CoOL

Digital Imaging

Imaging and imagebases


General resources
Technical resources
Standards, Specifications, Formats
Bibliographic resources
Resources at other sites


General resources

Anonymous
Luna Imaging venture
Request for Bids: Document Imaging System

Daniel V. Arrington
Departmental Document Imaging: Issues and Concerns

British Library National Preservation Office
Managing the Digitisation of Library, Archive and Museum Materials (PDF)

Patricia Battin
Image Standards and Implications for Preservation

Jennifer Durran
Developments In Electronic Image Databases For Art History

Donald P. D'Amato and Rex C. Klopfenstein
Requirements and Options for the Digitization of the Illustration Collections of the National Museum of Natural History

This report, sponsored by the National Museum of Natural History's Collections and Research Information System (CRIS) Development Program, is the result of a study to understand the requirements and alternatives for digital conversion of scientific illustration collections of the Museum. The analysis was undertaken by Mitretek Systems, McLean, Virginia. Specific digitization procedures, methods, and standards are being examined by the Museum within the framework of pilot projects to test the initial recommendations contained in this report.


DCViews
"The goal of [this] website is to provide you with up-to-date and complete information on digital cameras and support you with practical tutorials on digital photography."

Hyperspectral Imaging Foundation

Carl Jacobson
Institutional Imaging: Sharing the Campus Image

Anne R. Kenney Digital to Microfilm Conversion: A Demonstration Project 1994-1996
Final Report to the National Endowment for the Humanities PS-20781-94

James Marchand
The Computer as Darkroom and Camera

Freddie L. Robinson
Building a Business Case for Imaging/Document Management at the University of Miami

Commission on Preservation and Access Reports

Many CPA reports deal either directly or indirectly with digital imaging. The CPA Newsletter also deals with this topic quite regularly

The Digital Preservation Consortium Mission and Goals, Donald J. Waters and Anne Kenney
Electronic Technologies and Preservation, Donald J. Waters
A Hybrid Systems Approach to Preservation of Printed Materials, Don Willis
Image Formats for Preservation and Access, Michael Lesk
Intellectual Preservation: Electronic Preservation of the Third Kind, Peter Graham (While this article does not treat imaging per se, it discusses issues of authentication that are critical to an imaging initiative)
Joint Study in Digital Preservation: Report: Phase I, Anne R. Kenney and Lynne K. Personius
The Organizational Phase of Project Open Book, Donald Waters and Shari Weaver
Preservation and Access Technology
The Relationship Between Digital and Other Media Conversion Processes:
A Structured Glossary of Technical Terms
, M. Stuart Lynn et al.
Preservation of New Technology, Michael Lesk
Preserving the Illustrated Text
The Setup Phase of Project Open Book, Paul Conway and Shari Weaver

See also CLIR, below

Cornell University Libraries
Moving Theory into Practice: Digital Imaging Tutorial

SOLINET
Digital Imaging Technology for Preservation: List of Sources

Technical resources

See also David Remington, below

Cultural Heritage Imaging (CHI)

"Cultural Heritage Imaging (CHI) works to advance the state of the art in digital capture and documentation of the world's cultural, historic, and artistic treasures. By providing tools, technology, and training, CHI drives adoption of new best practices by cultural heritage professionals. These best practices benefit museums, libraries, archaeological sites, other cultural heritage institutions, and the audiences they serve.

To develop and disseminate best practices, CHI collaborates with digital imaging and cultural heritage experts from leading industry and research organizations. CHI technology collaborators include scientists at: Hewlett Packard Laboratories (HP Labs) and university and government researchers around the world. For more information on CHI's methods in the current context of cultural heritage research, read 'The Big Picture' position paper.

CHI's cultural heritage collaborators represent top projects and sites throughout the United States and Europe—from Southern California to the Swiss Alps and the Mediterranean. CHI ensures that its cultural heritage partners are dynamically involved in solution development from the beginning. See Featured Projects for examples of CHI's collaborative work.

CHI selects and develops technologies that meet stringent requirements. CHI best practices use standard digital photography tools and techniques. CHI processes can be fully automated for ease of use and are scientifically reliable. The results (high-quality, interactive images and data) are readily available to scholars via the Internet.

