose between color and black/white (which is realy greyscale) and PDF or JPG as output - as mentioned. Nothing like "line art" or anything else.
Yes, the problem is the program - the limitation is that it "demands" black/white - either TIF directly or PDF which in turn will get converted by this program to b/w TIF (this PDF -> TIF conversion works just fine if the source PDF is indeed Black/White) - problem is that it seems unable to convert Greyscale PDF to B/W TIF. The program is also not able to handle JPG -> TIF. I've reported this as a problem to the programs' authors but I doubt something will come out of
However, the problem is also the fact that the printer says its going to produce a "Black/White PDF" when it is infact Greyscale.
Regarding "manually" converting the JPG to TIF using some some application; The thing is that since this user is doing this routine so frequently he really needs to streamline it as much as possible. Adding more steps for him is (according to himself) out of the question - he'd rather buy another printer.
Using the web-interface to the printer (which is the only thing usable for this user) one can only adjust dpi and choose between color and black/white (which is realy greyscale) and PDF or JPG as output - as mentioned. Nothing like "line art" or anything else.
Yes, the problem is the program - the limitation is that it "demands" black/white - either TIF directly or PDF which in turn will get converted by this program to b/w TIF (this PDF -> TIF conversion works just fine if the source PDF is indeed Black/White) - problem is that it seems unable to convert Greyscale PDF to B/W TIF. The program is also not able to handle JPG -> TIF. I've reported this as a problem to the programs' authors but I doubt something will come out of
However, the problem is also the fact that the printer says its going to produce a "Black/White PDF" when it is infact Greyscale.
Regarding "manually" converting the JPG to TIF using some some application; The thing is that since this user is doing this routine so frequently he really needs to streamline it as much as possible. Adding more steps for him is (according to himself) out of the question - he'd rather buy another printer.
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
ASKER
Thanks. New printer it is :)
Looking through the manuals, there does not seem to be any way to adjust the darkness of the scan from the front panel. That means that, if you're scanning to email, you're out of luck. There may be a setting if you use HP's scanning utility. If it's there, it may be called something like "gamma setting".
If you're trying to adjust the print darkness, look through the driver settings. Click the Color tab in printer Properties, and try selecting a different color theme. You can also try to select the Manual Color Option, and then click the Settings button.