Curse breaker collection is a term that refers to the compilation or gathering of various items or artifacts that have the power to break or dispel curses. This collection can consist of a wide range of objects, from mystical talismans and amulets to ancient scrolls and enchanted jewelry. These curse breakers are believed to possess supernatural qualities and abilities that allow them to counteract or negate the effects of curses. They are often sought after by individuals who have fallen victim to a curse and are desperate to find a solution or remedy. The curse breaker collection can also include books or guides that provide instructions on how to perform certain rituals or spells to break curses. These books may contain ancient wisdom and knowledge passed down through generations, offering guidance and insight to those seeking to rid themselves of a curse.
ABBY software works by having you position a grid around the screen image to be OCR'ed. Here, the entire scanned image is shown in a viewer so ABBY will attempt to OCR the entire page . . .
Heat the remaining tablespoon of oil in a nonstick skillet if you have only a small pan that is nonstick, use it, doing this step in batches and using part of the oil for each batch. As it is, if you want a portable manual feed scanner that doesn t need a computer and can run on batteries, you should take a look at the Brother DSmobile 820W.
These books may contain ancient wisdom and knowledge passed down through generations, offering guidance and insight to those seeking to rid themselves of a curse. Collecting curse breakers can be a daunting task, as these items are often rare and difficult to come by. They may require extensive research, travel, and negotiations to obtain.
VuPoint Magic Wand Scanner Review
I have an e-book reader I’m finding that I want to put everything that I have that is on paper into the device: books, magazine articles, users/owners manuals, cheat-sheets, blah, blah and blah. But after spending several hours scanning an out-of-print book that was falling apart using my standard Epson desktop scanner a few weeks ago, my enthusiasm faded. It just took too long per scanned page and I had to sit in front of or very near my desk for several hours. Plus, it required booting up my PC, logging on, waiting for boot up, firing up the scanner software, yada, yada and yada. And yes, I DO happen to be the laziest person on the planet.
I also spent some time looking through several DIY book reader web sites (diybookscanner.org, for example) and while those devices could speed up the scanning time, building such a contraption is out of my technical skills and patience level.
I bumbled across Julie’s review of the DocuPen and I thought that would be a nifty compromise to the long scan time of the desktop scanner versus the mechanical finesse required to build a DIY book scanner. But then I bumbled on to the price of the DocuPen (and yes I also happen to be the cheapest person on the planet). Then the VuPoint Magic Wand hand scanner($99) started popping up here and there. For $99 I hoped it would make the new Great Compromise. Think it did the job?
BASIC SPECS
Here are the fru-fru specs from the VuPoint Solutions web site:
- Model PDS-ST410-VP
- Sensor A4 Color Contact image Sensor
- Resolution Standard Reso: 300x300dpi (default); High Reso: 600x600dpi
- External Memory Support Micro SD card up to 32GB (Micro SD card not included)
- File Format JPEG
- LCD Scanning status display
- Auto Power Off Off/ 3 minute/ 5 minute
- Scanning Speed Approximate scanning speed (standard letter size)
-High res. with color – 13 sec.
-High res with mono – 6 sec.
-Standard res. with color – 3 sec.
-Standard res with mono – 2 sec. - White Balance Auto
- USB Port USB 2.0 high speed
- Power Source 2xAA Batteries
- Battery Life Approx. 180 color or 200 monochromatic scans
- Dimension(LxHxW) 10” x 1.2” x 1.1”
- LCD Display Size 0.787” x 0.59”
- Weight 7.5 oz (with batteries)
- Support System Driver free to download for Windows® XP SP2/ Windows® Vista/ Windows® 7™ and
Macintosh 10.4 or above ( direct plug-in, driverinstallation not required) - Accessories USB cable, 2x AA alkaline batteries, OCR software CD, Pouch, Cleaning cloth, user’s manual
HARDWARE TOUR
Next, let’s take a tour of the device.
First it is about a foot long and about an inch wide and deep. It has an indentation on each of its sides, providing a good grip when scanning.
Both edges of the Magic Wand have a concave grip Magic Wand scans up to A4 size, or about 8.5 x 11 inches. The little white arrows on the sides of the unit give you a visual cue for where the scanner light starts and ends. This is a nice touch; it's very helpful when scanning larger books or documents to help you position the scanning surface. A subtle, but very helpful feature.
