Music Reading Software: Tomorrow's Applications Today!
by John Kuzmich, Jr.
October 4, 2000
Music reading or music scanning software is a milestone in computer applications. This is important because educators can archive and use their scores in a number of creative ways via playback, printing and further manipulation of the MIDI file. Music scanning applications use highly advanced decision_making algorithms to transform published score into scanned TIFF images of music and then convert them into multi-track MIDI files. These software converters are not intended to function purely as notation applications because they can also bring any music score to "life" with music performances! And what's more, it allows you to edit and manipulate the score creatively more than you can could before with traditional notation entry.
There are four products available that do music reading/scanning. Musitek produces MIDISCAN and Smartscore . Musicware produces Nightingale and has Notescan as a plug module and Sibelius has PhotoScore as a third-party plug-in by Neuratron. All of the above products are menu-driven and can be easily used right away without any training. All of the above-mentioned products are TWAIN-compatible which is essential for use with nearly every scanner. All programs offer Standard MIDI support which makes it compatible with all MIDI-based software.
Understanding How Music Reading Software Works!
New music reading/scanning technology eliminates the need to computerize a music score or composition by imputing the music via real-time or step-time MIDI. All you need is a scanner, a music reading/scanning software program and a 486 or faster computer. The process uses a scanner with an image editing software package that can produce a TIFF (Tagged Image File Format) image file of the sheet music. It can either be a black and white or color scanner. A TIFF file is a photographic image of the original music that cannot be edited, much like a duplicated copy from a copy machine. The music reading/scanning software transfers the hard copy into an editable music data file that can be saved into a Standard MIDI which can be then read, played, and printed and imported into a music notation or sequencing program for more creative use. Accuracy can be as good as the ninety percentiles. Since there is no standardization of fonts used by music publishers, accuracy depends on the fonts you are scanning. But it is realistic to accomplish high accuracy when scanning published music. Unfortunately, there are no software programs at this time that can accommodate hand manuscript.
Each music scanning/reading program has its own proprietary file format which allows you to fully edit, transpose and play back while working on the editing process. You can also save the edited proprietary music file as a Standard MIDI file type and export it to your favorite notation/sequencing software for further application enhancements and easily share it with others.
Education Applications of Music Reading Software
This music scanning process is much faster than imputing the score into a music sequencing or notation program playing each note on the keyboard thru MIDI. Once converted to MIDI files, the newly converted files can be performed by your multi-timbral MIDI system either as a full score or individual student parts. Individual student parts can then be recorded on cassette tape for study and practice. Converted MIDI file(s) can also be imputed to your sequencer or notation program for new compositional ideas, or transposed to another key or transformed into instant vocal accompaniments and/or printed out in minutes. Below is a summary of how creatively this kind of software can be creatively used by music teachers.
• Archive music scores for permanent notation engraving. Important when trying to replace missing parts.
• Replace missing parts. Very easy to do and welcomed by all teachers especially when many compositions go out-of-print!
• Transpose parts/scores instantly. Beats writing out the parts by hand.
• Re-orchestrate a score easily.
• Convert sheet music into your sequencer or notation program for new compositional ideas. Copy and paste is incredibly easy to do.
• Efficiently perform a score to better to assess the score than if "live" musicians are available with no rehearsal time required! Sometimes the only way to hear what the score should sound like! Great for students and educators alike.
• Output sequencer accompaniments directly to audio cassettes for student use. Great for practice.
How To Use Music Scanning Software
If the original manuscript is too light, set your scanning software for a higher intensity much like you would do on a copy machine. If the original is too small, consider enlarging it on a copy machine first to enhance the accuracy rate. Do not expect slurs, articulations and text to be part of the conversion process unless you have SmartScore or PhotoScore . However, you can add these components in the MNOD (Music Notation Object Description) editor or in your notation program. For manuscripts that need to be scanned in sideways, most products can easily rotate a TIFF file in 90 degree increments. They will even allow you to edit TIFF files before converting to the proprietary file format.
NoteScan 's normal scanner resolution is 200 dots per inch and up to 300 dots per inch while the other products use 300 dots per inch for most scores and up to 400 dots per inch for hard to scan images. That means that a scanned TIFF file will usually be around 200 to 300 dots per inch in size, and easily fit onto a diskette for transfer to another computer. NoteScan 's scanned files are slightly smaller but not noticeably. In the case of a miniature score or a conductor's score with small staff size, 300 dots per inch is often more accurate. PhotoScore , MIDISCAN or SmartScore , 350 or perhaps to almost 400 dots per inch is necessary. The trick is to use the smallest resolution quality needed since excessive dots per inch won't increase scanning quality.
