Subject: Re: Photo storage of scans From: SARA STEELE <smsteele@wisc.edu> Message-id: <3c929c77-e3f1-f1a1-4772-6e0066be2e3c@wisc.edu> Date: Fri, 22 May 2020 12:28:03 -0500
Thanks, Brian
Your examples sound good for the photos that are most likely to come
into a museum. Which key words or sub subjects we use depend upon
nature of photos that come in or that we choose to seek in, potential
use and orientation.
By orientation I mean the extent to which we take responsibility for
accurately recording the information about and photos of people,
places, and events important in our local community's history. That
differs from the traditional view of a HS primarily preserving things
which illustrate what life was like in a particular time period. That
also is important, but those illustrations often have more impact if the
objects have photos and short paragraphs of text which set the context
for the items displayed. People like to see faces and places along with
objects. And objects along with photos.
I'm focusing on collecting, organizing, and sharing visual records
of life over the years in a relatively small community, Thus my main
headings listed alphabetically are:*Animals *(horses , dogs, cats, other
pets ), *Business* (sub categories including retail, big, mobile,
employment, parks and malls), *Churches (*buildings and activities*)
**Community (*organizations, events, military, scenes.), *Family*
(single and multi generations, family groups, houses, furnishings
vehicles, weddings, other events),*Farmin*g ( animals, crops and
equipment, farmsteads and farmers), *Government *(Town and Village
buildings, officials, etc. Cemeteries, Police, Fire Department, EMS,
Parks and Recreation, Roads/Streets, Utilities ) *Leisure *(music, arts
and drama, sports of all kinds) *Nature *(weather, woods, flowers,
snow)*Other *(mostly visuals other than photos such as maps and
diagrams, papers such as certificates from original government purchase,
honors someone received, etc. *Schools* (rural, Cottage Grove Graded,
the three, about to be four schools, on CG land, but now in the MG
district. The high school is not in our community and high school
students are not identified by their home community, so this is a big
area missing from our image collection.) and *People* (names entered on
alphabetical pages, notables).
When I became involved, the largest number of photos in any one
grouping were photos showing tobacco work, weddings, and people and
their horses, with a few photo of businesses, parades,
festivals,churches, family reunions, etc. Also there was a file of
newspaper clippings with photos of men and women who had served in WW
II. My key areas and sub areas grew qualitatively( as a methodology not
referring to condition or content of the photo) as more photos became
available. That's why I suggest that any HS thinking about expanding its
image collection, think about all of the possible facets and then set
some priorities.
In regard to your original querry or other internet storage. ,
I've been interested in the several suggestions about how best to
preserve scans and would like to hear more about the p*ros and cons of
using Cloud *
*I also would like to hear more in terms of whether high resolution*,
which might be ideal in the photography world, is realistic when one is
trying to capture content and sometimes is thankful to find any kind of
photo of someone or something regardless of quality.
Sara
On 5/22/2020 9:09 AM, Brian Bigler wrote:
>
> Thanks much Sara for your detailed process.
>
> I am glad to see that you also have hard copy prints made. Seeing how
> detailed you are I am guessing that you have subjects covered in your
> search terms as well. Examples: Domestic, say for example if a group
> of women are sewing or cleaning, Death - a funeral or funeral floral
> arrangement or horse-drawn hearse, Weddings, Transportation - train,
> buggy, car, or the objects in the photos - sewing machine, clothing,
> hair styles, hats and so on.
>
> Again, thank you for sharing - Brian
>
>
>
> On 5/22/2020 8:27 AM, SARA STEELE wrote:
>>
>> Hi Brian
>>
>> I’ll take a crack at the scan inventory. I believe that photos and
>> other visuals and the local information that goes with them are the
>> most important things a community Historical Society can preserve.
>>
>> I suggest you start as follows.
>>
>> 1.Replace the scan image numbers with a chronological photo numbers
>> (or other means of individual scan identification.)
>>
>> 2. Develop a one line description of the content of the scan starting
>> with the scan number.
>>
>> 3. Put the numbered phrases in to a list ordered according to the
>> image numbers.
>>
>> I recommend using a spread sheet because the list can be copied
>> easily, coded according to purpose such as subject, time period, or
>> geographic area and easily sorted into sub lists.
>>
>> I suggest that your group identify some subjects that should have
>> highest priority (example, businesses, or houses, or notables, or
>> community activities, or families).The wider the net the more work
>> keeping an inventory up to date. Photos intrigue me so I add scans of
>> everything from turtles to what I can find on our former governor who
>> served in the 1870s.
>>
>> How much further you go in setting up an inventory depends on factors
>> such as:
>>
>> a.*The number of scans in your collection*.This is affected by what
>> time periods you want to include and how many members take or
>> diligently search out photos to be scanned. ExampleIf your HS’s focus
>> is primarily in the 1800s where there are few photos available, a
>> simple listing may do. If you are collecting current photos from
>> local Facebook pages you may quickly acquire hundreds of scans and
>> need a more complex system. Because I believe all local history, from
>> today back to the glacier, needs to be covered, our image collection
>> has now passed 14,000 scans.
>>
>> b.*How frequently the list will be used and for what purposes*.I post
>> photos from our image collection on our CGAHS Facebook page daily,
>> have written about 40 specific topic reports using as many photos as
>> we can find, and am currently pulling together, in Power Point,
>> series of scans which tell visual stories about buildings, events, or
>> people. We often have used photos as backgrounds in exhibits. So I
>> have a complicated process which results in lists by subjects and one
>> of alphabetized names of people who appear in the photos. (I’m
>> retired and have time.)
>>
>> c.*How important your photo/image collection is in the overall
>> priorities of your HS or whether you have a member or members who
>> really want to build an imagecollection for your community.*If it is
>> highly important and you have goals in terms of completing
>> sub-collections (examples, photos of people who have served in a
>> government, church, or school positions over the years, or your
>> community’s involvement in WW II) then you will want a way to create
>> sub lists out of your main chronological list so you can keep track
>> of what or who you are still looking for. On the other hand, if you
>> think of the scans as objects like a dish or tool only to be
>> preserved if photos are given to you, then using key words in the one
>> sentence phrases and a “Find” command on the chronological list may do.
>>
>> d.*Whether you can find people who enjoy doing the work involved in
>> taking or finding and scanning photos and keeping a complex inventory
>> up to date. *Some of our members have done some neat focused photo
>> projects which we have scanned and added to the master list.
>>
>> *In terms of keeping “hard copies”, t*he folks who started our photo
>> collection chose to have each photo enlarged to uniform size and a
>> copy made on card stock. Uniform sizes are easier to store than the
>> variation one finds in real photographs. The main reason is that
>> information about what is in the photo was put on the back of the
>> cardboard copy.The card stock copies were kept in plastic sleeves in
>> binders and were available in our History Room and at community
>> exhibits for people to look through.I have continued to have the
>> scans reproduced on card stock. I type quite a bit of information
>> about the who, what, and why of the photo content and its context, as
>> well as source and date received, on a full page label, cut off the
>> individual items and stick the labels on the back of the card stock
>> copies. Then scan both the back and front so the photo and info are
>> kept together. The scan of the back has an A added to the image
>> number so one can quickly see which is which.
>>
>> Brian, I started a response describing the whole system I use and I
>> will share that if anyone wants to see it or wants to discuss the
>> role and importance of photos as records of history-- just contact me
>> by email.
>>
>> Sara smsteele@wisc.edu <mailto:smsteele@wisc.edu> Cottage Grove Area
>> 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
>>>