How to Photograph or Scan a Document for Certified Translation

Why the image matters as much as the translation

A certified translation renders the document in front of the translator, in full. If the stamp in the corner is blurred, the registrar's signature is cut off, or the back page never made it into the file, the translation cannot include it, and the reviewing officer sees a gap. USCIS asks for a complete translation, and complete is measured against the original. The quality of your photo or scan decides how clean the final document will be.

You do not need a scanner. A phone camera, a flat surface and a few minutes of care produce a file we can work from. This guide walks through each step, from lighting to file format, and ends with a list of what makes an image unusable so you can check your own before you upload.

Set up the shot: light, surface, camera

Place the document on a flat, dark, plain surface. A table or the floor works; a bed or a couch bends the paper. Daylight from a window is the best light. Turn the flash off, because it creates a bright spot on glossy paper and washes out embossed seals. In the evening, use a ceiling light and move the document until your shadow and the phone's shadow fall outside the page.

• Hold the phone directly above the document, parallel to the paper, not at an angle.
• Fill the frame with the page but leave a thin border of background around it.
• Tap the screen on the text to focus, then hold still for a second before you press the shutter.
• Wipe the camera lens first. A smudge is the most common reason for a soft, foggy image.

If the document is folded, flatten it under a heavy book for ten minutes first. Folds that cast shadows across text are a frequent reason we ask for a retake.

All four corners, both sides, every stamp

Officers compare the translation against the original, so the translation has to show the same margins, stamps and notes. Keep all four corners of the page in the frame on every shot. Series numbers, registration numbers and issuing office codes often sit in a top corner or along the bottom edge, and a tight crop cuts them off.

Photograph the back of every page, even if it looks empty. A Russian or Ukrainian birth certificate often carries stamps on the reverse: citizenship, apostille, a note about a later name change or an issued passport. A diploma supplement has text on both sides. If the back is truly blank, send it anyway and the translation will state that the reverse side is blank.

• Round seals: make sure the full circle is visible and the text inside is readable.
• Rectangular stamps with handwritten dates: zoom in and confirm the digits are legible.
• Handwritten notes in the margins: include them, as they are part of the document.
• Laminated documents: move the light source, not the phone, until the glare leaves the text.

Booklets: passports, work record books, military IDs

Booklets are captured one spread at a time, in page order. Open the booklet flat, hold the pages down with two fingers outside the printed area, and photograph each spread so that both pages and the fold are in the frame. Do not skip blank pages in a work record book or a military ID; the sequence matters, and a missing page raises questions.

1. 1Cover, then the inside cover if it carries any text or stamps.
2. 2Each spread in order, including pages with only a stamp or a single line.
3. 3The last page and the back cover.
4. 4A separate close-up of any page where the text is very small, such as a passport data page.

For a foreign passport, the data page, the pages with visas and entry stamps, and any page with a note about children or a name change are the ones usually requested. For a work record book, each employment entry runs across two facing pages, so a spread must show both halves together.

Phone apps, file formats and size

A plain camera photo is fine. The document mode in your phone's notes or files app adds edge detection and straightening, which helps. Use it, but check that the automatic crop did not slice off a corner or a stamp. Turn off black and white or enhance filters if they erase faint stamps; the color original is safer.

• Formats we accept: PDF, JPG, PNG, HEIC. One PDF with all pages in order is the easiest for you and for us.
• Resolution: use the phone's default full size. Do not send images through a messenger that compresses them; upload the files directly or attach them at original size.
• Size: a page from a modern phone is usually a few megabytes, which is normal. If an upload tool has a limit, split the document into several files rather than shrinking the images.
• Naming: something like birth-certificate-front.jpg and birth-certificate-back.jpg prevents mix-ups when you send several documents at once.

A screenshot of a photo is not the photo. It is the size of your screen, far below the camera's resolution, and small text becomes a gray smear. Send the original file from the camera roll.

What makes a scan unusable

Before you upload, open each image and zoom in to the smallest text on the page. If you can read the series number, the registrar's name and the date inside the stamp, the image is good. These are the problems that force a retake:

• A corner, an edge or a stamp cut off by the frame or by an automatic crop.
• Motion blur or missed focus, where letters have soft double edges.
• Glare from a flash or a lamp covering part of the text.
• Deep shadow from a hand, a phone or a fold across the page.
• Heavy compression that turns small print into blocks.
• A missing back page or a missing spread in a booklet.
• A photo of a screen showing the document, or a photo of a faded photocopy.

One more case: a photocopy or a notarized copy sent instead of the original. That can be fine if the copy is clear and that is what you will file, but tell us, because the translation will describe what it was made from.

Send it and let your translator check

Once you upload, we look at every image before work starts. If a page is missing or a stamp is unreadable, we tell you which one and what to reshoot, so no page is translated from a bad image. The price starts at $23.70 per document with certification included, and you see the exact price right after upload. A clean set of images is the shortest path from upload to a translation you can file.