A minimum size for hard disk storage will depend on the number of TIFF-pages scanned. A good rule of thumb is to allocate 1 MB for scanned TIFF images and 1 MB for each music page scanned in a music scanning proprietary music file. NoteScan data files will be slightly smaller because of the lower resolution level
Text cannot be scanned at this time with first generation music scanning programs such as NoteScan and MIDISCAN . Slurs will also not be recognized. But systems, staff lines, clef signs, key signatures, time signatures, notes, rests, rhythmic definition, beams and barlines will all be identified. Creases in the paper, pencil and ink markings, coffee stains, and the like will all contribute to errors. Also, jiggling the hand scanner, making a pass on titled paper and let the paper scoot around will hinder getting a good TIFF file to operate on. Large notes should be scanned at a lower resolution of 100 to 200 dots per inch while small music notation should be scanned at 200 ( NoteScan ) and 300 ( NoteScan ) and up to 400 dip for SmartScore and PhotoScore . The quality of the TIFF file will be the determining factor. Flatbed scanners are easier and more stable to use. Hand scanners are a bit harder to use.
Scanner Requirements
An optical scanners may not need to be purchased right away. First check with your school and school district to learn where there are scanners already available for your use. Once you have scanned in the music parts/scores, you take these newly created TIFF files and put them on a floppy diskette and take them to your computer at home or in your classroom to use with the music reading/scanning program.
In the past, the cost of scanners was a significant obstacle for software applications requiring a scanner. Three years ago, the list price of a black and white flatbed scanner was about $800. Today, a 300 dots per inch black and white flatbed scanner can have a retail price of $100. Hand-held scanners can be purchased today for less than $100. When purchasing a scanner, I suggest you purchase a flatbed scanner for convenience of operation. TWAIN drivers, the latest industry standard for acquiring images, are now the most popular drivers for scanners. It is much like a type O positive blood universal donor because TWAIN compatible applications accept images directly from the scanner. If you purchase a clone-brand, I suggest you investigate if it has a standard emulation for a popular national known brand such as Hewlett-Packer, Microtek, or Logitech (held-held). Scanner drivers are very important, particularly in the installation so that image editing, Optical Character Recognition (OCR) and other applications work directly with your scanner more efficiently.
Music Reading/Scanning Software Options
Although MIDISCAN is a first-generation music scanning program released in 1993 (first commercial music scanning program), it is also NIFF (Notation Interchange File Format) and works very well. This is a new data_description standard for musical notation compatibility with the ability to produce finished copies identical to the original part/score scanned. To learn more about NIFF, please go to the last section of this article under the “Future Music Scanning Trends” heading. MIDISCAN can work even with a 386DX computer. A 486 computer can cut down convention time depending on which CPU processor you have. You can view the music at actual size or down to 1/4 size to see more staves along with both the TIFF and its proprietary editable files to check for possible mistakes. You also have an option of editing the proprietary files (MNOD) before converting to a MIDI file. This process is easy because the MNOD editor is both powerful and intuitive, and the actual conversion process from MNOD to MIDI file takes only a few seconds. Note: there is no undo feature in MIDISCAN and I suggest that you back up your editing periodically to avoid having to correct editing mistakes you might make. There is a 74 page manual that is clearly written and well organized for extensive editing. NoteScan is a good music scanning program that runs inside of Nightingale music notation program for the Macintosh platform. It comes free with Nightingale when purchased at its retail price or for $75 when purchased Nightingale at the academic price of $295.00. What makes Nightingale so powerful is that it can read Finale 2001 files and has a third-party plug-in that allows you to post Nightingale scores on the Internet with security features so that the scores cannot be downloaded by anybody else and yet the scores can be viewed and played over the Internet. NoteScan takes a different approach to editing scanned music than the other products in this article. The primary difference is that Notescan creates far more than merely MIDI notes information. It sends stronger score layout, note position and beaming information directly into Nightingale music notation application. And it does this in only a two-step process when converting TIFF files into MIDI files. Its simplicity, speed and accuracy of operation is nothing short amazing. Nightingale is able to then automatically process the staff size, number of systems per pate and the number of measures per system. The scanned score image is immediately re-notated showing any clef changes appearing throughout the score, the actual accidentals plus the original beaming used in the scanned sore. However, if you don't use Nightingale as your notation program, you can't use Notescan which makes it proprietary only for Nightingale . But the advantage of this matter is that if Nightingale is your regular notation program, you will already be familiar with the editing process. I particularly like how NoteScan can automatically determine the number of staves in a system by looking at the left end of the systems. It works great whether you have a piano grand staff, a single staff solo part, a four-part chorale, or an orchestral score. One favorite idea is to scan a piano or organ work, and then use Nightingale to divide up the notes in the score and distribute them to four or five individual parts, thus, creating a chamber ensemble piece.
SmartScore is Musitek's second-generation music scanning program that offers a substantial notation editor and sequencer in addition to advanced recognition capabilities. Recognition of dynamics and articulations gives more realism to playback of music after scanning. Files can be exported directly into Finale 2001 with page formatting intact. SmartMusic comes on a hybrid CD-ROM for both Macintosh and Windows platforms. What makes SmartScore a second generation program is that it offers a variety of ways to extract the scanned notation for instructional uses. For example, you can separate polyphonic voices, staves or systems into independent parts or MIDI. This gives the user some powerful alternatives to use the scanned parts giving full control over collapsing and/or expanding systems. SmartScore offers unlimited MIDI channels with direct voice-to-channel linking. A second characteristic of a second-generation product is the ability to scan dynamics and articulations. This eliminates extra editing time. First-generation programs only recognized the music notes/rhythms. SmartScore offers up to 32 staves per score system with unprecedented control over page layout, spacing, irregular systems, parts and voices.
