The Library of Congress recently surpassed the 25,000 mark in its project of digitizing books from its library, and high-end digital cameras play an important role.
The Library of Congress is using 10 Scribe systems, each of which use two high-resolution digital cameras to photograph facing pages in the book. Scribe software then cleans up the images. Most Scribe stations make use of EOS 1Ds Mark II or EOS 5D Mark II (pictured above) digital SLR cameras from Canon.
By using high-resolution digital cameras and by using a V-shaped cradle that doesn't completely crack open the books, the Scribe system protects them from damage. Many of the texts being scanned are fragile, making them ideal candidates for digital scanning, because they're too brittle to make available to the public.
The Internet Archive hosts all of the texts. Just search for the title you want to read at the site.
Image courtesy Canon
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