How to Pull Text from Images and Scanned PDFs in a Snap

Posted by Bhavesh Joshi On Wednesday, November 6, 2013 0 comments
How to Pull Text from Images and Scanned PDFs in a Snap
If you have experience using PDF files on a regular basis, and most people do, then you probably know that not all PDFs are the same.  Even though PDF files are popular for the fact that they are universal and look the same no matter what platform you are using, that does not mean that they are all created equally. 

There are essentially two types of PDFs – PDFs generated from an electronic source and scanned PDFs that were made from the image of a paper document. The first type is the most common. If you have created a document in Microsoft Word and then saved it as a PDF, you are talking about the first kind. However, if you have a spreadsheet of business data on paper that you have scanned and saved as a PDF, you are working with the second type.

PDFs generated from electronic sources are easier to access. This is because the characters and information that is found within the PDF already have electronic character designations, meaning that they can be easily recognized and pulled from the PDF. Scanned PDFs are another story entirely. They are essentially image files. Therefore, if you want to extract information from them, you are going to have to use a tool that can read and recognize those characters visually and then translate them into electronic form. 

That is one of the featured benefits that Invest in tech’s Able2Extract 8 Professional offers to users. Most PDF converters, both free online tools and paid software, cannot extract information from scanned PDFs. However, thanks to Able2Extract Pro’s industry-leading OCR technology, there is no PDF that cannot be converted using this software. 

OCR stands for optical character recognition, which is technology that enables the software to literally read the scanned image and recognize the characters that are found within the image and then turn them into electronic characters before converting the scanned image PDF into another, more editable file format. 

Using Able2Extract Professional 8, users can take scans of physical book pages and convert these image PDFs into editable Microsoft Word or Text files. Or they can take a scan of a data table that was handed out at a recent meeting and convert the PDF into an editable Excel spreadsheet for further evaluation. 

Here’s a look at how the process works.

This is a scanned PDF that we want to convert into an editable Microsoft Excel document. 

PDF

Run Able2Extract Professional 8 and open the PDF.

Able2Extract Professional 8 Software

Once the file is open, you can choose to either convert the entire PDF by selecting “All” or only parts of the document by selecting “Area.”

Convert the entire PDF by selecting “All” or only parts of the document by selecting “Area”

In this example, we will only convert one table within the PDF, not the entire document. Simply select what you want to convert with your mouse. 

Convert one table within the PDF

Now click on “Excel.”

Now click on “Excel”

Since the conversion of PDF to Excel documents really requires a lot of accuracy so that the output file is easily usable immediately, Able2Extract provides custom options for Excel conversions that allow you to get everything exactly write. To use these customization options, click on “Define.”

Custom options for Excel conversions

The Custom options allow you to define the rows and columns to make sure that everything is set up perfectly before you begin the conversion. You can even preview the file before committing to the conversion. 

Custom options allow you to define the rows and columns to make sure that everything is set up perfectly before you begin the conversion

Once you have set up the columns and rows perfectly, simply click the green “Convert” button and select where you want your file to be saved. This is what the defined columns and rows looked like once we completed our customization of the conversion output. 

PDF Converted File 
OCR technologyAs you see, Able2Extract Professional 8 provides users with the advanced OCR technology needed to interpret the characters locked within scanned image PDFs and then translate them into electronic formats before converting the file into an editable document.

Not only that, but the software also offers advanced settings and features that enable users to create tailor-made and incredibly accurate conversions that will not need any further editing before use. This professional PDF conversion utility is available for $129.95 or a month-long subscription license can be purchased for $34.95.

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