Atari-Forum

I've started scanning my entire ST Format mag collection (which is all of them)

I've uploaded the first batch to http://www.stformat.com

They are in PDF and also individual page scans.

So far there's ST Amiga Formats 5 & 12, then STF's 3,7,8,9 74 and the last one 86.

Let me know if you have any one you're itching to see and I'll add it to the batch of next ones I do

Cheers,
Jez

That's just awesome. Thanks for all the hard work on this!

Nice work, Jez! Do you have a scanner big enough for the oversized issues? This seems to be a sticking point for a lot of people.

Thanks for the work so far Jez. I've already read some articles from a few issues I missed in the past.

Thank you. The community has been clamoring for a full set scan. Nice to see someone take up the charge.

StickHead wrote:Nice work, Jez! Do you have a scanner big enough for the oversized issues? This seems to be a sticking point for a lot of people.

Unfortunately not / My scanner will do slightly wider than A4, but not wide enough to get one of the wide STF's though. Somewhere in between.

So I've decided I'm going to guillotine the wide-boys down to a width that the scanner will take. Gulp. I've been sitting on these issues for over 20 years, but have decided they're for the chop! I've done some tests and decided that chopping them down will not loose any of the actual content.

I'll do one of these next to show you guys how it turns out.

Also, had an offer from someone else on this forum to provide some scans, which will be awesome.

Cheers,
Jez

I did ask dimensions for STF some time ago, but nobody replied. I only had a quick look at my box, and can only see A4 sized ones. I was sure they were bigger than A4 on some issues ? Unless it was another mag ?

My girlfriend has offered to scan STF, but it will take some time. As stated in another post, I have AC and AW scanned, though it takes a day easily to scan one issue, then theres cropping and tweaking and touching up in places, so it pretty much takes 2 days to scan a issue. It also depends on number of pages in the thing.

I have some touching up to do with the AC & AW mags yet, though in a few weeks time I suspect we should be able to start scanning other things such as STF too

nice one

as far as i remember, STF went 'big' after issue 30-ish, I'll measure one when I get back tonight

spiny wrote:nice one

as far as i remember, STF went 'big' after issue 30-ish, I'll measure one when I get back tonight

Yes, and then they went small again around issue 73 or 74 I believe.

Yep, they got wide from 27 until 71, then went back to A4 again. Width went from 21cm to 23cm. My scanner can cope with about 21.75, so I need to shave 1.25cm off to get the scan done.

STFormatJez wrote:Yep, they got wide from 27 until 71, then went back to A4 again. Width went from 21cm to 23cm. My scanner can cope with about 21.75, so I need to shave 1.25cm off to get the scan done.

So is it just whitespace that is lost when you trim?

Pretty much, yes.

Just trimmed STF39 down now to 21.5-21.75 and not lost any content at all from the inside pages.

The only loss comes on the adverts - that were mostly full width.

Left the cover in tact, so will scan them manually on a flat-bed scanner.

Will try and get it on-line over by this w/e, so you can see what I mean.

just grabbed a 'wide' copy and it looks like the content is mostly 20.5cm wide apart from a few articles where some images go to 21-22cm

not sure if these pics will load, my phone is being a dick and so I've had to upload them to picasa:

It's a shame to see even the most inconsequential content sacrificed to the craft knife, even if it is the edge of a photo or advert. It's a shame that A3 scanners are so expensive, otherwise I'd convince the wife that one would be essential for our work!

Still, if A4 is the only way, it is better than not scanning them at all!

Issues 1,2,4 and 39 now on-line.

Many thanks to Champions_2002 (of this parish) for providing scans for issues 2 & 4.

Issue 39 is a 'wide-boy' issue. I've cropped (with extreme prejudice!) 1.25cm off the page (approx. 0.6cm off each side) in order that it fit through my scanner.

You may not be overly keen on the results and certainly it's not for the purist but before you get too critical, remember this; A3 multi-feed scanners are totally out of my price range, so at the moment, it's the only show in town!

Cheers,
Jez

Not too shabby at all, Jez. The issue looks great, and if you didn't know it was a 'wide-boy' (love that phrase) then you wouldn't notice anything amiss. Are there any pages in particular you were worried about?

Thanks,

I think page 104 (the middle Sensible Soccer page) is an example where there's some cropping evident. It's not too bad, but not exactly archive quality stuff :/

Looks good to me. Good job!

STFormatJez wrote:Thanks,

I think page 104 (the middle Sensible Soccer page) is an example where there's some cropping evident. It's not too bad, but not exactly archive quality stuff :/

Well, it's only the page number that's been excised, which has little or no impact on reading experience at all. Nice job!

Is there any way you can indicate which issues have scans on the main index page? That would be very convenient!

ST Amiga Format 1 and STF 18 PDF's and page scans up. More to follow in the coming weeks...

StickHead wrote: Is there any way you can indicate which issues have scans on the main index page? That would be very convenient!

Good call! I'll update the index to show which issues have scans / pdf's - maybe a sticker logo on the image cover or something? I'll also update the hover to show the scans are there.

I've got a few other STF related things to put on the site when I get time - the special edition STF00 that was given away free with new ST's as well as some supplements they gave away down the years.

Also got some other ST mags like STampede and some ATARI related articls from EDGE to go up.

If you do plan on chopping STF to scan, I have a A3 scanner...

Insistently My scanning has stopped as I am using a A4 scanner as it does really good scans (the A3 one look a bit blah to me) which packed in the other day, Should have it fixed though in a few days Amazing how a multifunction can die after a year and yet the ST is still plodding away all these years later!

for everyone involved. This magazine was probably the most important thing when I was a nerdy teenager in Finland in a Amiga country. I almost had a tear in my eye when I finally had an opportunity to read the last issue because of you. My subscription back then ended at issue 83. Apparently the subscription personnel for the foreigners were aware about the almost imminent closure as the normal procedure for renewal never emerged. You couldn't buy single issues from anywhere in Finland for years as far as I know it.

Dromedary wrote: for everyone involved. This magazine was probably the most important thing when I was a nerdy teenager in Finland in a Amiga country. I almost had a tear in my eye when I finally had an opportunity to read the last issue because of you. My subscription back then ended at issue 83. Apparently the subscription personnel for the foreigners were aware about the almost imminent closure as the normal procedure for renewal never emerged. You couldn't buy single issues from anywhere in Finland for years as far as I know it.

Far out! Good to hear & glad you enjoyed it. STF was pretty important for me too in the early 90's. Think I actually stopped getting it at about issue 65 though and have only caught up on the later issues through ebay.

Have got a couple more issues (32 and staf 13) that will go up this w/e and then I'll start scanning more.

Cheers