CHI refines best practices through rigorous field tests with real-world collaborators and freely distributes its work to the cultural heritage community."

Topics include:

Reflectance Transformation Imaging
When a virtual light is moved over the RTI image in a special viewer, the user sees surface relief emerge in striking three dimensionality.
Digital Photography
When a virtual light is moved over the PTM image in a special viewer, the user sees surface relief emerge in striking three dimensionality.
Digital Photography
When a virtual light is moved over the PTM image in a special viewer, the user sees surface relief emerge in striking three dimensionality.
Object Movies
Object movies are a cost effective way to document cultural heritage materials in the round.
3D Imaging
Building 3D virtual worlds with geometric spatial information and associated surface textures is just the beginning.
Panoramas
Panoramas are an excellent way to document an environment, site context, or an enclosed space. Building 3D virtual worlds with geometric spatial information and associated surface textures is just the beginning.
Selected publications

Image Permanence Institute (IPI)
Franziska Frey and James M. Reilly
Digital Imaging for Photographic Collections: Foundations for Technical Standards (see also Frey below)

University of Illinois
Image Quality Calculator

A tool to calculate the minimum resolution (in dpi) necessary to resolve the smallest detail required, at the the quality level desired (based on ANSI/AIIM MS23-1991 Quality Index).


Timothy J. Vitale
Projecting Digital 'Slide' Images
Color Targets for Digital Imaging
Digital Documentation: Getting the Most from a TIFF Image
Testing Still-Image File Compression using JPEG2000, JPEG & TIFF-LZW
Brief History of Imaging Technology v21, October 2011
Historic Wallpaper Digital Remastered
Estimating the Resolution of Historic Film Images: Using the Resolving Power Equation (RPE) and Estimates of Lens Quality, v9 revised November 2009
Film Grain, Resolution and Fundamental Film Particles, v24 revised October 2009
Digital Image File Formats and their Storage: TIFF, JPEG & JPEG2000 v20 updated April 2010
Digital Imaging in Conservation: Cameras (dSLR), v6/v12 "long version with short version in the January 2005 AICNews Still has relevant information that can be used today."
Digital Imaging in Conservation: File Storage v28 "long version with short version in the January 2006 AICNews. Information as relevant today as 5 years ago, except the HDD are bigger and cost even less."
RGB Values in 0.1D Steps - An Excel Spreadsheet, v14a, 2007/2011
Lens MTF Data and Graphs - An Excel Spreadsheet v13 2007
Light Levels in Modern Flatbed Scanners 1997
Effects of Lens Quality on Image Resolution - DRAFT DRAFT. July 2010

Standards, Specifications, Formats

See also:

Adobe
Tiff Revision 6.0 (PDF)
TIFF Revision 5.0
TIFF Revision 4.0
TIFF Class F

American Library Association Preservation and Reformatting Section
Minimum Digitization Capture Recommendations

Anonymous
JPEG FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)

Liz Bishoff
California State Library Scanning Standards
California State Library Imaging Table--Specific Minimum Recommendations
California State Library Metadata Standards

Thomas Boutell
PBF (Portable Bitmat Format)

Robert Buckley
JPEG 2000 - a Practical Digital Preservation Standard? (PDF), Digital Preservation Coalition (DPC) Technology Watch Report, February 2008

Alan Katz and Danny Cohen
A File Format for the Exchange of Images in the Internet

Paul Oliver
Wotsit's Format: The Programmer's Resource

A wonderfully rich compilation of information on formats, current and past, for data, software, and hardware. Coverage includes graphics, 3d graphics, movies/animations, archive formats, binaries, spreadsheet/database, financials/stocks, fonts, games, text/documents, Internet related formats, sound and music, Windows, GIS formats, communications formats, printer formats, hardware formats, etc

NITFS Technical Board (NTB)
The National Imagery Transmission Format Standard (NITFS): Baseline Documents, Software, Imagery, and Tools

The National Imagery Transmission Format Standard (NITFS) "is the standard for formatting digital imagery and imagery-related products and exchanging them among members of the Intelligence Community (IC) as defined by Executive Order 12333, the Department of Defense (DOD), and other departments and agencies of the United States Government as governed by Memoranda of Agreement (MOA) with those departments and agencies."

