ISO 10196:2003 provides guidance on the creation of printed documents so that they may be easily reproduced as microforms or scanned images.

Although studies were based more specifically on the Latin alphabet, the general principles may be used as guidelines for the production of documents using other alphabets or ideograms.

ISO 10196:2003 does not apply to technical drawings for which requirements are given in ISO 5457 and ISO 6428. It also does not apply to special micrographics or scanning-related applications (scanning of bank cheques or bar codes).