Scan Old Photos with New Google PhotoScan App

A few years ago whenever someone had to scan a document, a picture or anything that was on paper, they had to invest in a good scanner. But things have changed ever since the smartphones started to come with high resolution cameras. These days it is not uncommon to have a smartphone with 16 megapixel camera and that is more than enough to scan any kind of document or picture. And now Google has added more features to their PhotoScan app which is now able to scan your old pictures and can remove the light reflection automatically.

Google PhotoScan app is available for the Android devices (also for iPhone) and is works great with smartphones having a high resolution camera with flash. After installing this app when you launch it, it will show you animation explaining how to use this app. Basically you have to put your old picture on a flat smooth surface (do not hold it in your hand or put on a shaky surface) and then scan it using PhotoScan.

Google PhotoScan

During the scan, you have to keep the picture inside the PhotoScan frame. In order to remove any picture glares, light reflections or any other distortions you have to bring the circle from the center to four circles on the corners of the picture and scan it four more times.

After this Google PhotoScan uses a special algorithm to take the data from all the scans and put them together into a great looking picture without any distortions or light reflections. It also corrects the picture’s color, contrast and brightness to make it look much more vibrant than when snapped using the standard Android camera app.

Google PhotoScan

In my personal experience, it is no match for the good old flat bed scanners that produce a very high resolution scan of your images. But PhotoScan app takes a shorter time, is much easier to use, and does all the post-scan editing automatically.

You can get the Google PhotoScan app from https://www.google.com/photos/scan/.