Hi, Since we been discussing the stand ScanPro/giraffe reader etc, I decided to play with Prizmo and TextGrabber freehand for a change. I tried out, what I think is often the hardest of all tests, a page of the newspaper text. I found, if I lift the phone high enough to encapsulate the whole page, the results were usually pretty bad. This will, I think changing time as there is no reason why the camera can't see at least as well is your average person. But for now, it appears, that for small print on a larger sheet you need to keep close in. I remember, quite a few years ago now, playing with Prizmo and newspapers with very little success. However, below you can find an extract, it is a small section of page taken from about 8 inches above, using Prizmo, from the Telegraph newspaper. Looking back on my old posts I am amazed to see how well Prizmo has improved. Remember, reading from newspapers involves sorting out columns ignoring images dealing with headlines etc. Prizmo still beats TextGrabber for these more complicated OCR functions. Which is why I usually suggest to people that having both apps is the best way to go.
So, by way of a sort of celebration here is a little Prizmo present! Thanks, Sandy if only just; and then 1946's 1he Best Years of Our Lives, which was a wholly different story. A ruminative saga about the despair, and then the consolations, of homecoming, it summed up the experiences of a whole generation, including those of Wyler himself, who poured an unmistakable amount of personal feeling into the project. Hm'ris's splendid job makes you want to revisit many of the films he mentions, but most of all this one, which feels totemic, a capstone for the period. Meanwhile, the fact that we're done with the Oscars for a good six months should be cause for relief, not least for Mark Harris: he's turning into too shrewd a historian to be wasted on them. Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls by.David Sedaris ABACUS, £8.99 0 This is another book of biting, intimate anecdotes from America's finest humorist. It purports to be an "educational series" but really it's an excuse for Sedaris to mouth off about his childhood, and the people he comes across in rural England where he now lives. And there are occasional sudden moments of honesty, revelation and frailty. Last Fdends by Jane Gardam ABACUS, £8.99 0 It is 10 years since Jane Gardam published her novel Old Filth, about a chilly barrister and product of the British Raj. After that came a sequel telling his wife'S side of the story, and now we have a volume devoted to his fellow lawyer and deadly enemy, Terence Veneering. This is as mordenfly precise and moving a novel as you will find anywhere. 0 Har~V compellin We are ric and spent Thus whal argues, ha revealing i a breezy, e Telegraph j arresting i Pick of the week ONE NIGHT IN WINTER Simon Sebag Montefiore TRr x¢, t t Melt ttl eX ' SimonSebag Montefiore • [ This week's choice is One Night in Winter, a novel by the acclaimed historian Simon Sebag Montefiore. Set in Moscow in 1945, it is his second work of fiction. Oliver Bullough gave the book four stars in The Telegraph. Here is his (edited) review: First, a confession: I have been writing about Russia for more than a decade, but had never previously read a book by Simon Sebag Montefiore, not even his widely praised biographies Young Stalin and Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar. I did, however, avoid his historical novel about the Soviet elite, Sashenka. I knew what to expect, after all: an earnestly worthy evocation of the stresses of family life during the relentless strain of the great purges. So I opened One N/ght in Winter, a sort-of sequel set in Moscow in 1945, with a feeling of imminent edification, and could hardly have been more surprised. This isn't worthy at all. It is Arthur Koestler, rewritten by Phih'ppa Gregory - think of it as "The Other Beria Girl" or "The Commissar's Concubine" - and it is seriously good tim. It opens with the deaths of two teenagers~ who shoot each other in what appears to be a tragic accident. But there is more to it than meets the eye. The book roams through the last days of the Soviet march on Berlin, nightmarish drinking games at Stalin's country home, the magnificence of the Bolshoi Theatre, interrogations, communal aparlxnents, snow, sex and exile. It is an eminently readable tunicripper, and strangely affecting. Get our Pick of the Week every week for only £2.99, better than half-price at WHSmith. NEXT WEEK: Burial Rites by Hannah Kent Sent from my iPhone -- The following information is important for all members of the viphone list. All new members to the this list are moderated by default. If you have any questions or concerns about the running of this list, or if you feel that a member's post is inappropriate, please contact the owners or moderators directly rather than posting on the list itself. The archives for this list can be searched at http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/. --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "VIPhone" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/viphone. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
