Boyer, D., Cheetham, R., & Johnson, M. (2011). Using GIS to manage philadelphia's archival photographs. The American Archivist, 74(2), 652-663. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/23079054
This article discusses the initiative of the city archives of Philadelphia to make its vast trove of photographs documenting the city's history dating back to the mid-1800s available to the public through a geographically searchable website, Phillyhistory.org. The photographs, in a similar way to Green-Wood's predominantly New York-centric collection, provide a valuable resource to scholars and researchers of the city's past; however, only a small number prior to the initiative had been processed and catalogued. The author notes that the photographs were of minimal value if they did not become accessible to the public. The resultant website is a digital asset management system that brings their archive to light, growing from an original 90 scanned images to over 96,000. Descriptions of the project's steps and concerns were helpful and interesting to note as I developed my own approach - issues related to descriptive metadata creation, selection, scanning, organization and preservation. It also raises interesting possibilities for our archive in the future, such as the implementation of a blog, and the use of geographic information systems technologies, in which geocoding of images enable users to search according to specific geographic criteria, in addition to collection name, series, topics and other options of interest to researchers.
Conway, P. (2010). Modes of seeing: Digitized photographic archives and the experienced user. The American Archivist, 73(2), 425-462. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/23290754
Conway explores the potential for photographic archives to open new possibilities of interpretation and lead to new discoveries through digitization. This became a relevant point to return to in the scope of my project and in thinking about how users might find value in the collection. Using digitized photographs in the collections of the Library of Congress, seven participants described their selection processes and methodology. The value they placed on certain photographs and the choices they made had much to do with their individual ways of seeing as well as on the images that would best serve the projects for which they were engaging in research. Most made discoveries and connections among images they had not previously made. As one participant remarked, "One of the things that I think is really exciting about historical photographs is the unintended historical record as well as the intended one." Although photographs and objects embody a certain kind of inherent power, Conway found that “reproduction and the processes associated with delivering digital surrogacy carry as intense an emotional power as is often attributed to the original artifact.” He also notes that experienced users make distinctions regarding original versus surrogate material: for some users and in some cases, the original source is preferred, while others are satisfied with surrogates as long as they fulfill their informational needs. We anticipate that users of Green-Wood’s lantern slide collection will ultimately be able to do both.
Greene, M., & Meissner, D. (2005). More product, less process: Revamping traditional archival processing. The American Archivist, 68(2), 208-263. doi:10.17723/aarc.68.2.c741823776k65863
In this widely known essay, authors Graham and Meissner argue that there is an enormous backlog of unprocessed materials in archives that continue to challenge archivists both in the United States and abroad. This problem could be alleviated if archivists would change outdated practices and strive, not to describe everything in their collections down to the item level or remove every paper clip, but rather to take a "good enough approach" to description, arrangement, and preservation. The MPLP line of thought emphasizes taking the minimal steps necessary for preservation, adopting a more flexible approach to processing collections, and providing general descriptive information that will serve to deliver the material to the user in as expedient a fashion as possible. "The goal should be to maximize the accessibility of collection materials to users. What is the least we can do to get the job done in a way that is adequate to user needs, now and in the future?" ask the authors. I found that for the most part, I could not adhere to the MPLP approach with the lantern slide collection because it is a collection of individual photographic images, and photographs are often (though not always) described at the item level. Most of them featured a label with descriptive information and in order to keep track of them I began to itemize them from the start. This went hand in hand at the same time with conservation measures, which I undertook from day one on the entire collection. It was necessary for each slide to be individually considered when placing into a series and therefore I came to know them intimately. What I did take from the MPLP approach was the decision to describe them at the series level for the finding aid, with an eye towards inputting them individually at some point in the future.
Hughes, L. M. (2004). Digitizing collections: Strategic issues for the information manager. London: Facet.
This book offers an in-depth examination of the process of digitizing archival collections. Chapters include such concerns as addressing selection of materials, analysis of user needs, project management, the digitization of images including rare and fragile materials, and best practices. Many issues the author raises were relevant to this project in terms of supporting my methodology and in some cases providing information on the important steps institutions should take in preparation for digitization. These include considerations such as conservation of original materials, handling and re-housing, creating and managing catalog records and metadata, and applying file formats and naming conventions to digital objects. In some instances the text validated discoveries that I made along the way myself, such as the realization that it may not always be possible to describe everything in a collection but that one should be prepared to make decisions about which materials or items are unique and compelling enough to warrant digitization. In other instances it was too late to modify my tasks, such as the cleaning of every item in the collection when all items may not be ultimately digitized; however, it was affirming to read in a cited case study that all of the glass negatives in the Nebraska State Historical Society's collection were first cleaned prior to their digitization project. Although it might have been helpful to discover this book earlier on in the project, it was beneficial to read along the way and provided affirmation that I was on the right track.