It is powered by two AA batteries and I’ve been running the thing for three or four days now and it’s still going strong. This is in part due, I believe, to the way that a scan is performed: you first hit the scan start button, do the scan, then hit the start button again. Additionally, the scan light only illuminates when the little rollers on the bottom of the device are in motion (more on that in a bit).
Battery cover slides off easily. Also in this photo note the little silver button just to the left of the batteries -- this is the power on/off and scan start/stop button.
On the top of the device are two buttons that allow you to choose between color or black and white and 300 or 600 DPI. The on/off switch and start/scan switch (one switch doing two jobs) is also on the top of the scanner. An LCD screen gives you indication of the number of scans you’ve performed, and the mode and resolution chosen. Two LEDs indicate when a scan is in progress and if an error during the scan was detected.
Left-hand buttons select color/BW and 300/600 DPI resolution. The LCD shows current mode, number of scans taken, right hand side SCAN LED illuminates during a scan; ERR LED illuminates when a scan error is detected.
A USB port and micro ScanDisk port are along the side. There is additionally a “Format” button that can be pressed to reformat the memory disk, though I never used it.
USB and microSD ports and Format recessed button. (Blury image courtesy of my Canon 200SX whose macro mode is "in spec". Ahem. Review on that coming soon.)
On the bottom of the unit you’ll find the meat: the scanner and, equally important, a set of rollers. The scanning will only take place while the rollers are in motion, a notion that is very important to remember as we go through this review.
Bottom of the unit sports a set of roller wheels and the scanning light. The scanning light only operates when the roller bar is turning (and of course, when the unit has been powered on and the scan start button has been pressed). This photo was taken by spinning the roller bar outside of the camera's view.
The wand also comes with OCR software.
OCR scanner software included with Magic Wand. By the way, this is actually a scan of the CD. Note the grain of the desk showed up in the scan too.
To perform a scan, turn the Magic Wand on with the on/off button for a few seconds until it turns on; then press the on/off button again to start a scan, do the scan thang, then turn the on/off button again to stop the scan. Wash, rinse repeat.
Preparing for a scan. Yellow stickie note was used to help identify the resulting scan. This scan was performed horizontally (i.e. from the book binding center to the edge of the page) on a right-hand page.
By default, the scanner turns on in color mode and in the 300 DPI resolution. Pressing one of the two option buttons allow you to easily change these modes.
Overall, the design is pretty sweet. It’s small and narrow, has a nifty ergonomic indentation along the sides to help you with the grip during a scan, and has a limited number of buttons to futz with. The LEDs and display offer simple and intuitive feedback. If the ERR LED lights up, it indicates that the scan was not successful, although the scan is nonetheless saved off as a file. That’s one of the annoying things I found during scans: I couldn’t tell what it was that would cause a scan error and I wish that it would not save the scan when an error did occur because those extra files with errors in them would require editing out later. Some of the scans that were reported as an error actually looked ok, so I would often times end up with near-duplicate scans of the same page when editing. Below is a screen shot of the contents of the micro drive when connected through the USB port on a PC after several scans:
List of scanned files. Unfortunately there is no easy way (other than viewing all the files) to determine which of the files were scanned with an error.
SCANNING EXAMPLES
Scanning actually took me a while to get used to because I kept trying to scan my book excerpts from top to bottom. Instead, due to the bending that occurs in the center of the book binding (aka a “book crack” hee hee), the scanner works best when running it from the center of the binding out to the end of the pages in a horizontal fashion. Once I dawned (duhed) onto running the scan sideways it usually became a breeze to scan a few pages here and there. I am a klutz so it was easy for me to foul up scans a number of times and the scanner would illuminate its ERROR light when that occurred. There were times when I thought that I had a smooth scan but the ERROR light would still turn on and I’d have to repeat the scan. I tried to do some research on why some scans just don’t work, but I haven’t found anything to report yet. I’d just like to know what I’m doing wrong on those occasions and be able to prevent it. It would also be REALLY nice if the scans that did result in an error were not saved.
