OMR - Optical Mark Recognition

OMR stands for Optical Mark recognition. As the name suggests OMR is a device that gathers information from humans by analyzing the marks on a document that is fed into it. Usually a special type of scanner is used to detect the marks on a document. The advantage of using OMR technology is that it can process from hundreds to tens of thousands of documents per hour. It is very accurate too. If the multiple choice exams were to be corrected by hand than it would take forever to grade the entire university and due to the boredom of the sheer mechanicalness of the task errors would easily creep in! Thanks to OMR, now that cumbersome task can be accomplished in a matter of hours leaving enough time for the teachers to utilize in more fruitful deeds! The only downside to using OMR is that specially prepared forms are required. Regular papers won't work.

Working principle of device:

The scanner that is used to detect the marks on a document emits a beam of light on a particular pre-defined part of the document. The spots where the marks have been made are dark and hence reflect less intense light in comparison to the spots that have not been marked. Due to this disparity in the intensity of the light reflected the marks on the given document can be detected easily.

Other OMRs use 'transoptic (semi-transparent)' papers to detect the marks. A beam of light is incident on the 'transoptic' paper that has the appropriate marks on it. The areas of the page that have been marked will reduce the amount of light that passes through. This reduction in the intensity/amount of light at certain points on the paper is measured. In this manner the scanner can pin-point where exactly the mark has been made on the physical paper.

Using either of the two technologies, once the mark is detected, the information is further passed onto the OMR software that interprets the result and publishes the outcome. For example, after detecting the marks on a multiple choice exam the software will grade the paper according to the rubrics it is programmed to assess. The grades could then be transferred to a central server or mailed directly to the student, as is desired by the institution.

Device installation and standard configuration: OMR scanners come in two varieties, 1) Regular image scanners 2) Dedicated OMR scanners. The latter one is more suited for huge enterprises and organizations demanding high speed and accuracy while the former is a cheap solution for an average home user. Dedicated scanners are an overkill for personal use. No one is insane enough to process an insane heap of 15,000 pages per hour while sipping his cup of coffee! Besides, the cost of the dedicated scanners is in lakhs (20 lakhs to be precise – of course at the point of this writing) which might be out of budget for even the most extravagant techno-maniacs! Regular scanners do not come equipped with special software while dedicated ones do. There are many open source software available such as FormScanner, QueXF, UdaiOMR etc. These software transform a standard image scanner to an OMR scanner! All of the processing is done by the software. All that is needed is to install the scanner. Software or drivers usually come with the scanner so installing the scanner in itself won't pose an intimidating challenge, though! Dedicated scanner come with their own proprietary software (such as Addmen). However, the process of the setting them up remains the same as the one already discussed.

Applications:

·        Attendance registers in schools

·        Survey forms for market research

·        Time sheets in factories

·        Lottery Forms

      ·        Objective type tests 

Market share of different models (Standard companies only):

l  HP

l  Fujitsu

l  Canon

l  Panasonic

l  Epson