Specifications

Page 4
ROM August — September 2007
sand words with OmniPage
Professional 16. While
others have tried to support
converting documents
captured using digital cam-
eras, the accuracy and re-
sults have disappointed.
Through the addition of
3DC, or 3D Capture, Om-
niPage automatically cor-
rects for the distortion of
the angle and rotation of
the camera, as well as for
the curve of the page in an
open book – making Omni-
Page 16 a practical solution
for digital camera capture and up to an
astounding 74 percent more accurate than
alternatives.
Unique “Scan-and-Redact” – Handling
sensitive information is a serious concern
for government and corporate organiza-
tions, as well as individuals concerned with
names and email addresses, social security
and phone numbers and other information
that can be used by identity thieves. Omni-
Page Professional 16 is the first desktop
OCR product to address this concern, mak-
ing redaction – the removal of text from an
image and PDF file – a core feature. It is
also the first ever to make redaction a part
of the scanning process. Users can set sen-
sitive words or phrases as an attribute prior
to scanning, and OmniPage Professional 16
will redact on the fly. Users can also select
highlight-for-redaction, where candidate
words are highlighted for review by the
individual or others prior to the final redac-
tion step. Nuance has submitted a patent
application for the redaction capabilities
delivered in OmniPage.
Easiest OCR to Use – OmniPage 16
proves once and for all that scanning and
document conversion does not have to be
complex. Its Quick Convert feature auto-
mates and simplifies turning paper and PDF
into documents that you can edit, while its
patented One-Button scanning makes it
easy to associate specific tasks to buttons
on your scanner – such as scan-to-Word or
PDF, save as XPS and more. The new File-
It Assistant feature even creates barcode
coversheets that let you automatically scan
documents directly into specific folders on
your PC and network.
First OCR with Integrated Document
Management – Scanning and OCR simply
aren’t enough for the millions of people
using all-in-one and multifunction devices
to turn paper into digital information that
they can store and search. Nuance responds
to this need by being the first to bundle
document management capabilities with a
desktop OCR application by adding Paper-
Port 11 to OmniPage Professional 16. Fur-
ther, for existing users of PaperPort and
PaperPort Professional, OmniPage Profes-
sional 16 includes enhanced “scan to” fea-
tures that make using the two products
(Continued from page 3)
more seamless and powerful than ever.
First OCR to Include Electronic and
Paper Forms Processing – For organiza-
tions needing a better way to implement
electronic and paper forms processes, scan-
ning and OCR alone are not sufficient.
While sending PDF forms is easy, the chal-
lenge is in processing completed forms into
data – a challenge that is met with the new
release of OmniPage Professional 16. Now
users can complete PDF forms on their PC
and submit them as either paper or PDF,
where OmniPage Professional 16 will auto-
mate the data extraction into CSV files
suitable for Microsoft Office Excel and
database applications.
One-Button Workflow – In order to
distil complex, multi-step tasks into a sin-
gle click, OmniPage Professional 16 has
made creating and using document work-
flows even easier – and has added native
support for the ODMA content manage-
ment standard and Microsoft Office Share-
Point Server 2007 in order to make storing
your documents even easier.
First OCR to Support 2007 Microsoft
Office System Files and XPS – Nuance
and Microsoft have had a close relationship
on OCR and document conversion for
many years, including a collaboration that
resulted in PDF Converter, the first-ever
solution that accurately turned PDF into
Microsoft Office Word documents. The
collaboration has continued through the
development of export filters for OmniPage
that leverage the Ecma Open XML file
formats used in 2007 Microsoft Office
system applications, including Office Word
(.docx), Office PowerPoint (.pptx) and
Office Excel (.xlsx). Nuance has also added
robust support for the XML Paper Specifi-
cation, XPS, which enables document shar-
ing and archiving with Windows Vista.
“With OmniPage Professional 16, Nu-
ance has significantly improved the core
features that matter most within OCR prod-
ucts – accuracy, speed and application sup-
port,” said Robert Weideman, senior vice
president and general manager for Nuance
Productivity Applications. “More impres-
sive are the robust set of new features, such
as 3D Capture for digital cameras and scan-
to-redact capabilities, which make Omni-
Page more valuable to existing users – and
more compelling to an even broader audi-
ence.”
3D Capture for Digital Cameras
One of the more innovative features of Om-
niPage 16 is the 3D Capture for Digital Cam-
eras. Others such as Abbyy FineReader Pro
support converting documents captured using
digital cameras, however in certain circum-
stances the accuracy and results can be disap-
pointing. OmniPage 16 through the addition of
3DC (3D Capture) automatically corrects for
the distortion of the angle and rotation of the
camera, as well as for the curve of the page in
an open book – making OmniPage 16 a practi-
cal solution for digital camera capture and up
to an astounding 74 percent more accurate
than alternatives.
I regularly carry out research at the National
Archives at Kew in London using a 5MP Acer
camera mounted on one of the National Ar-
chives supplied camera stands to take photos
of documents and later at home use the import
photographic image process with Abbyy Fine-
Reader Pro 8 OCR to convert the photo-
graphic image into editable text in Word for-
mat. It will be interesting to see how Omni-
Page 16’s 3-DC feature works, especially
when it’s necessary to copy documents, books
or manuscripts with fat bindings that are often
a copier’s nightmare and result in text that is
often unrecognised by the OCR software.
Nuance have promised to supply a review
copy — it’ll be interesting to see how it com-
pares with Abbyy FineReader Pro 8 which
essentially does the same job, albeit without
the OmniPage 16’s 3-DC facility — so watch
this space.
Pricing and Availability
OmniPage 16 will be available in late Au-
gust through Nuance’s global network of re-
seller partners. OmniPage 16 Standard is
£79.99 including VAT, while OmniPage 16
Professional is £249.00 excluding VAT for
individual users, with volume discounts avail-
able. Upgrade pricing and support products
are also available. For additional information
on features, pricing and volume licensing
programs, please visit www.nuance.co.uk.
3DC (3-Dimension Capture) at work as it copies deep into the spine of open books etc.