Image Processing Problem

[Stephen D. Gaimari]

I too have been scanning SEM images to prepare for publication.   I have
been scanning the negatives (Polaroid in my case) directly into Photoshop,
keeping it in Photoshop format while I cleanup the image (it is so easy to
invert the negative image into a positive, to change contrast and
brightness, etc.), converting to TIFF afterwards.  I think that how you
scan it in is very important.  For example, if you want to print at 600
DPI, it has to be scanned in at 600 DPI.  Expanding an image after it has
been scanned in can cause problems.  I have found that the printed copies
that come out of a 600 DPI printer just are not publication quality, but as
Terry Arnold said, the color laser printed copies are.  (Just as an aside,
the 600 DPI copies are fine for submitting manuscripts for review: they are
much better than even good xerox photocopies, and it allows you to change
your figures around more easily if reviewer comments come back suggesting
that some figures are unnecessary or others should be added or moved.)
Another option, which may be less expensive than color laser printing may
be to print the images directly onto film with a slide printer (provided
you or someone nearby has one!).  You can make a plate of 3 figures, A-C,
and print it on the slide printer or color laser printer, rather than
printing each image separately.  Plus, you can add any of the lettering and
arrows to point out particular structures right in Photoshop.  One thing to
mention, these Photoshop format images are quite large, so converting them
to TIFF and compacting them onto disks, or even better, onto Bernoulli or
Syquest or whichever external cartridge drives is good for storage.  If you
say there are several hundred SEM's it will take up a lot of space no
matter which format you use.  For electronic publication, I would imagine
that you would need to use either GIF or JPEG format, to make it accessible
in terms of speed on the WWW, as these are smaller sized formats.  I
suppose you could use TIFFs on a CD rom, but I don't really know.  I hope
some of this info helps
Steve

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Stephen D. Gaimari                   Internet: gaimari at uiuc.edu
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