Hunter, N., Legg, K., & Oehlerts, B. (2010). Two librarians, an archivist, and 13,000 images: Collaborating to build a digital collection. The Library Quarterly, 80(1), 81-103. doi:10.1086/648464
In this article, the authors examine a digitization project undertaken by the Archives and Special Collections unit of the Colorado State University Libraries. This project required close collaboration among several different departments in order to digitize a large trove of historical images, the oldest of which included lantern slides dating from the 1880s to the 1930s. Each key member of the project—a project archivist, a digital projects librarian, and a metadata librarian—brought his or her individual skills and perspectives to the job. Each of these perspectives was quite different. The archivist was focused on employing archival principles to construct a usable finding aid, which did not exist yet, and to re-arrange the collection into series and sub-series that would facilitate discovery. The digital project librarian was tasked with creating high quality digital images, and the medatada librarian was concerned with providing sufficient metadata, image identifiers and description. Their goals were both preservation of the original objects and the desire to make this unique visual history available for research to a broad base of users. The digitization effort required the ability to work in close partnership with each other throughout all phases of the project. It was interesting to read about a project that, similar to mine, applied concepts of both archival and library methodology. It was also instructive and reassuring, on some level, that they faced many of the same challenges—gaining physical and intellectual control over a collection, creating a spreadsheet to record complete metadata, conceiving of unique image identifiers, and the many other various tasks each side brought to the table in order to realize their project.
The Northeast Documentation Center (2015). Session 5: Care and handling of photographs. (2015). Retrieved from https://www.nedcc.org/preservation101/session-5
The Northeast Document Center's various articles address the storage and housing needs of glass negatives and photographs, and offered valuable information with regard to the initial planning stages of the lantern slide project. Storage recommendations include either plastic or paper envelopes; the decision to rehouse this collection in archival polyester envelopes, which are inert and non-reactive with printed materials, was made so that the user could easily view the images. This type of housing also requires less handling than paper, which necessitates first removing the slide from the enclosure. An additional benefit is that slides can be safely digitized without having to take the slide out of the enclosure. The recommendations for archival boxes to house the lantern slides followed these guidelines as well. The article on glass supports provided historical background on lantern slides, including technical information and clues as to how the older slides in this collection might have been made (a dry plate method commercially available after 1870 until the 1920s). It also addresses characteristics of deterioration, which was helpful in being able to identify the more vulnerable slides.
This article discusses the initiative of the city archives of Philadelphia to make its vast trove of photographs documenting the city's history dating back to the mid-1800s available to the public through a geographically searchable website, Phillyhistory.org. The photographs, in a similar way to Green-Wood's predominantly New York-centric collection, provide a valuable resource to scholars and researchers of the city's past; however, only a small number prior to the initiative had been processed and catalogued. The author notes that the photographs were of minimal value if they did not become accessible to the public. The resultant website is a digital asset management system that brings their archive to light, growing from an original 90 scanned images to over 96,000. Descriptions of the project's steps and concerns were helpful and interesting to note as I developed my own approach - issues related to descriptive metadata creation, selection, scanning, organization and preservation. It also raises interesting possibilities for our archive in the future, such as the implementation of a blog, and the use of geographic information systems technologies, in which geocoding of images enable users to search according to specific geographic criteria, in addition to collection name, series, topics and other options of interest to researchers.
Conway, P. (2010). Modes of seeing: Digitized photographic archives and the experienced user. The American Archivist, 73(2), 425-462. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/23290754
Conway explores the potential for photographic archives to open new possibilities of interpretation and lead to new discoveries through digitization. This became a relevant point to return to in the scope of my project and in thinking about how users might find value in the collection. Using digitized photographs in the collections of the Library of Congress, seven participants described their selection processes and methodology. The value they placed on certain photographs and the choices they made had much to do with their individual ways of seeing as well as on the images that would best serve the projects for which they were engaging in research. Most made discoveries and connections among images they had not previously made. As one participant remarked, "One of the things that I think is really exciting about historical photographs is the unintended historical record as well as the intended one." Although photographs and objects embody a certain kind of inherent power, Conway found that “reproduction and the processes associated with delivering digital surrogacy carry as intense an emotional power as is often attributed to the original artifact.” He also notes that experienced users make distinctions regarding original versus surrogate material: for some users and in some cases, the original source is preferred, while others are satisfied with surrogates as long as they fulfill their informational needs. We anticipate that users of Green-Wood’s lantern slide collection will ultimately be able to do both.