And what makes SmartScore so user friendly is that it can do playback, transpose and print out entire scores within minutes of scanning. For example, SmartMusic offers 15 templates so you can create musical scores from scratch, including basic piano, piano/vocal, several chorale formats, quartets and a 16-instrument orchestra format.. Drop in one key and time signature, press a button and the entire score is updated. Need more space between staves? Change one setting and apply to the current system, subsequent systems, page, part or entire score. There are 23 preset instrumental templates available. For easy and powerful editing, it is possible to open all 10 SmartScore Tool Palettes. It is possible to process up to 24 pages at once and create and save it in a singe SmartScore file (ENF file).
The default resolution is set at 300 dots per inch (dpi). This should be adequate for most music. If the original music is printed with smaller type, you may increase resolution to 350, 400 or 450 dpi. For miniatures, try 500 dpi. It is not recommended to scan music beyond 600 dpi. This flexibility of adjusting scanning resolution is important when dealing with scores that are difficult to scan in.
PhotoScan is the newest music scanning product on the market. A shareware version is included free in Sibelius and a powerful full-feature product is also available. What makes this product so incredible is accuracy in the 90 percentile. Basic notes can be scanned which includes notes and chords including stem direction, beams and flags, rests and in up to four voices per staff along with accidentals and articulation marks in any clef, key signature and time signatures. The format of the page, including the page size, staff size, margins and where systems end can also be scanned. The full-feature version offers some rather nice whistles and bells such as allowing you to scan not only music notation but slurs, ties, and hairpins along with text expression marks, tempo, title, lyrics and more. You can scan sheet music into your computer in seconds in four easy steps: 1) scan music as a TIFF file, 2) read the page, edit any mistakes and transfer the edited music file to your music editor via a Standard MIDI file. Once the music has been transferred to a separate editing package, it can be manipulated just like any other piece. It can be fully proofed, transposed, re-arranged, saved, played back, parts extracted and printed out. PhotoScore is an official third-party plug-in for Sibelius so it operates seamlessly within Sibelius.
PC system requirements include an Intel 486DX compatible with Windows 95/98/2000 and at least 32 MB RAM and 20 MB free hard disk drive space, a scanner compatible with your computer and a copy of Sibelius if using the plug-version for Sibelius. Apple Macintosh system requirements include: Apple Power PC, operating system 7.1 or higher with the Appearance manager installed, at least 32 MB RAM and 20 MB free hard disk drive space, a scanner compatible with your computer and Sibelius if using a plug-in version.
Future Music Scanning Trends
The lack of an accepted standard format for music notation has for years been a source of great frustration for computer musicians, engravers and publishers. Numerous attempts have been made in the past to create a standard format. The effort resulting in NIFF to standardized music notation was completed in 1995 with the NIFF (Notation Interchange File Format). It is a standard digital format for the representation of musical notation. NIFF allows the interchange of music notation data between and among music notation editing and publishing programs and music scanning programs. NIFF aims to be the notational equivalent of the MIDI file standard. It is a non-proprietary format available without licensing fees. Its design is a result of combined input from many commercial music software developers, music publishers, and experienced music software users. Unfortunately, the NIFF project was finished on schedule but because several key publishers (co-sponsors) withdrew and several key people likewise moved onto other jobs and Passport Designs (the main sponsor) is no longer in business. NIFF is not likely to further evolve in major ways until users demand it, and only when several software packages use it, and only when they need their particular favorites imported and exported NIFF files. Sometime in the future NIFF may become widely used and available with no fees or licensing requirements. Music scanning software programs that offer NIFF compatibility are in a great marketing position to offer music reading/scanning and the ability to authentically capture the manuscript for universal file transfer into a host of music notation programs. Present software programs that are NIFF compatible are: MIDISCAN , PianoScan ( same as MIDISCAN except it only has two stave capacity), and SmartMusic by Musitek, Lime , SharEye Music Read , Concert-O-Braille , Encore , Igor , the original NIFF SDK and ProScore . For examples of what NIFF files look like, please go to: < http://www.musitek.com/niff.html>.
With a 386DX computer, it can take 4 or 5 minutes to scan a page. With a Pentium II or III computer, it is possible to reduce this to 30 seconds or less. Not only does higher CPU's make it easier and faster to use music reading/scanning software, but someday, there will be 32-bit band width applications via gray scale techniques of 4-bit and 8-bit applications. Accuracy will be increased significantly but software processing speed will be increased 4 to 8 times. In addition, software applications will take advantage of upcoming Pentium CPU chips. The future of music scanning is bright as technology improvements are made in both hardware and software.