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Review on πŸ“Έ CZUR Shine500-Pro High-Speed Document Camera: Smart OCR Scanner for MacOS and Windows by Johnny Chambers

Revainrating 5 out of 5

Stylish and portable scanner!

I have had another Czur scanner, the Czur Aura Pro, for about 20 months. Love it! As a scientist, I keep scanning objects for my research, teaching and yes, also for my official work. I have recommended it to my colleagues over and over again. I jumped at the opportunity to purchase the Czur Shine Ultra for its advanced features. It's smaller and lighter than the Czur Aura Pro (weighing just 2.2 pounds), so it's just as light and packable as a thin laptop. Both scan up to A3 (European paper size; slightly larger than a double sheet of paper). When the skies open up for travel again, I look forward to Using Czur Shine Ultra in libraries and archives in Germany - it's easier to travel with than Czur Aura Pro. I found Czur Aura Pro aesthetically pleasing, but Czur Shine Ultra is even more beautiful! The scans are just as good as Czur, which handles flat images. I particularly like the ability to create OCR (searchable) PDFs, Word documents and Excel spreadsheets from scans that are first processed as JPGs. I work in several languages; Czur Shine Ultra can recognize 180 different languages. Once a document is searchable, computer search programs capture the smallest details in documents. There are other functions for editing documents. Both scanners feature innovative Czur curve smoothing technology (good for books). Even the professional Zeutschel scanners, the ones I use in the Library of Congress or in German libraries have no such function. (Same as Zeutschel OCR documents.) The Czur Shine Ultra not only surpasses the Czur Aura Pro in terms of aesthetics and portability, but also has an additional video recording function in addition to flat images. This is where the screen sharing feature of various online meeting programs comes into play. With online meeting programs, you're limited to what your webcam can capture, and that usually includes yourself (unless you tilt your webcam in that direction). With Czur Shine Ultra you can create or publish videos with a book or text that link to the relevant parts for your audience. You can also create or show a video containing only the object (see my video of a UV-illuminated uranium glass candle holder on the page, which I show in my Atomic Age course). Czur Shine Ultra is a great scanner with more capabilities than Czur Aura Pro and more functionality. And it's easy to use. Highly recommended!

Pros
  • Handsfree
Cons
  • Very expensive