Sudden brain failure! - deciphering a tricky 1750 will

[bugbear]

I was deciphering a tricky 1750 will - this is old enough
that the writing is starting to be unfamiliar, the document
is slightly faded, and my image is a photograph of a microfilm
reader screen (more on the latter in a separate post).

I was working my way through, pretty much word by word,
when I had a lapse of concentration. And suddenly the whole
page changed from lines of words to a random white/gray/black
texture.

The image didn't change, of course, just my brain's
ability to interpret it.

I couldn't even find my place in the transcription; I had to go back to
the start of the page to re-sync.

Anyone else had this happen?

    BugBear

[Josephine]

That's never happened to me, BugBear, but maybe I haven't stared at the screen long enough.
 
I think this emoticon is apt:

[McGroger]

Hi, BugBear. Visiting from the photo restores board.

Something akin to what you describe occasionally happens to me when I’ve been staring too long at a badly faded photograph. I zoom out to see/imagine/isolate the various different bits (people bits, inanimate bits, damage), then zoom in to do repairs. Sometimes my brain just gives up - none of the bits fit anymore, it all becomes a grey blur - and I have to stop for a while and sometimes have to start all over again.

Cheers, Peter.

[karen58]

Hello Bugbear

You are certainly not alone. This happens to me all the time. Currently I am transcribing 7 wills and inventories ranging from 1667 to 1722. This is hard work.

I find having lots of breaks help. Try doing something outside in the fresh air. My garden hasn't looked so tidy since I got the wills.

I also have found printing the documents on A3 paper a big help so I am not always staring at a screen.

Have you tried the program Transcript. Its free to download. It allows you to open a document and a word processor in the same window. Very helpful.

Hope this helps

Cheers
Karen

[bugbear]

Have you tried the program Transcript. Its free to download. It allows you to open a document and a word processor in the same window. Very helpful.

It appears to only run "properly" under Windows, and I'm a Linux user.

http://www.jacobboerema.nl/en/Freeware.htm

Thanks for the pointer though.

 BugBear