From: Rebecca Dubey <curator@saukcountyhistory.org> Date: Thu, 21 May 2020 13:49:12 -0500 Message-ID: <CAKNAg9NvLxn=sQbF8dKMLd7W3=E98OxZW-W=sFsUK6Rchj3Tsg@mail.gmail.com> Subject: Re: Photo storage of scans
HBrian,
at the SCHS Museum we store two copies of our images on Hard drives which
are backed up periodically. Previously, they were stored on the server,
but when that crashed several years ago, we lost a good portion of our
images and the links to them. So, we learned the hard way. The Society
runs a Flicker Account in which Bill has uploaded images according to a
Collection, with a sheet of titles that you have to leave Flicker to find.
Retrieval from Museum Collections is pretty easy; scanned images are stored
by Object Id in several folders, backed up to the Removable hard drives.
The links to the records made by Past Perfect are also stored on the two
removable hard drives.
Retrieval of hard (original) copies is another matter. At first, I am told
they were stored by subject, but we can all guess how that turned out. One
man's photo of a bridge is another man's photo of a building, that happens
to have a bridge in the background, and Bill, yes, the Bill above, could
not find the images he was looking for, and ran out of room in one box and
had to shift all the images in the next box to fit in the remainder from
the first box. So, we no longer store our hard copies by subject.
Rather, each image is cataloged (even scanned images), placed in an Acid
Free Envelope, and in boxes according to size which are placed in order by
object ID. We let the computer sort the collection by the subjects we
need, then look for the images by number. I also make a Finding Aid for
each box, printed with first just the images in case anyone wanted a quick
look at images without disturbing the originals, and then another print out
with description and image, all sorted by Object ID.
I am told by many others that we should be using TIFF, but unfortunately
our collections management program will not handle TIFF, and we don't have
time or space to make two files, so we stick with JPEG.
Hope this helps
On Thu, May 21, 2020 at 1:16 PM Douglas County Historical Society <
dchs@douglashistory.org> wrote:
> Just a note on the JPG format. While it is popular and takes less space,
> it is what is called a lossy compressed format. It will lose something
> off its initial quality each time the image is saved, rename, or moved.
> TIFF files are one of the preferred formats for digital achieving in either
> uncompressed or lossless compression.
>
> Here is a good resource in more detail
>
> https://digitalarch.org/blog/2017/4/7/best-image-formats-for-archival-photography
>
>
>
> Jon Winter
> Douglas County Historical Society
> 1101 John Avenue Superior WI 54880
> Business Manager
> 715-392-8449
>
>
>
> On Thu, May 21, 2020 at 11:16 AM William Schuette <wschuette9877@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> We have to change with the times. When I first began making copies of
>> the photo images in our collection, I copied them onto black & white
>> film. That format has gone out of date, however, these negatives are
>> much longer-lived than digital scans. We store our digital images in the
>> .jpg format. That has been around for many years, and I assume that
>> anything recorded in that format, will be accessible for a long time.
>> When a newer format comes along, I'm sure that these jpg images can be
>> converted. In addition to the actual storage of most of our photos in
>> acid-free envelopes and boxes, our digital images are stored on the
>> cloud, should anything happen to our collection. Should someone request
>> an image from our collection, they usually ask for digital copies, which
>> we are happy to provide for a price. If they want a paper copy, I print
>> them out on my photo printer. However, that hasn't happened in the past
>> few years. We survived the transition from 78 records, to 45 & LP
>> records, to CDs, to digital, and I believe we'll survive any photo image
>> storage updates too.
>>
>> Bill Schuette-- Sauk County Historical Society
>>
>> On 5/20/2020 6:07 PM, Brian Bigler wrote:
>> > I have noted the discussion of photo copyrights and related on
>> listserve.
>> >
>> > My questions to organizations out there is this: How do you store
>> > these images? If they are scans and stored on a computer how do you
>> > plan to retrieve them in the future with the rapid change in
>> > technology? Already items stored on CDs are a problem and many CDs -
>> > even archival ones- are short lived. Other computer devices would
>> > prove to be problematic as well - even off site storage may soon be
>> > antiquated for future use.
>> >
>> > A firm believer in hard copy storage to prevent constant updating of
>> > equipment I am wondering how many organizations print out quality
>> > prints for customer and archival use? If so, how do you store them or
>> > impute them on a database?
>> >
>> > Thank you in advance for your answers.
>> >
>> > Brian J. Bigler
>> >
>> > Volunteer Curator - Mount Horeb Area Historical Society
>> >
>>
>
-- Rebecca DuBey, Museum Curator Sauk County Historical Society (608) 356-1001 W-F; please leave a message other times!