Processing and Output

How a run works

Stage	Message	What happens
1. Loading	Iamge Data loading starts	The image is read and checked.
2. Raster and vector processing	Processing nn %	The image is cut into bands of BDWIDTH pixels; each band is thresholded, cleaned of specks and traced into polygons.
3. Merging	Data Cleaning starts	The polygons of all bands are joined; shapes cut at a band border become whole again.
4. Export	Image2CAD conversion was done	The drawing is written in the requested format.

ImgScan uses several processor cores. No parameter is needed for this.

Output formats

Format	Contents
DXF	Closed polylines on one layer, Layer_1. Units: millimetres.
Gerber	Extended Gerber (RS-274X) with filled regions. Millimetres, coordinate format 4.6.
ODB++	A compressed ODB++ job (.tgz) with step step and one layer, layer_1.

LinkCAD reads all three; see using ImgScan with LinkCAD.

Reproducibility

Two runs on the same image can give files that differ by single points of 1 µm along the edge of the image or of a band. The difference comes from the outline-tracing library and has no practical effect on circuit board data.

Several runs at the same time

Several conversions can run at the same time, for example from several batch files. Give each its own OUTPUT file, and start only as many as the computer has memory and disk space for.

Temporary files

Each run works in its own folder IMGSCAN_<process number>_<n> in the Windows temporary folder (%TEMP%). It can reach about eight times the size of the image, 72 MB for a 9 MB image, and ImgScan deletes it at the end of the run. With DEBUG it is kept for analysis; delete such folders yourself afterwards.

The files jdllGdsW.log and jdllOdbR.log in the Exe folder are written by a library that ImgScan uses and can be ignored.