How can I make photographed document text more readable in post-processing?
Asked 1/30/2020
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I have a JPEG photo of a printed page, but the text is faint and hard to read. I’m not very familiar with Adobe software and wanted to know if there’s a particular editing approach or filter that can improve legibility. Is there a useful workflow for increasing contrast or converting to black and white, and are there limits to what can be recovered from a compressed image like this?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
6y ago
2 Answers
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You can recover 'gross' detail using curves, as mentioned in Hueco's post. You can additionally desaturate, leaving an essentially black & white image.
This will be somewhat more legible…
however, fine detail cannot be recovered because it has already been lost in the jpg compression, leading to these ghosting artefacts around the edges of each letter…
This may be recoverable using a dedicated scan/reader app, though I've tried Readiris Pro & it can't read this page, quality is too low.
Originally by user57929. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user57929
6y ago
0
Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
You can usually improve readability a bit, but not fully recover detail that was never captured. For a JPEG like this, the most useful edits are:
- adjust curves/levels to increase contrast and darken the text
- desaturate or convert to black and white so color doesn’t distract
- fine-tune brightness/contrast after that
This may make the page more legible, but JPEG compression artifacts and blur can destroy fine letter detail. Once that detail is lost, no filter can truly restore it.
If your goal is readable documents rather than photo editing, a document scanning app is often better. These apps can automatically straighten the page, enhance black-and-white contrast, and export a cleaner PDF.
For best results, improve the original capture:
- keep the page flat
- align the camera square to the page
- use even lighting from both sides at about 45° to reduce glare
- use low ISO to minimize noise
- avoid reflections, especially if shooting through glass
So: yes, try curves plus black-and-white conversion, but for this image the quality may simply be too low to recover all the text cleanly.
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