My main purpose in using the Magic Wand was to scan a few out-of-print books that I have that are literally falling apart and to scan certain chapters out of technical manuals so I focused my scanning on that type of target. But I also performed scans on what I thought others might like to see, including a magazine scan; recipes from a cook book; a regular 8×11 paper with a technical drawing; and a few other samples. All of the resulting images were fine. No complaints on the quality of the results. The following examples show some of these results.
A typical book crack (heh heh). It's hard to get some books with large book cracks (heh heh) to lie flat, so the Magic Wand works best when run horizontally. Its roller wheels help to keep the scan at the same height above the page. (Blurry image courtesy of Cannon 200SX.) Example scan of a standard sheet of paper with some technical drawing on it. Scan of book with technical diagram, 300 DPI Scan of same page from same book, at 600 DPI Scan of a user's manual that had staples in the middle of its binding. While the scan lenghth worked ok, the staples tripped up the scanner so I should have split the scan into two. Note that the ending edge of the manual was clipped off. Example recipe scanned from hard-back cook book. Scan taken from a very small hard-back book. Scan from a magazine. The size of the page was a little large for the scanner and it was difficult to scan vertically due to the binding of the magazine. Magazine scan attempt 2. Error! Magazine scan after the page was ripped out and laid flat, then scanned vertically. Color scan, 300 DPI Color scan, 600 DPI
The biggest problem I had during scanning trying to get all of the information of a page into the scan on certain books that have the page numbers at the very edge of the pages. The reason that it was difficult to get the page numbers included on the scan is that the scan actually occurs only when the little rollers on the bottom of the wand are in motion. And, when page numbers are at the very edge of the page, the roller wheels roll off the page first, and the scanning turns off before it can read the page numbers. Note: this is NOT a fault of the Magic Wand; it is just a matter of book formats. Some books have page numbers in a nice place, others (in fact most of mine for some reason) have the page numbers way at the edge or nestled deep in the book crack (heh). This is a little hard to grok, so the following photos attempt to demonstrate the issue.
Example of a book that has page numbers at the extreme edge. From the bottom looking up, you can see that although the scanner is over the page number and hence would leave you to believe that the page number would appear in the resulting image, in reality the rollers have rolled OFF of the page and therefore have disabled the scanning at that point. Typical scan of one of my manuals that has its page numbers at the far edge. While the quality of the scan is great, the page number is clipped off.
The reason that this is a problem for me is that when doing a large number of scans from a book (say, for example, that you wish to scan 100 or so pages),once the scanning is complete you then have to go back and “stich” the individual scanned pages into a complete e-book. You normally will want to take each image, rotate as needed, despeckle (as needed) and do some overall clean up. Having the page numbers on the scanned images helps you in this process in putting together the final ebook but also helps once the ebook is complete and you need to skip around pages; having the page number on the scan just makes that easier. I tried several configurations with the wand to attempt to get the entire contents of a page and the page numbers, but on some books this just was not possible. This is something to keep in mind if you plan on scanning many pages. My final decision is that when faced with these type of books (i.e. those that push the page numbers to the far edge or binding book crack [heh heh]) is to write the page numbers by hand in the book away from the edges before beginning the scan.
OCR
The ABBYY ScreenShot software that comes with the Magic Wand has an OCR engine and has the following user interface:
The ABBYY software -- the Capture drop down contains "Screen", "Area", "Timed Screen" and "Window". The Language drop down includes "English", "German", "French", "Spanish", "Italian", and "More Languages". The Send drop down includes "Text to Clipboard", "Text To MS Word", "Text to File", "Table to Clipboard", "Table to MS Excel", "Table to File", "Image to Clipboard", "Image to File", "Image to Email".
This version of ABBYY basically takes a screen shot of an image and performs an OCR. I used the following scanned image as the OCR candidate. You can see in the second photo how the image is a little skewed, has some bleed-through from the page in the book beneath it, and has a few speckles. I ran ABBYY against this image as-is when viewed inside of the Windows image viewer program.
Original scan from a cook book, rotated. Zoomed in view of the file text image; note that there is some bleed-through from the other side of the page and some noise that could use a little clean up. It could also be oriented a little better too. Each of these clean up tasks can be performed in a variety of tools including Scan Tailor, a SourceForge project available for free download.
