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capella-scan

Introduction - Description - Feature List - How to Order

Make retyping of sheet music a nuisance of the past
capella-scan

Let capella-scan transform your sheet music quickly into a score that is ready for editing and printing!

What sounds like magic has become reality: capella-scan has put an end to the laborious task of typing out notes! At last, there is now a way of transposing printed notes and creating part extraction from a printed score without having to type out sheet music note-for-note.
Step 1 - Using capella-scan, your sheet music is scanned into the PC.
Step 2 - capella-scan takes one good look at your sheet music and plays back the score for you to hear.
Step 3 - capella finishes, transforms, prints... (or you might want to use capella-scan's MusicXML export feature for Finale, Sibelius, etc.)

Description

How it works

Step 1: Scanning

Scanning capella-scan activates your scanner directly. You can use all scanners with Twain interface.

Step 2: Recognition

RecognitionThe note and text recognition function is activated with a mouse click. capella-scan has been developed to recognize notes, barlines, accidentals, clefs etc. and to transform sheet music into capella and MusicXML files. The entire process takes only a few seconds.

Step 3: Printing and making changes

capella fileBy opening the scanned file in capella notation software (available separately), you can print the file to your specifications. capella-scan is also compatible with all other music programs such as Finale and Sibelius thanks to its MusicXML export filter. You can also scan PDF and PostScript files directly, without physically using a scanner.
You will find that all the notation program's score editing functions are available for editing your new file. In the illustration opposite (please click) a file was transposed from D Minor to C Minor. Even the chord symbols have been transposed automatically. You can, of course, also produce part extraction or change the notes yourself - there are no editing restrictions whatsoever.


Text recognition in 100 languages

Recognitioncapella-scan uses the FineReader engine from ABBYY to recognize text. You will automatically benefit from this world leader in OCR technology. A large number of reviews have recognized FineReader as the best text recognition program there is. capella-scan comes with over 100 dictionaries, which can be installed if and when you need them. capella-scan's text recognition system uses these dictionaries to check the recognized text for its plausibility.

What can capella-scan do?
  • Are you scanning from a PDF file instead of paper?
    capella-scan works directly with multi-page PDF files. No more need to work with TIFF files. capella-scan provides powerful tools to make sure that each musical part is identified correctly across multiple pages. (Ghostscript required.)
  • Was the scan somewhat dirty?
    No reason to worry. capella-scan is capable of tolerating slightly slanted lines and shadowy images.
  • Staves at variable heights?
    capella-scan is also capable of recognizing staves at varying heights in the score.
  • Would you like to see the results of the recognition process right away - preferably superimposed onto the original itself?
    capella-scan plots the objects (notes etc.) that it has recognized directly into the scanned notes - and in color! So there's no need to spend extra time comparing and contrasting between two windows as is often the case for other note scanning programs.
  • Would you like to use capella-scan in conjunction with your existing music program?
    Thanks to its MusicXML and MIDI export functions, capella-scan provides you with contact to the outside world. Indeed, you can use capella-scan in conjunction with other software products (Finale, Sibelius, etc.).
  • Would you like to avoid using the indirect route via MusicXML format?
    capella-scan has been optimized for capella: Many of the score layout's properties such as vertical intervals, accolade brackets, the size of note lines etc. are passed on to capella by capella-scan. This means that you will not have to edit the layout afterwards.

Unique to capella-scan

Comfortable voice management

Music recognition programs have to work very hard when several voices appear in a single line. In actual fact, this is the point where many of the other programs on the market reach their limitations. Yet capella scan has been developed to accomplish its task even when faced with these difficult situations. Drawing on its excellent voice management system, capella-scan analyses and establishes the right connections and assigns all notes to their correct vertical and horizontal positions.

Note recognition - the basics

Note recognition - the basics

capella-scan can recognize pitch and pitch length, rests, accidentals, keys, key signature and time signature. It also recognizes brackets and curly braces, distances between staves, slurs, ties, repeat boxes, articulation signs, staff size, cue notes and much more.

Note recognition is a very demanding process that requires software to accomplish something that in principle is only possible with human experience. When is an undefined mark on the music sheet a note, an eighth rest, or simply a smudge? capella-scan 6.1's recognition system uses the methods of mathematical morphology. If the software does diagnose an eighth rest for a smudge, you can edit it out using the same capella-scan program. It comes equipped with intelligent tools for this very purpose. The whole process is very fast and takes only a few minutes for medium-sized scores, sometimes only seconds!

Of course, you can always make changes later after exporting the file to capella (or Finale, Sibelius, etc.).

All in all, you will find using this powerful note-recognition software extremely useful. Depending on how fast you work, typing out sheet music manually takes between 20 and 100 times longer than using capella-scan!

Feature List
Number of recognized staves per system
Uses mathematical morphology technology for lightning-fast and precise recognition of notes, accidentals, keys, bar lines, slurs, ties, repeat boxes, crescendo signs, dynamics, articulation signs, etc.
Recognizes small and large notes (cue notes, grace notes, normal notes), as well as small and large staves (piano score).
Recognizes text: Lyrics, title, headers, footers, musical symbols (f, p), crescendo, etc.
Recognizes chord symbols: transfers chord symbols as transposable objects to capella for automatic transposition when score is transposed.
Recognizes ties, slurs, musical symbols etc.
Plots recognized notes directly onto the sheet music.
Recognizes information specially for capella's score layout.
Integrated player: plays back the recognition status - meaning you hear immediately when something is not as is should be.
Offers intelligent and intuitive help for the error correction process.
Excellent voice management system even for very complex sheet music.
Graphic import: BMP, TIFF, PNG, GIF.
PDF and PostScript import: Recognize multi-page PDF scores!
MusicXML 1.1 export: capella-scan can be used in conjunction with Finale, Sibelius, etc.
MIDI export: capella-scan can be used in conjunction with all MIDI-compatible music programs.
Infinitely variable zoom function for lightning-fast navigation.
Ability to attach scanned sheets to existing capella score: creating larger scores.
Enables clear line allocation; also from systems scored differently.
Works with all common scanners and can read notes scanned elsewhere and in bitmap format.
Supports digital camera images: Just take a snapshot of your score and have capella-scan turn it into a MusicXML or capella file.

How to Order

capella-scan runs on Windows 98SE, ME, 2000, XP, and Vista. It must be activated within 30 days of installation. To scan from paper editions, you must have a TWAIN-compatible scanner. Download it to try it out before ordering:

You may order capella-scan from the Recordare Online Store for $199.95. You can also purchase capella-scan at a discount as part of our Big Notation Bundle. The bundle includes capella professional, capella-scan, and capella playAlong all for $439.95 - a $90 savings over purchasing the software separately.

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Copyright © 2008 capella-software GmbH and Recordare LLC.

Last updated January 2, 2008.