Scanning music

Converting printed music to digital notation.

The SmartScore Lite feature in PrintMusic, like many music scanning products, doesn’t recognize articulation marks, hairpins, double or repeat barlines, or text. It will recognize 3 accidental types, 3 clefs, 16 staves per page, smallest note value is a 32nd note, and a maximum of 1 augmentation dot.

Because scanning is not a perfect science, you will need to clean up any file after conversion. Depending on the music, some users will find it easier to simply re-enter the music via one of PrintMusic's traditional note entry methods: Simple Entry, Speedy Entry, or HyperScribe.

Remember that to take advantage of any of PrintMusic's scanning capabilities, you will need to have a properly installed scanner (contact the manufacturer of your scanner if you have questions). Because scanners and scanning software varies widely, we cannot provide instructions on how to prepare a file for every scanner. For some hints on how to prepare a scanned file from some popular scanners, see Scanning. The scanned sheet music image should be saved as a black and white (or line art) graphic in TIFF format at a resolution of 300dpi.

To open scanned files with SmartScore Lite

1. Place a sheet of music on your scanner. Ensure it is placed squarely on the scanner’s bed, and the staff lines are not slanted on the page. Do not use handwritten or photocopied scores.

   If you have already scanned and saved TIFF files (or want to use our demonstration TIFF file), choose File > Scanning: SmartScore Lite > Import Existing TIFF File and skip the next three steps.

2. Choose File > Scanning: SmartScore Lite > Scan and Import. PrintMusic opens the SmartScore Lite scanning software. In most cases, all the settings you need to properly scan the file for PrintMusic import are configured.
3. Scan the first page of your score. After the scan, click Yes to scan additional pages. Click No once all your pages have been scanned.
4. Click OK. The SmartScore Lite dialog box appears.
5. Click Add Files to List. The Open dialog box appears. If you just scanned, your files appear in this list. Click the first file in this list and then hold down SHIFT and click the last file to select all of them. Then click Open.
6. Click the file name to highlight it. A preview of the file appears in the left window.
7. Click Begin Recognition. The Instrument Name Assignments dialog box appears, which allows you to configure instrument transpositions, staff names, and the MIDI instruments. It is important to apply this information to ensure your staves are transposed properly.
8. Click OK. PrintMusic transcribes the scanned file(s) and displays the music in a single file. Add ties with the Simple or Speedy Entry tools. For more information, see Scanning.

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