Most of us have collections of real pictures, making us nostalgic of those old memories. However, what if you want to share those old pictures online? Well, you can do that by digitalizing your photos using a good mobile photo scanning app. That said, here is a list of the best photo scanning apps for Android.
Best Photo Scanning apps for Android
- Google PhotoScan
- Photomyne
- Helmut Film Scanner
- CamScanner
- Office Lens
Generally, using a flatbed photo scanner is the best way to convert printed photos into digital copies. But, not everyone has access to the machine. Thus, the best possible workaround for the same is to use mobile scanner apps on your phone. With your phone’s in-built camera and proper software, you can create shareable digital copies within a few minutes. Mainly, such mobile scanners help in reducing glare and uneven exposure, especially in indoor lighting. That said, let’s get started with the list of best photo scanning apps for Android.
1] Google Photo Scan
Recently introduced by Google, the Google Photo Scan app is indeed the best photo scanning app available today. Compared to the other similar apps, Google Photo Scan works in a different yet effective manner.
To get started, place the picture you need to scan in the given frame. When the four white dots appear, all you need to do is move your phone such that the center aligns with each dot, one by one. This way, the phone takes not one but five shots of the object. Furthermore, it stitches all of them together, corrects perspective, balances exposure and more importantly eliminates glare.
Certainly, glare one of the main issues while capturing a picture printed on glossy paper. However, in our testing, we were amused by seeing how well the app eliminates the glare, even when using the flashlight. Plus, the Google Photo Scan integrates very well with the Google Photos app, letting you take backups. If you want a mobile photo scanning that can work in multiple lighting conditions, Google Photo Scan is the way to go!
Download Google Photo Scan here!
2] Photo Scan app by Photomyne
Though not widespread, Photomyne works very well if you are in a real hurry with a load of multiple pictures. Similar to a flatbed photo scanner, Photomyne can scan multiple photos at once. You can click various photos from various albums in one go. After that, the app automatically detects different pictures and saves them into albums accordingly.
Furthermore, Photomyne shines when it comes to automatic edge detection, cropping, and rotating photos. Nonetheless, you can also make manual adjustments if needed. In our usage, we noticed that edge detection goes tricky at times, especially when pictures are kept on a complex colored background. That said, you can further enhance photos using different preset filters. Also, there’s an option to attach names, dates, locations, and descriptions to photos for your convenience. Note that the free version offers limited functionality and you need to subscribe to enjoy it fully.
Download Photo Scan App by Photomyne here!
3] Helmut Film Scanner
Do you have a bunch of old-school film negatives but couldn’t get them processed? Well, the Helmut Film Scanner can help you in converting those negative physical rolls into digitized photos. All of this without any specialized hardware, impressive right?
The app involves steps like capturing, cropping and enhancing. Moreover, it allows you to play with the image’s brightness, contrast, levels, color balance, hue, saturation, lightness, and more. You can scan any of the black and white negatives, color negatives, and even color positives and save them into digital copies to share with your friends online.
For optimum results, make sure to keep your negatives against an uniformly-lit light source. For instance, you can increase your laptop’s brightness to max and use an empty notepad window for a white and bright screen. After that, you can keep your film over it and continue with the process. Notably, bright and uniform lighting ensures best color accuracy when scanning film. With the ability to scan negatives, it is one of the best mobile scanning apps available out there.
Download Helmut Film Scanner here!
4] CamScanner
CamScanner is mainly a document scanner app, but can also be used to scan photos. The app works well, and you can flawlessly browse for multiple pictures in a single go.
CamScanner uses your phone’s camera to capture pictures. Once done, it smartly crops and enhances the image accordingly. It has several post-processing filters that you can use. Nonetheless, you can manually set the frame and adjust colors, contrast, brightness, etc. as per your liking. You can use this app even in cases when you want to scan old documents, letters, ID cards, etc.
Other notable features onboard include options to delete, share, merge, change tag and add password protection. You can also perform OCR (Optical Character Recognition) on the app to recognize the text in images. While the app is free for the most part, there’s also a pro subscription that brings the ability to edit OCR results, more cloud storage & collaborators.
Download CamScanner here!
5] Office Lens
From the house of Microsoft, Office Lens is a multipurpose app for scanning documents as well as photos, just like the CamScanner. While the app focused mainly towards productivity, business and documents, it does have a photo-capture mode that doesn’t apply enhanced saturation and contrast tweaks.
More importantly, Office Lens lets you choose the camera’s scanning resolution which is overlooked by other applications in the list. The app is quite minimal, and you need to tweak rotation and cropping, leaving everything else on the app itself. If you have steady hands and an ample amount of lighting, Office Lens will give you sharper and better quality pictures than other photo scanning apps. Furthermore, integration with Microsoft services acts as a cherry on the cake.
Download Office Lens here!
So these were top five photo scanning apps for Android. Let us know which one is your favorite amongst all. Feel free to reach us via comments in case of any queries.