ABBYY literally uses the screen as a way to capture its text, so if you run it against a full size image, as shown below, you’ll see the less-than-captivating results…
ABBY software works by having you position a grid around the screen image to be OCR'ed. Here, the entire scanned image is shown in a viewer so ABBY will attempt to OCR the entire page . . .
y vup_hardback_text.JPG - Windows Photo Viewer | cd S3 twMM evitrtr 4M • Irnpuin uflroo thread*, crudied 2 tahie-*m »«m - ir. . 1 (ablnpoon lemon jiuie • trMpoon tall, it dewed 2 lablnpoora vir.ttah* oil. divided \'i i t. ii-, «nn hrmn m I lat|K lUnr gaclic. baeli mimed (I icnpooo) I large union, i narieli chopped 11 cup) 2*1 io 34 (apt <(talked broth * icaapooo ire*hli ground black pepper •* trii|"in paprika I ¦-!"( ean tomaioci miih I heir |u«e 1 dried thili prppct. iruihrd. »r h>H red pepper Hj«tv lo Uilc i pi i. ml 2 tahtnpiun mined frrih parelci at 2 KupmiiH dried pariley flake* I 10-ounie package Iraien pea* 4 tup diied black oli»e» M 2 minuie-i. Mil inrring Trantfcr the rue vegetable m unite 10a I>ut.h men. and then add 2Vi .uptbrixh. thca*e. chdi pepper, and pankn. arrange the (take* partn oa aunt** (he rxr. nmt the pi*, and ma rhe 1 h« «*"» He niiture c»*r in* krat k« V> mavarl or anal the chidM m eamrh; done Chart once or r**ce. and add more baodt at ae-rded V Spnake- the- pern, olran, and paaaaraan over *W anp of *U chatkea. add ¦tore broth of »aacr d neiruari, com the pea. and took ake mature tor antmSer lOao |] mi mm-* or until the chKfcm 11 arndcr, the ncc farl*.-dry. and the pcaa hot
Results of ABBYY OCR of entire scanned image. This took about 40 seconds.
So I zoomed in on the page to increase the text size on the screen and re-ran the OCR with the following results . . .
Zooming in on the scanned text produced a better OCR result . . .
1 28-ounce can tomatoes with their juice 1 dried chili pepper, crushed, or hot red pepper flakes, to taste (optional) 2 tablespoons minced fresh parsley or 2 teaspoons dried parsley flakes I 10-ounce package frozen peas Vi cup sliced black olives xk cup chopped pimiento 1. Place the chicken pieces in a bowl. In a cup, prepare a marinade by combin- ing the turmeric and saffron with the warm water, stirring to dissolve the saffron. Add the lemon juice, salt, and 1 tablespoon of oil. Pour the mari- nade over the chicken, tossing the pieces to wet them. Refrigerate the chicken for 30 minutes or longer. 2. Heat the remaining tablespoon of oil in a nonstick skillet (if you have only a small pan that is nonstick, use it, doing this step in batches and using part of the oil for each batch). Remove the chicken from the marinade, reserving the marinade. Brown the chicken pieces in the oil, and remove them from the pan.
Results of ABBYY scan after zooming in on the image.
So after zooming in, the scan went much better. But imagine trying to do this for multiple (maybe even hundreds) of pages. And you’d still have to go back and do a post-clean up of the text where the OCR was incorrect. On the plus side, ABBYY has quite a number of supported languages which I found pretty impressive.
For batch processing, you might want to look at a combination of Scan Tailor (to rotate, clean up the images, and convert them to TIFF format) and then FreeOCR . These two tools could help a little with batch processing many pages. Following are a few screen shots of running just FreeOCR and its results.
FreeOCR program converts image files to text without the need to zoom in. On the left is the (rotated) scanned image. On the right is the resulting OCR'ed text.
