Scan from Brother 2750dw - Set Color Mode

[mrtunes]

I am unable to scan into Adobe Acrobat Version 2020 with this multifunction unit. The error is involving the incorrect colour mode. It's not clear how to set the colour mode on the device either.  It does scan into Apple Preview no problem though. What are some tricks I can look into trying out to get the colour mode to match? 

[ls_rbls]

Hi,

What I have recommended to other users before is to grab the most current printer drivers, the firmware driver, the full installation software , and the scanning software from the printing device manufacturer's website.

Then  perform a manual update of both your OS and the printer software following the recommended guidance from the vendor.

Do not allow  the OS to do an unattended automatic update. Sometimes this option installs in your computer its own sets of generic software.

Here is Brother's recommended troubleshooting tips: 

• https://support.brother.com/g/b/faqtop.aspx?c=us&lang=en&prod=mfcl2750dw_us_eu_as

• Refer also to the user guide: https://support.brother.com/g/b/manuallist.aspx?c=us&lang=en&prod=mfcl2750dw_us_eu_as&dlid=doc100802...

• Downloads section: https://support.brother.com/g/b/downloadtop.aspx?c=us&lang=en&prod=mfcl2750dw_us_eu_as

The reason why is because it seems like there is a similarity between TWAIN plugin for scanning versus WIA,  yet a  big difference in the type of support that both MS Windows and macOS may require.

So the first resommendation is to update to make sure that is out of the way. Then configure what you need at the printer driver level, not directly from the Adobe Acrobat application.

See this  Adobe Helpx guidance:

•  https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/kb/twain-scanner-plugin.html
• https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/kb/troubleshoot-scanner-issues-acrobat.html
• https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/using/scan-documents-pdf.html

[gary_sc · Accepted solution]

I'm going to give you a bit of different advice and I've been using Acrobat since version 3 and I've been using Macs since 1985 and I've been scanning since 1986. Please, for the love of whatever, do not bother to scan via Acrobat. The reason is that a bunch of years ago, Apple stopped letting people have access to any application via a plugin called Twain. This was done for security reasons. 

To let people get around this and still be able to scan into Acrobat, Photoshop, Preview, etc. you HAVE to use Apple's "Image Capture." That has to be the worst scanning software I've ever dealt with, period. 

What I strongly suggest is that you use either the software that came with your scanner (free) or get ViewScan, good software and not expensive, or SilverFast, great software but expensive. 

The new process that I recommend (and I've been doing for many many years) is to scan into a folder (where ever you want on your computer), and then take the TIF files to bring into Acrobat, Photoshop, whatever. Do not scan into JPGs, why start with a lossy format?

Last bit of comment: a full page TIF document is about 20 MB. Do not be concerned about that. After it's processed into a PDF, it will be about 40-60 KB. Also, if you scan a multi-page document and drag all of the pages onto the Acrobat icon in the Doc, Acrobat will ask you if you want the to be one or individual documents and will also do auto OCR as well. Very slick, very efficient.

Lastly lastly, this is from a blog I wrote for Adobe (you do have to be logged into your Adobe account to have access).

Scanning Clean, Searchable PDFs

https://forums.adobe.com/community/creativepipeline/blog/2018/01/22/scanning-clean-search-able-pdfs

[mrtunes]

Thanks this strategy makes sense to me. I thought scanning into Acrobat would save headaches by making the PDF in one place but if I can just accept that I will have trouble I will save the headaches in the long run. 

[gary_sc]

It will do better than headache avoidance, it will give you good quality scans.

You'll need to be logged into your Adobe account to see this but please check out this blog I wrote for Adobe some time back. It will give you some pointers on document scanning:

Scanning Clean, Searchable PDFs

https://forums.adobe.com/community/creativepipeline/blog/2018/01/22/scanning-clean-search-able-pdfs

[gary_sc]

Ack!! Adobe did something here, it's not showing up.

Give me a few....

[gary_sc]

Hi MrTunes,

OK, one real quick job here. It's been years since I did any coding and boy, does this look like it. But here is the link to the page I was talking about. If nothing else, this quarentining should give me opportunities to re-learn my coding so if you come back to this in the future you'll see (hopefully) improvements on the appearance of this page. In the meantime, the content is good.

http://photosbycoyne.com/Gary's_Help/Scanning/clean-scanning.html

Enjoy!!

[JR Boulay]

I'd rather read this than be blind, but I can't agree.
I have been using Macs and scanners since 1991 and Acrobat since 1996 and it still works very well today with Acrobat Pro DC (or better).

The only thing missing is a keyboard shortcut, but since then I haven't even hoped for it, I guess I would be dead before the developers wake up.

😉

[gary_sc]

Hi JR_Boulay,

What I want you to do is to go into your applications folder and see if you can find an application called "Image Capture." Please start your scanner and then start up that application. 

You will see that there is no difference, they are the same application. 

Now, if you have Photoshop, open Photoshop, and from the File menu select Import -> Images -> Image from Device. You will note it's the same interface, it's the same Image Capture. 

Trust me, this is the worst scanning software period. Please, for your piece of mind, stop using it. Whatever kind of scanner you have, the default software that came with it is better than this is. 

Parrallel comment: I was visiting a friend in Colorado and he was scanning photos for a book he was writing. This exact same issue came up. He was scanning some images (Black & White) that had some very subtle shade variations in the dark range, with my guidance he got the best image he could. In the scans, it was all black. I asked him to try the same thing with the EpsonScan software. Again, I provided my experience on scanning on how to get the best scan. The difference was so great that he rescanned some 50 images because they were so poor in quality than the one we had just done with EpsonScan (and I use SilverFast which is a large step above EpsonScan).

I hope you agree now.

[JR Boulay]

I must admit that I rarely scan photos, they are mostly documents (invoices, quotes, etc.).
But I thought I was using the software provided by Canon, not Apple software (what a horror, I don't use just one).

So you're right, I should agree now.

🙂

[gary_sc]

No problem, this has tripped up a good number of people. The workflow is so continuous, the workflow is very well done. Just crappy software.