Deceptive Ebay Scans - problem solved?

[Runscott]

Someone suggested in an previous thread about tweaking scans, that you could get a better scan by simply leaving the scanner lid up. Here are two scans of an E96 Mack, one with lid up, and one with lid down. The 'lid up' scan hid several wrinkles, even though the scan was huge.

Don't end up chasing butterflies in a place where highly illegal activities are taking place - leave your lid down.

[Sean1125]

Scott, what scanner are you using?

Whenever I scan /w the lid up in a dark room (Epson V33) it shows ALL wrinkles and surface problems even ones difficult to see in light (office mode default 300 dpi).

Sean

[bn2cardz]

I could see this being the problem with an larger auction group where they are trying to save times with scans by keeping the lid up and the automatic color management is trying to over compensate for it.

Doing the scans in a dark room could fix the problem (as Sean indicated) but it depends on the scanner. Those lids are there for a reason. The scanner is made and optimized for the lid to be there. Even scanners that allow thick items typically allow for the lid to go up higher.

[bobbyw8469]

Scan up is the preferred method to show the true card. Not sure what is going on in this instance.

[glchen]

When you sell raw cards w/ white borders, many sellers use the scan lid up, so that the background is black, and buyers can see edge and corner details better. When the scan lid is down w/ a white background, it's much more difficult to do this. I agree you don't need to do this for graded cards, but some sellers still do this for consistency in their listings where all of their cards for sale have a black background.

[Section115]

Originally Posted by glchen

When you sell raw cards w/ white borders, many sellers use the scan lid up, so that the background is black, and buyers can see edge and corner details better. When the scan lid is down w/ a white background, it's much more difficult to do this. I agree you don't need to do this for graded cards, but some sellers still do this for consistency in their listings where all of their cards for sale have a black background.

This. If I am buying then I want to see a background that is darker or lighter than the card.


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[Runscott]

Interesting responses. I use a CanoScan 9000F, but I don't scan in a dark room, and probably won't. For raw cards, I usually put something flat and black over the cards, then drop the lid.

In any case, my example might explain possibly unintentionally deceptive scans. I had scanned all of my recent graded cards with the lid up, but then saw the that Mack was missing his wrinkles, so re-scanned everything.

[bn2cardz]

Originally Posted by Runscott

Interesting responses. I use a CanoScan 9000F, but I don't scan in a dark room, and probably won't. For raw cards, I usually put something flat and black over the cards, then drop the lid.

In any case, my example might explain possibly unintentionally deceptive scans. I had scanned all of my recent graded cards with the lid up, but then saw the that Mack was missing his wrinkles, so re-scanned everything.

Yes the solution for getting a black back ground is putting something else over the back. Keeping the lid up is allowing too much light in, the calibration in the color management system now has to overcompensate and turn that to a solid color (black) which makes your black point (just the opposite of a white point) a lot deeper than it should be messing up all the saturation.

[BlueSky]

Lid up with the lights off might not work for everyone.

[Ronnie73]

When selling cards, I scan with the lid up but cover the card with an empty black three ring binder. That usually gives a nice color difference for showing corner and border details. I also set the DPI to 150 to 300 so its a larger clearer scan.

[atx840]

Scott, interesting topic. I've never had/noticed an issue with cards scanning differently with the lid up. I do have low light in the room...wrinkles are always quite noticeable.

[steve B]

I usually scan with the lid up as well. (Epson perfection 2400)

With fairly low light I get the black background, and the scanner doesn't hide anything. More light I still get detail, but with a reddish background - if the lamp is close enough it shows clearly in the scan from about 2ft above the scanner.

I also typically scan at 300 dpi, sometimes higher.

I have noticed that the boards auto resize will hide details.
This card has a light crease that's most noticeable right between his eyes. It's clear on the original 300dpi scan, but invisible on the resized one.



I think Ebay also resizes if they're hosting the photos? When I was selling I only used one photo hosted by ebay but included at least two that I hosted myself so I could have nice clear pics. Later when they added the ability to check off that pictures were in the description and automatically used one for the gallery view I just hosted them all myself.

Steve B

[steve B]

As another reference point, the circular area on the scan is light fogging inside the scanner because I had a coffee cup on the bed a few minutes before doing the scan.

There are times I wish the scanner missed stuff

Steve B

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by atx840

Scott, interesting topic. I've never had/noticed an issue with cards scanning differently with the lid up. I do have low light in the room...wrinkles are always quite noticeable.

Today is another big scanning day, so I'll give it a try today in a darker room. I'm wondering if it's a scanner setting that I inadvertently set. The good news is that this scanner requires no touch-up to any scans - very happy with the results, and it's lightning-fast....slow lightning, but fast compared to other things.

[thecatspajamas]

Originally Posted by Runscott

Today is another big scanning day, so I'll give it a try today in a darker room. I'm wondering if it's a scanner setting that I inadvertently set. The good news is that this scanner requires no touch-up to any scans - very happy with the results, and it's lightning-fast....slow lightning, but fast compared to other things.

You might also try replacing/recovering the mat inside the lid of the scanner if you're always going to want a black background. For my main scanner, I took one of those matte plasticky kinds of pocket folders, cut out a panel that almost covers the whole area, and affixed it directly to the existing white background inside the scanner lid. It covers the entire scanner bed except for about 1/4" at the bottom, which I rarely require anyway. I used the cellophane type double-stick tape to affix it, so it lays flat. Voila, I have the black background I prefer, and don't have to leave the scanner lid up to get it.

Incidentally, I find this whole argument of lid up/lid down, native/tweaked settings to be ridiculous (not aiming this at you, Scott). All scanners are going to have different native settings and compensate for the lid being up differently from one scanner model to the next. Pick a combination that gives the most true-to-life appearance on your screen, and go with that. Don't tie your hands from improving the correlation between what you see with your eyes and what the scan represents by trying to adhere to some arbitrary set of "universal scanning standards."

[Runscott]

Lance, I was just offering an explanation as to why some auction scans look doctored, when it might be unintentional on the part of the seller.

[thecatspajamas]

Originally Posted by Runscott

Lance, I was just offering an explanation as to why some auction scans look doctored, when it might be unintentional on the part of the seller.

Scott, I think you're exactly right on "apparently doctored" scans being unintentional 99% of the time. I cannot fathom anybody spending time to purposely tweak the hue and saturation in every scan that they post on the off chance that it will get some unwitting buyer to bid a couple more bucks on their item (never mind the headaches that would ensue when the item delivered to the buyer didn't appear as shown in the scans). On the other hand, I can easily see someone reading that they are "supposed to" always scan with the lid up, and then doing so regardless of how it made their scans appear in comparison to the real thing.

I probably should have separated my suggestion for permanently affixing a black background to the scanner lid from my more general rant above into separate responses, as the latter was definitely not aimed at you.

[Runscott]

I didn't take your comments the wrong way - just wanted to clarify that I wasn't trying to re-start any old battles.