The ScanTent

Professional scanning with your smartphone

The ScanTent

The ScanTent is the optimal solution for scanning loose or bound documents on the go – for low-cost and high-quality scans.

239,00 €

incl. 20% VAT plus Shipping Costs 

  • White tent fabric
  • LED strip for low-light conditions (with USB type-A plug for powerbanks, phone chargers etc.)
  • Black base (neoprene)
  • 4 tentpoles
  • Smartphone mount
  • Bag for storage/transport
ScanTent_features2

Get it on Google Play

Scanning with The ScanTent and the DocScan App

In combination with the DocScan app the ScanTent enables you to hold a document with both hands and to scan it with your smart phone without pressing any button. DocScan takes the picture automatically once a page is turned, and stops as long as the same page is presented to the camera.

The mount on top of the ScanTent enables you to place the smart phone in a convenient way and thus guarantees an optimal viewing angle and a constant distance. If daylight is not sufficient white LED strips provide a uniform lighting that maximize image quality. Disassembling the ScanTent and its low weight allow for compact transportation.

Get it on Google Play

ScanTent Setup

This how-to explains the ScanTent and DocScan app step-by-step. A technical documentation can be found in this paper.

The DocScan App

DocScan is an Android app designed for the ScanTent. It detects pages in the live preview and makes high quality scans. An automatic series mode takes an image once a page is turned. It therefore enables you to scan books or documents quickly without interacting with your mobile. Please report issues concerning DocScan here.

Also with iOS support: Thanks to ifunplay who have integrated an automatic mode into their popular Doc Scan app the ScanTent can now also be used with an iPhone

Get it on Google Play

Example images

The images below come from a ScanTent campaign carried out in February 2020 with the Tyrolean Regional State Archive. We scanned about 45,000 images with the support from 7 students. We used the following smartphones.

Huawei P20 – Camera model: CLT-L29 – full image
HuaweiP20_CLT-L29_clip
Huawei P10 – Camera model: VTR-L29 – full image
HuaweiP10-HonorP20_VTR-L29_clip
Samsung S8 – Camera model: SM-G970F – full image
SamsungS8_SM_G970F_clip
 Samsung S10 – Camera model: SM-G970F – full image
Samsung_S10_SM-G970F_clip

Camera Resolution

We have tested eight different smartphones and measured their resolution if mounted to the scantent. You can see their field of view and resolution in the illustration below. DocScan does not support the Nokia 7 Plus Tele and iPhone 7.

QR Code Generator

DocScan is capable of reading QR codes, which encode special information about documents – such as document title, name of archive, or date. By simply scanning a QR code with DocScan, documents can be automatically created. If you want to see how it works fill out the forms in the following and download the QR-Code by clicking on it. In real world projects you could generate QR codes from an Excel file and use these QR codes during your scanning campaign in order to get all metadata directly into your documents on Transkribus.

Generate









Generated QR-Code

QR-Code

Title:

Authority:

Hierarchy:

Signature:


The ScanTent was developed as part of the READ project by members of the Computer Vision Lab of the Technical University Vienna (Markus Diem, Stefan Fiel, Florian Kleber) and the Digitisation and Digital Preservation group of the University of Innsbruck.