[Dixielandjazz] SMARTSCORE (and also Photoscore)

[Craig I. Johnson]

Warning -- long !! post, skip out if the subject doesn't interest you.

Bob,

I'll point out the problems with Smartscore (and another, Photoscore) --
but the end result is that I find both of them very useful. Vince Giordano had
felt they did not have a high enough degree of recognition, but I guess I'm
either worse at using the bigger programs (e.g. Sibelius) than he or have a
lower standard of what is useful to me. In many cases, I use the scan programs
as it is easier for me to correct than to enter it all by hand and I like the
feature that the original is availble to me and synchronized with my version
even when the scan recognition is virtually zero.
-----------------
I used Smartscore for a while, until I moved from Finale to Sibeliius for the heavy lifting.
I found that to get the things I needed, I had to buy Smartscore Pro, or whatever
the full-featured version was, as in all the other versions there was always a
feature missing that I needed. It wasn't too bad, but don't expect full recognition
with handwritten stuff. It's not too bad with professionally engraved and printed 
scores. (More on that later when I hit the general comments on both packages I've
used.




I move to Photoscore (PRO again) with Sibelius. It does a better recognition job,

BOTH of these tools miss some things you'd like to do when correcting the
scanning errors, but you have to do those things in the full featured music
program (Finale or Sibelius) -- Too bad, as one of the nice features of the
scanning program is that you can correct or add stuff while you have the original
on the screen right above the version you are (correcting or creating.) 
You see, even when the recognition is miserable, I find that having the original
right above my version on the screen --- and having the computer track what
staff I am working on  and synchronizing the two - is of great value and you
lose that ability when you go into Finale or Sibelius.  (Encore, by the way has NO
associated scanning tool.)

The other problem with BOTH scanning programs --- when you get to the
editing phase, is that they both have relatively miserable autosave capabilities.
No matter what they say, it is up to YOU to save when you think you've done
too much to want to lose it. Smartscore does great automatic backups BUT!!!
it save to the same file all the time and when it gets an error it saves the
one that fails to same file which means you can't use it as it fails instantly
when you reload it -- if the reason for termination was a program error. --
SO, though it backs up well, the backup is frequently absolutely useless.

Photscore (which I like) doesn't have the same problem, but it doesn't save often enough.
You lose a lot that you entered since the last autosave and I see no option to set
the frequency of saving.

That's it. Write to me privately if you need more..

Regards,
Craig





On 10/8/2004 8:04:24 AM, Bob Romans (cellblk7 at comcast.net) wrote:
> Have any of you had any experience with this software?
> SMARTSCORE
> 
> http://www.musitek.com/
> 
> 
> Warm regards,
> Bob Romans
> Cell Block 7 Jazz Band
> 1617 Lakeshore Dr.,
> Lodi, Ca. 95242
> 209-339-4676
> www.cellblockseven2002.net
> Cell 747-1148
> Because I play trumpet, I envy no man!
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