ENTREESY FOUL TRY I
Vu teaspoon saffron threads, crushed
2 tablespoons warm water
1 tablespoon lemon juice
IA teaspoon salt, if desired
2 tablespoons vegetable oil, divided
1% cups long-grain brown rice
1 large clove garlic, hnely minced (1 teaspoon)
l large onion, coarsely chopped (1 cup)
2*/2 to 3*/2 cups chicken broth
% teaspoon oregano
IA teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Vs teaspoon paprika
l 28-ounce can tomatoes with their juice
1 dried chili pepper, crushed, ar hot red pepper
Hakes, to taste (optional)
2 tablespoons minced fresh parsley or 2
teaspoons dried parsley flakes
l 10-ounce package frozen peas
lb cup sliced black olives
IA cup chopped pimiento
1. Place the chicken pieces in a bowl. In a cup, prepare a marinade by combin-
ing the turmeric and saffron with the warm water, stirring to dissolve the
saffron. Add the lemon juice, salt, and 1 tablespoon of oil. Pour the mari-
nade over the chicken, tossing the pieces to wet them. Refrigerate the
chicken for 30 minutes or longer.
2. Heat the remaining tablespoon of oil in a nonstick skillet (if you have only
a small pan that is nonstick, use it, doing this step in batches and using part
of the oil for each batch). Remove the chicken from the marinade, reserving
the marinade. Brown the chicken pieces in the oil, and remove them from
the pan.
3. Add the rice to the pan, and "fry" it for about 3 to 5 minutes, stirring it
constantly to coat it with oil and toast the grains. Stir in the garlic and onion,
and fry them for 1 to 2 minutes, still stirring. Transfer the rice-vegetable
mixture to a Dutch oven, and then add 21/2 cups broth, the oregano, pepper,
and paprika. Stir the ingredients to combine them, bring the mixture to a
boil, reduce the heat to low, cover the pot tightly, and cook the rice for 30
minutes.
4. Stir in the reserved marinade (if any), tomatoes and their juice, chili pepper,
and parsley, arrange the chicken pieces on top of the rice, cover the pot,
and cook the chicken-rice mixture over low heat for 30 minutes or until the
chicken is nearly done. Check once or twice, and add more broth if needed.
5. Sprinkle the peas, olives, and pimiento over the top of the chicken, add
more broth or water, if necessary, cover the pot, and cook the mixture for
another 10 to 15 minutes or until the chicken is tender, the rice fairly dry,
and the peas hot.
Results of FreeORC conversion, not bad but note all the extra line feeds
Finally, below is an example of clean up and conversion to TIFF through Scan Tailor followed by processing by FreeOCR.
Scan Tailor program -- this is used to clean up images and create TIFF output files. Although this screen shot shows just a single file/page, you can add multiple files and perform actions in bulk. You can easily rotate, "deskew", set margins, de-speckle, and convert your images to TIFF files. Scan Tailor converts a scanned file to a TIFF file.
E:x¤TREss.— PO ut TR Y 43 1 % teaspoon saffron threads, crushed 2 tablespoons warm water l tablespoon lemon juice */1 teaspoon salt, if desired 2 tablespoons vegetable oil, divided 1*/2 cups long·grain brown rice l large clove garlic, finely minced (1 teaspoon) 1 large onion, coarsely chopped (1 cup) 2*/2 to 3*/2 cups chicken broth */2 teaspoon oregano */s teaspoon freshly ground black pepper */s teaspoon paprika 1 28·ounce can tomatoes with their juice l dried chili pepper, crushed, or hot red pepper Hakes, to taste (optional) 2 tablespoons minced fresh parsley or 2 teaspoons dried parsley flakes l l0-ounce package frozen peas */2 cup sliced black olives */1 cup chopped pimiento 1. Place the chicken pieces in a bowl. In a cup, prepare a marinade by combin- ing the turmeric and saffron with the warm water, stirring to dissolve the saffron. Add the lemon juice, salt, and l tablespoon of oil. Pour the mari- nade over the chicken, tossing the pieces to wet them. Refrigerate the chicken for 30 minutes or longer. 2. Heat the remaining tablespoon of oil in a nonstick skillet (if you have only a small pan that is nonstick, use it, doing this step in batches and using part ofthe oil for each batch). Remove the chicken from the marinade, reserving the marinade. Brown the chicken pieces in the oil, and remove them from the pan. 3. Add the rice to the pan, and "fry" it for about 3 to S minutes, stirring it constantly to coat it with oil and toast the grains. Stir in the garlic and onion, and fry them for 1 to 2 minutes, still stirring. Transfer the rice-vegetable mixture to a Dutch oven, and then add 2*/2 cups broth, the oregano, pepper, and paprika. Stir the ingredients to combine them, bring the mixture to a boil, reduce the heat to low, cover the pot tightly, and cook the rice for 30 minutes. 4. Stir in the reserved marinade (if any), tomatoes and their juice, chili pepper, and parsley, arrange the chicken pieces on top of the rice, cover the pot, and cook the chicken-rice mixture over low heat for 30 minutes or until the chicken is nearly done. Check once or twice, and add more broth if needed. 5. Sprinkle the peas, olives, and pimiento over the top of the chicken, add more broth or water, if necessary, cover the pot, and cook the mixture for another 10 to 15 minutes or until the chicken is tender, the rice fairly dry, and the peas hot.
