The BLB Blog

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BIG DAY | New Book Scanner Installed

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Yesterday was a big day for us at the Blue Letter Bible offices.

You might remember a blog post last week in which we shared our continuing desire to provide timeless resources to aid in your Bible study. We wrote:

One of the big projects that we were able to move forward is the “Resources for Women’s Ministry” portion of our website which included reproductions of many lovely devotionals from the 19th century. Using a scanner, we were able to place many pages and images online for you. We’ve also been able to add more maps and Bible images to our image gallery.

Because of equipment limitations, we could only scan small books or books that could easily be taken apart. However, our office library is full of other great books—old antique books which are high in demand but hard to come by. Many are first print 18th century editions that have never been republished. The books in this valuable “Antiquarian” section include the trusted works from: Charles Spurgeon, Thomas Watson, Richard Sibbes, D.L. Moody, William Tyndale, Andrew Murray, and many others. We have wanted to scan many of these works, but because of their size and/or fragility we could not scan them.

At the beginning of this new year, we received the first components for our new book scanner. This one is a full table-top scanner with a larger book platform. It utilizes point-and-shoot cameras with trusted image editing software.

Well, we are excited to tell you that over the last week, the rest of the equipment came in. And yesterday, we had the book scanner fully installed. The company we purchased the scanner from was kind enough to train our staff on how to operate it. In the upcoming weeks, we will begin scanning many previously unreleased works. We plan to roll these out to you later on this year, along with the Blue Letter Bible redesign.

Here are a few snapshots of the day’s events.

Left: Tony and Jim set up shop. Right: Francisco installs the scanning software.

Setup and training begins.

Training's almost over... we're ready to go!

Thank you for your continued support, prayers, and provision. We labor each day to serve you, the BLB users. Our prayer is that God may be supremely glorified as He uses our free tools and resources to bless His church.

To God alone be the glory. AMEN!

 

Comments

  1. YAY! It is so nice seeing all you guys 🙂 This is going to be awesome! 🙂 No more old school scanning and OCR?! Miss you. Blessings to you all.

  2. This looks and “sounds” awesome. BLB is a huge blessing already. With added new resources for interpretation/study of the Bible, I pray that understanding and clarity of the Word will grow. Thank you, BLB staff for your dedication.

  4. Praise the Lord! Thank you for using 21st century technology for the advancement of God’s word and for His praise and glory! Keep up the good work you have been called to do according to His will.
    May God’s peace and grace be with you. Amen.
    Hector

  5. You guys are great. Thank you so much. You are a huge blessing to so many.

    Hey I was thinking of something today. In studying I often use maps.google.com. They now have a feature where you can take a 3D tours of a specific route or landmark etc. It basically walks you through the route in 3D I was thinking of how neat it would be to do the same thing with biblical routes and landmarks etc. For example right now I am in John 5:1. Jesus leaves Cana and heads to Jerusalem. In putting those two locations on googlemaps I get the modern route, which is helpful. But it would be neat to be able to punch in those same biblical locations and follow the route that Jesus would have taken etc in 3D. Or perhaps I want to look at Paul going from here to there and be able to see the most common routes of the day etc. in 3D complete with distances etc.

    Maybe this concept is already out there? May it’s too far fetched. Just a thought I had though. Basically an interactive 3D virtual map of Bible locations. Am I crazy?

  6. Thanks for having a passion for the LOrd and His people, as we get clairity though the Word and added tools we grow more like Him and be the salt and light that He said we would be. Praise the Lord and pray His will be done. God bless you

  7. wow! Praise God for the new book scanner! I’m already really blessed by this site. great help for so many Christians all over the world. Looking forward to read more spiritual books on this site. May God continually richly bless all the staffs of BLB and the website. Praying! I thank God for you. =)

  9. “Happy the man within reach of a library, the shelves of which are well lined with books of holy biography.” F.B. Meyer

  10. Praise God.
    Thank you for your great work and for letting me benefit from it.
    Your sister in Christ
    Birthe
    Holsted, Denmark

  11. I love your site. It has been a wonderful study source for me in Bible Training and as I teach others. Thank you and may God continue to bless you.

  12. Oh, now THIS is GREAT news.
    Let me know if you guys want some pdf’s that I’ve found on various e-book libraries: Google’s, Archive’s, and a handful of other locations.
    I’ve stumbled across some really great books that I’ve learned about through some of the Puritan era writings.
    Thomas Boston, Richard Baxter, and others.
    Joseph Seiss, Simon Greenleaf……

    You’ll need to provide an ftp link though. Some of these are really huge, and my isp’s email server won’t handle more than 10mb’s.

    Thanks for the really great news.

  13. Thank you so much. Your services are a blessing to many. I have been using your site for probably 10 yrs now. It is my primary resource for studying the Word. May the Lord richly bless you in this life and the one that is to come.

  14. LOVE THIS SITE USE IT FOR THE NIV THAT I CAN’T FIND ON THE BIBLE PROGRAMS THAT I HAVE ON MY PC STILL LOOKING FOR THE (GOOD NEWS) BIBLE. THANKS AND GOD BLESS YOU ALL.

  15. God is awesome! My whole family relies on you as the “go to” for Biblical information. Blessings as you move forward.

    • I want to put a little picture next to my name, to represent me. How do you do that?

  17. YAY!!!! I absolutely LOVE your site!! This is awesome news.
    Thank you so much for your dedication, devotion,and desire,
    to deliver God’s word to the world.. This site is my resource even during times of witnessing, to pull up a scripture quickly, to share to someone..
    Not to mention the devotionals, women’s ministry page,etc.
    Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

    Blessings be upon you,
    thru Jesus Christ Our Lord!!

  18. Wow! This is fantastic! That scanner looks like a monster but I bet it is fun to use, and even more exciting to see the pages of antique books being reborn! And I love seeing the photographs of the people who make this all happen: the Blue Letter Bible.

    I truly thank God for you, and ask for the Lord to guide, direct, care for and protect you. Thank you so much for all of your hard work.

    I am excited to read Tyndale’s work.

    Love, Debi

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