Sheet Music Scanning Procedures
Historic American Sheet Music Project
Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library
Duke University

This document was prepared to guide student assistant scanning technicians in scanning, correcting, saving, and quality control of files in the Historic American Sheet Music Project.

Table of Contents

Glossary
Filenaming Conventions
Scanning with the UMAX Scanner

Glossary

Illustrated Title Page: The first page of a piece of sheet music, the "cover."

Halftone: Printing process by which images are rendered by hundreds of tiny dots.

Moiré Patterns: Interference patterns appearing in a scanned halftone image. They often appear as stripes, checkers, or patches. (See example below)

Descreening: Process used to minimize moiré patterns.

Image without descreening (with moiré patterns)

Descreened Image

Filenaming Conventions

Filenames follow this template:

[call number (four digits)]-[image number].jpeg

• For call numbers eliminate the dash and change the letter to lowercase: B-170 becomes b0170; A-2454 becomes a2454 The resulting number must always be 4 digits, add zeros if necessary: B-17 becomes b0017
• For call numbers beginning with number signs (hash marks) replace the symbol with the letter "n": #2480 becomes n2480
• For call numbers of confederate music prefix with "conf": Conf #224 becomes conf0224

The image number represents the number of the image only and is not related to the page numbers of the music.

Create a folder and name it the same as the call number. Save the individual image files in this folder. The structure should be:

    [Working folder]
         \
         b0170
            \
             b0170-1.jpeg
             b0170-2.jpeg
             b0170-3.jpeg
             b0170-4.jpeg
             etc...
             b0170-10.jpeg
             b0170-11.jpeg

The image number should simply increase to two digits after 9 (01, 02, etc. is not necessary). This will cause 10 to appear after to 1 in the directory, but this is will be accounted for later.

2 or more copies of the same title: Check the pieces carefully to determine the differences.

• If the two pieces are identical, scan the best copy.
• If only the title pages are different, save one as image 1 and the other as image 2.
• When ads or other interior pages are different, intersperse the different pages but scan the best copy of the music itself if it is identical. For example:

• Sometimes copies of the same piece or the same song will have different folders and call numbers. If this is the case, scan each one as a separate piece.

Multiple parts: If there are multiple parts within the music, i.e. a piano part, horn part, vocal, guitar arrangement, etc., scan each part in sequence.

• Check for dust or brittle paper flakes - clean using compressed dusting gas
• Check for smudges or fingerprints - clean by spraying glass cleaner onto cleaning pad and wiping glass. Be sure not to spray cleaner directly onto the glass, and don't use anything other than a soft cleaning pad to clean the glass.
• Open Photoshop and the MagicScan helper application (File/Import/UMAX MagicScan) and verify that the scanner settings in the Scanner Control are correct:

Let someone know if anything doesn't seem right after scanning your first image so we can make sure the software settings are correct. Be aware of color inconsistencies - the image’s color should closely match the original.

• Determine if the page is a halftone image which will need descreening.
• Generally the illustrated title page and back page will need to be descreened, while the remaining pages of music will not need descreening. Watch for halftone ads and images inside, though!
• Handle the music carefully and keep in mind the principles of preservation. Place original on the scanner glass face down in the upper left corner with the head of the page to the left. For multi-page pieces of music which are attached, interior pages will need to be placed with the head of the page facing right and the attached page(s) supported as they drape over the front of the scanner. Place the white backing over the original being careful not to move it. The backing will need to be weighted down with softbound books or tabloid-size magazines since the scanner cover does not flatten the paper to the glass by itself.
• If a piece is sewn or glued at the left margin so that it cannot be opened without folding the paper, bring it to Stephen or Lynn’s attention so that we can perform conservation work before it is scanned.
• Open the MagicScan helper application in Photoshop under File/Import/UMAX MagicScan. Check and maintain the settings in the Scanner Control window as listed above.
• Preview the illustrated title page only and select area around the image (within the dotted-edge box), allowing white space which will be cropped later. This white space affects the color of the scanned image so be sure to leave some around the page in the preview. Check for skew in the preview and correct if necessary. For subsequent scans of the same piece of music, increase the selected area slightly and scan without previewing.
• If lettering or an illustration appears in the center margin of the page, include it with the first of its neighboring pages scanned.
• Scan each page as an individual image.

• Enlarge the image to 100% and compare the image to the original. Look carefully for moiré patterns and rescan if necessary. If the colors are too dark, dissimilar or badly distorted bring it to our attention.
• Some pieces feature a cover page which is horizontal. Scan these vertically, but rotate the images into the correct orientation using Image/Rotate Canvas.
• Select an area to be cropped using the square selection tool. Crop using Image/Crop. Crop as close to the edge of the paper as possible.

Unsharpened Image

Sharpened Image

• Determine if the image needs sharpening. If the paper is glossy, don’t sharpen. If the paper is normal, rough, or uncoated, sharpen the image using Filter/Sharpen. Take a look at the image after sharpening to be sure that the filter did not lighten or fragment the image too much. After the first use of the filter, its listing will appear at the head of the Filter menu.
• IMPORTANT: Be sure to complete the above steps before saving! After a file is saved as JPEG it MUST be re-scanned to be altered. Save the file as JPEG according to the project filenaming conventions. Set the quality level to 7 which registers as High Quality.

About JPEG: The JPEG compression process is known as "Lossy," meaning that data is thrown away when an image is saved. As a result, a JPEG which is opened and re-saved is "second generation" and does not have the quality of a "first generation" JPEG which has been saved only once. The level of quality goes downhill very fast - a third generation JPEG is very poor quality and unacceptable for use. For this project we are planning to create 72dpi images and thumbnails for access, which will be second generation. It is INCREDIBLY important that all of the 150dpi images be first generation, otherwise the quality of these access files and the project in general will suffer greatly.