Results of FreeORC conversion after Scan Tailor clean up
Once you have your text, you can then convert it to PDF format. Of course you can also just convert the raw JPG files to PDF but then you can’t do any searching on the results.
SUMMARY
This is a nice scanner, well thought-out and at a nice price. (You can even get it at Bed Bath & Beyond, by the way). For batch scanning it could work out but you want to watch out for books with text near the edges of the page.
Being able to preview a thumbnail image is, admittedly, a second-best solution. Much better is being able to send the scan to a smartphone or tablet by Wi-Fi to preview it at a larger size, as you can with the Brother DSmobile 820W manual-feed scanner that I recently reviewed or the Editors' Choice VuPoint Solutions Magic Wand Wi-Fi PDSWF-ST44-VP .
Many curse breaker collections are held by secretive organizations or individuals who guard the knowledge and power that these items possess. In some cultures and belief systems, the curse breaker collection plays a significant role in spiritual and mystical practices. It is believed that possessing these items can bring protection, fortune, and the ability to ward off evil forces. Individuals may turn to these curse breakers as a last resort when all other remedies and solutions have failed. However, it is important to approach the concept of curse breakers with caution and skepticism. While many people believe in the power and efficacy of these items, there is often a lack of scientific evidence to support their claims. Additionally, individuals should be wary of charlatans and scam artists who may take advantage of their vulnerability and desperation. In conclusion, the curse breaker collection is a fascinating and mysterious topic that captivates the imagination. Whether one believes in the supernatural powers of curse breakers or not, the allure and intrigue of these items continue to capture the fascination of many..
Reviews for "Magic and Mystery: Revealing the Secrets of the Curse Breaker Collection"
1. Sarah - 2/5 - I was really disappointed with the Curse Breaker collection. The stories lacked depth and the characters felt one-dimensional. The plotlines were predictable and I found myself losing interest halfway through. Overall, I didn't find it engaging or captivating. I would not recommend it to others looking for a thrilling read.
2. John - 3/5 - While there were some moments in the Curse Breaker collection that had potential, overall, it fell short for me. The writing style was choppy and inconsistent, making it hard to become fully immersed in the stories. Additionally, the dialogue felt forced and unnatural, making it difficult to connect with the characters. I had high hopes for this collection, but unfortunately, it didn't meet my expectations.
3. Emma - 2.5/5 - I found the Curse Breaker collection to be quite underwhelming. The stories lacked originality and the world-building seemed superficial. The pacing was also off, with some parts dragging on while others felt rushed. Overall, it was a forgettable read for me, and I wouldn't recommend it to someone seeking a captivating fantasy collection.
4. David - 2/5 - I was not impressed with the Curse Breaker collection. The stories felt disjointed and the transitions between them were poorly executed. The writing lacked finesse and the characters were hard to connect with. Unfortunately, this collection didn't live up to the hype for me, and I regret spending my time on it.
5. Lisa - 2/5 - The Curse Breaker collection was a disappointment. The stories lacked originality and the plotlines were formulaic. The pacing was inconsistent, with some stories dragging on and others feeling rushed. Overall, it felt like a collection of half-baked ideas rather than fully developed stories. I would not recommend it to anyone looking for an immersive and engaging read.