Greene, M., & Meissner, D. (2005). More product, less process: Revamping traditional archival processing. The American Archivist, 68(2), 208-263. doi:10.17723/aarc.68.2.c741823776k65863
In this widely known essay, authors Graham and Meissner argue that there is an enormous backlog of unprocessed materials in archives that continue to challenge archivists both in the United States and abroad. This problem could be alleviated if archivists would change outdated practices and strive, not to describe everything in their collections down to the item level or remove every paper clip, but rather to take a "good enough approach" to description, arrangement, and preservation. The MPLP line of thought emphasizes taking the minimal steps necessary for preservation, adopting a more flexible approach to processing collections, and providing general descriptive information that will serve to deliver the material to the user in as expedient a fashion as possible. "The goal should be to maximize the accessibility of collection materials to users. What is the least we can do to get the job done in a way that is adequate to user needs, now and in the future?" ask the authors. I found that for the most part, I could not adhere to the MPLP approach with the lantern slide collection because it is a collection of individual photographic images, and photographs are often (though not always) described at the item level. Most of them featured a label with descriptive information and in order to keep track of them I began to itemize them from the start. This went hand in hand at the same time with conservation measures, which I undertook from day one on the entire collection. It was necessary for each slide to be individually considered when placing into a series and therefore I came to know them intimately. What I did take from the MPLP approach was the decision to describe them at the series level for the finding aid, with an eye towards inputting them individually at some point in the future.
Hughes, L. M. (2004). Digitizing collections: Strategic issues for the information manager. London: Facet.
This book offers an in-depth examination of the process of digitizing archival collections. Chapters include such concerns as addressing selection of materials, analysis of user needs, project management, the digitization of images including rare and fragile materials, and best practices. Many issues the author raises were relevant to this project in terms of supporting my methodology and in some cases providing information on the important steps institutions should take in preparation for digitization. These include considerations such as conservation of original materials, handling and re-housing, creating and managing catalog records and metadata, and applying file formats and naming conventions to digital objects. In some instances the text validated discoveries that I made along the way myself, such as the realization that it may not always be possible to describe everything in a collection but that one should be prepared to make decisions about which materials or items are unique and compelling enough to warrant digitization. In other instances it was too late to modify my tasks, such as the cleaning of every item in the collection when all items may not be ultimately digitized; however, it was affirming to read in a cited case study that all of the glass negatives in the Nebraska State Historical Society's collection were first cleaned prior to their digitization project. Although it might have been helpful to discover this book earlier on in the project, it was beneficial to read along the way and provided affirmation that I was on the right track.
Hunter, N., Legg, K., & Oehlerts, B. (2010). Two librarians, an archivist, and 13,000 images: Collaborating to build a digital collection. The Library Quarterly, 80(1), 81-103. doi:10.1086/648464
In this article, the authors examine a digitization project undertaken by the Archives and Special Collections unit of the Colorado State University Libraries. This project required close collaboration among several different departments in order to digitize a large trove of historical images, the oldest of which included lantern slides dating from the 1880s to the 1930s. Each key member of the project—a project archivist, a digital projects librarian, and a metadata librarian—brought his or her individual skills and perspectives to the job. Each of these perspectives was quite different. The archivist was focused on employing archival principles to construct a usable finding aid, which did not exist yet, and to re-arrange the collection into series and sub-series that would facilitate discovery. The digital project librarian was tasked with creating high quality digital images, and the medatada librarian was concerned with providing sufficient metadata, image identifiers and description. Their goals were both preservation of the original objects and the desire to make this unique visual history available for research to a broad base of users. The digitization effort required the ability to work in close partnership with each other throughout all phases of the project. It was interesting to read about a project that, similar to mine, applied concepts of both archival and library methodology. It was also instructive and reassuring, on some level, that they faced many of the same challenges—gaining physical and intellectual control over a collection, creating a spreadsheet to record complete metadata, conceiving of unique image identifiers, and the many other various tasks each side brought to the table in order to realize their project.
The Northeast Documentation Center (2015). Session 5: Care and handling of photographs. (2015). Retrieved from https://www.nedcc.org/preservation101/session-5
The Northeast Document Center's various articles address the storage and housing needs of glass negatives and photographs, and offered valuable information with regard to the initial planning stages of the lantern slide project. Storage recommendations include either plastic or paper envelopes; the decision to rehouse this collection in archival polyester envelopes, which are inert and non-reactive with printed materials, was made so that the user could easily view the images. This type of housing also requires less handling than paper, which necessitates first removing the slide from the enclosure. An additional benefit is that slides can be safely digitized without having to take the slide out of the enclosure. The recommendations for archival boxes to house the lantern slides followed these guidelines as well. The article on glass supports provided historical background on lantern slides, including technical information and clues as to how the older slides in this collection might have been made (a dry plate method commercially available after 1870 until the 1920s). It also addresses characteristics of deterioration, which was helpful in being able to identify the more vulnerable slides.