Scan Photos With Your Phone – PhotoScan

There are many apps for smart phones that allow the camera to act as a scanner for photos, but one of the easiest is Google’s PhotoScan. This post will show how to use PhotoScan to scan photos using a phone.

More information about PhotoScan can be found at Google.com.

First, open the AppStore on an iPhone or Google Store on an Android phone. (AppStore shown here)

Click in the search box and type Scan Google

Click on Get, or in this case the cloud icon, to download the app to your phone. This app is free.

The PhotoScan App

Then find the icon for the app on the phone and tap on the icon to open the app.

The first screen will step quickly through a video describing the way the app works.

Which will then leave this opening screen, where one can click on the Start Scanning button on the bottom.

The first time using the app, it will ask for permission to access the camera and the photo library. These are both required, so click OK.

Next the app will ask to send Notifications. This is not necessary, so click on Don’t Allow.

Start a Scan

Once the questions are answered, click on Tap Button to Start Scanning

When positioning the camera over the photo, these dots will appear. The empty circle in the center needs to be dragged with a finger until it is over one of the white circles in the corners. Hold the phone as steady as possible.

After the first corner, move the empty circle to the next white circle and so on until all four corners are identified. The white dots will disappear as they are matched.

The app will process the photos it has taken and transform them into a single photograph of the file type JPG.

Sending Scanned Photos

Hold a finger on this photo, and the choices will be displayed for sending this photo by email or messages (a box with an arrow pointing upward), or for editing (rotate and adjust corners). This photo will also be put into the photo library automatically.