GIMP Version: 2.6.11
Operating System: Mac OS
OS Version: XP - SP3
GIMP Experience: Basic Level

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I downloaded a scanned old book and I want to remove the dark background prior to printing some pages. Is there a way to do this with GIMP?

Thank you.

Do you have an example page?

Read here (in Russian: I used Google Translate):

http://leoblog.ru/?Proekty:Pesni_pro_gr ... -Fu_v_GIMP

I've had some luck with this script (note: this is a direct link to the script):

http://leoblog.ru/files/leon-paper-white.scm

This is way too complicated for me. I was hoping for an easier way to make the page background white using GIMP. I will try to use Inkscape or printer-scanner software to whiten the pages.

Thank you all for your replies.

Hi Leo9lives and welcome to Gimp Chat.
We have a few topics stickyed on how to install resources into Gimp that may help you.
You can find them here -
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=721 - MAC
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=720 - LINUX
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=719 - WINDOWS

Those 3 posts cover how to install scripts into Gimp on all platforms.

My apologies for your confusion.

That is way too complicated A person with a hammer sees everything as a nail

You may just be able to use the levels tool - that is comparable to what most scanners will use to clean up images automatically:

http://docs.gimp.org/en/gimp-tool-levels.html

use Colours->Levels, and in the dialog pull down the white input level (1) until the background is white, pull up the black level (2) until the text is black, then pull up the gamma adjustment (3) to get the best contrast with out the text getting all aliases (jaggies):


Here is a sample using this technique on a source image I found on the web:


-Rob A>