Flatbed Computer Scanners: Everyone’s an Art Director

Abstract

In this chapter I explain that scanners turn everyone with a computer into a potential art director, for scanners allow us to scan images we like and save them in various programs such as Picasa. We live in an image-centered society, which explains why 70% of the content on Facebook is images. I offer an example of how having a scanner with optical character recognition allowed me to publish a manuscript I wrote in 1973. I also discuss the use of my scanner in publishing images on postings on Facebook and other sites. Finally, I discuss the development of a new art form—scanner art, in which artists use their scanners to create pastiches, some of them elaborate and imaginative works of art.