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Kevin Myers · Guest

Following is a copy of an extended thread that I previously started on
sci.geo.petroleum with regard to the need for a low cost scanner for
well logs (basically extremely long continuous strip chart recordings).
I am reposting the thread here in the hopes that someone on this list
may know of or be willing to consider development of such a scanner.
More information regarding the scanner hardware and software requirements
is included in this thread, and I can provide any necessary additional
information
upon request.

Right now there is only a single scanner in this market, which is
outrageously
over-priced at over $8000 (see the NeuraScanner at www.neuralog.com).
There is a significant opportunity here for someone who could develop a
reasonably
competitive product with a much lower price tag. The required scanner
capabilities
do not exceed those of a typical portable sheet-fed consumer grade scanner,
except for primarily the maximum scan length issue.

My purpose in posting this? Like many others in my industry who do NOT work
for a major oil corporation (along with others with similar needs in mining,
hydrology,
environmental, and medical fields), I simply cannot afford to shell out
$8000 for the
NeuraScanner, even though I have great need for a scanner with similar
capabilities. So, I simply want to encourage competing development of a
much
less expensive scanner (or driver), and to be the first of many customers...

s/KAM

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Since nobody else has yet offered anything in response, I'll follow up my
own post with a few ideas that perhaps someone else might care to follow up
on:

1. The only presently manufactured portable scanner on the market that is
really acceptable for well log scanning is the $8000+ NeuraScanner
(www.neuralog.com).

2. Although the NeuraScanner seems to be a very good unit, there are
literally thousands of oil and gas industry folks such as myself who don't
work for major companies and simply can't afford a scanner in this seemingly
unreasonable price range. There are also numerous folks in mining,
hydrology, environmental, and medical fields with similar needs.

3. A log scanner has no unusual requirements in terms of image quality,
pixel depth, resolution, or scanning speed.

4. There are only two significantly exceptional requirements for a log
scanner: A) First and most importantly, essentially unlimited image length
(up to hundreds of feet) is an absolute requirement. B) Many hardcopy logs
are 9 to 10 inches in width, with some up to 12 inches, which means that
those larger format logs can't be scanned on devices with an 8.5 inch
maximum document throat width.

5. Except for the preceding two requirements, there are *numerous* sheet
fed, consumer grade scanners on the market that would otherwise work as log
scanners.

6. A very large number of well logs are available in "half-scale" format,
which generally does not exceed 6 inches in width. Such reduced scale logs
generally constitute the vast majority of logs that independent petroleum
industry personnel work with. Consumer grade scanner *hardware* is
perfectly capable of scanning these logs. Only the unnecessarily limited
*software* that is provided with these scanners prevents them from being
used effectively.

THEREFORE, I would like to propose the following two product development
ideas for a large potential customer base with very little competition, with
the thought that a much more realistically priced alternative could be
produced:

1. Take an existing consumer level sheet fed scanner such as one of the
Visioneer models or the older Storm/Logitech models, and develop an enhanced
scanner driver that can perform unlimited length scanning. Possibly follow
that up with a custom application that is designed to facilitate gathering
typical identifying information for the scanned images. It should easily be
possible to sell thousands of copies of such software. Furthermore, if this
software could be used to provide Windows 2000/XP compatibility for older
scanners that are no longer manufactured (e.g. Logitch PageScan, FreeScan)
then there would also be a very significant consumer level market for the
software. I see a lot of demand for such updated drivers on the twain.org
lists, for example, and the scanner manufacturers are *not* meeting this
demand.

2. Get with a scanner OEM, and develop a scanner similar in concept to the
NeuraScanner. Since most of the parts for such a scanner should be availabe
as off the shelf parts for existing sheet fed consumer level scanners
(perhaps with some minor modifications), it should be relative cheap to
design and manufacture such a scanner. It should be easily possible to sell
such a scanner at a *MUCH* lower price than the NeuraScanner and still make
an excellent profit far exceeding development costs.

Personally, I would like to take on these projects myself, except that I'm
already tied up in too many other projects to tackle the software
developement, and don't have enough development capital to get the custom
scanner idea off the ground...yet. Meanwhile, there are lots of us out here
who really NEED these capabilities *RIGHT NOW*. So, I'm hoping that maybe
someone else can run with these ideas instead.

If so, then please put me down on your waiting list as customer number one!

s/KAM

"Kevin Myers" <KevinMyers@austin.rr.com> wrote in message
news:1055m3jsv1j5r35@corp.supernews.com...

KachinaPeak · Posted: Mon May 21, 2007 9:30 pm Post subject: Re: Low Cost Well Log Scanners

Kodak is currently manufacturing the i280 which is a continuous feed scanner. The cost is slightly less than NeuraLog....about $6500.

We have never used them so I cannot offer a review of the product. We do log scanning on a massive scale for oil and gas companies and depend on NeuraScan despite the cost. What choice do we have?

I understand your concern and yes the price is exorbitant. Kodak is not far behind in the "higher than a mad cat's back-price range". The housing on the i280 is plastic and that turned us away from it. Our employees still manage to bang-up, mangle, and tear up our NeuraScanners even though they are built like little tanks. We do pay for the extra maintenance and parts coverage though.

If you need a small amount of logs scanned; just send a CA over, we will sign it, send it back, and you can courier you logs to us. Confidentiality is big with us and we work with major hitters. If we did not hold proprietary data in confidence and securely; we would have been out of business 15 years ago. Your data security is guaranteed.

www.DigitalRelayGeologix.com