Sometimes, you don’t have the time to locate the electronic version of a document, so you run to the copier immediately before class to get a PDF to use in the classroom. The PDF is an unreadable document for TTS software. If you run your mouse over the page, it will appear as a giant image. Text-to-speech software cannot read an image; they can read the alt text, but most likely, you don’t have the alt text of all the information typed in either.
Learners or instructors can use the optical character recognition tool (OCR) to help make an unreadable document readable.
As learners or instructors encounter an “image PDF,” using the OCR tool will make that PDF readable for ReadSpeaker TTS software.
If you have an image-based PDF document, try opening it with docReader. You will notice that a message pops up saying that the document looks like it has words and asks if you would like ReadSpeaker to try to make it readable.
For best results with the OCR feature, the original document should have a standard font, as handwritten documents will be less accurate.