It entails

Digital Image Archive of Medieval Music (DIAMM)
"The purpose of the Digital Image Archive of Medieval Music (DIAMM) is to obtain, archive and, where necessary, enhance digital images of European sources of medieval polyphonic music". See especially Digitizing primary sources for the DIAMM archive: why build a digital and not an analogue archive? which includes information on scanning from originals vs. scanning from surrogates, image capture specificitions, etc.

RAF Technology, Inc.
DAFS: Document Attribute Format Specification, RAF Technology, Inc.

Bibliographic resources

National Library of Canada
Digitization — the issues, projects and technology: a selective bibliography

David Remington
Codex Sinaiticus Digitization Project
Of special interest:
HCL-DIG Imaging Practices
Selected Equipment List
Final Recommendation
Final Recommendation
Capture Recommendations
HCL-DIG Imaging Practices
Selected Equipment List

University of Houston
Library Issues: Information Conversion, Integrity, and Preservation

Willett, Perry

Bibliography on Optical Scanning for Preservation

Digital imaging resources at other sites

Howard Besser
Procedures and Practices for Scanning (prepared for CHIN)

Howard Besser and Jennifer Trant
Introduction to Imaging: Issues in Constructing an Image Database:
Full text including

CCTV Camera Pros
A Tutorial On Using a Digital Camera

Columbia University Libraries
Technical Recommendations for Digital Imaging Projects

Prepared by the Image Quality Working Group of ArchivesCom, a joint Libraries/AcIS committee. (Last Revised April 2, 1997)


Heather Gray
Mississippi State University
Comparison of Computer Image Analysis and Physical Analysis of Artifacts

"Abstract: Archaeological visualization can be valuable to archaeologists if it includes analytical possibilities and solutions to methodological problems that confront them (e.g., faster data sharing). In this study of methods, non-metric and metric analyses were carried out on images (taken using a digital camera) of 8 two-dimensional views of each of 30 projectile points. Metric analysis included the invention of programs that produce grids as measuring devices that adjust to the length of a centimeter scale in an image. Portability of data and speed of data communication are explored in this project, especially in the creation of this website because the data can be shared very quickly with other archaeologists, and the project can be transferred somewhat easily to a CD-ROM to avoid problems associated with obtaining the information from the internet (e.g., slow connections). Issues associated with the use of these statistically valid results are also discussed."


Council on Library and Information Resources
Stephen Chapman, Paul Conway, and Anne Kenney
Digital Imaging and Preservation Microfilm: the Future of the Hybrid Approach for the Preservation of Brittle Books

Pedro González
Computerization of the Archivo General de Indias: Strategies and Results (September 1998)

Dan Hazen, Jeffrey Horrell, Jan Merrill-Oldham
Selecting Research Collections for Digitization (August 1998)

Image Engineering Conference Papers
What if the image quality analysis rates my digitization system a "no go", Dietmar Wueller
Differences of digital camera resolution metrology to describe noise reduction artifacts, Uwe Artmann and Dietmar Wueller
Interaction of image noise, spatial resolution, and low contrast fine detail preservation in digital image processing, Uwe Artmann and Dietmar Wueller
In Situ Measured Spectral Radiation of Natural Objects, Dietmar Wueller
Noise Reduction vs. Spatial Resolution, Uwe Artmann and Dietmar Wueller
Statistic Analysis of Millions of Digital Photos, Dietmar Wueller and Reiner Fageth
A Pilot Study of Digital Camera Resolution Metrology Protocols Proposed Under ISO 12233, Edition 2, Don Williams, Dietmar Wueller, Kevin Matherson, Hideaka Yoshida, and Paul Hubel
Investigation of two Methods to quantify Noise in digital Images based on the Perception of the human Eye, J. Kleinmann, D. Wueller
Measurement Method for Image Stabilizing Systems, B. Golik, D. Wueller
Digital Camera Resolution Measurement Using Sinusoidal Siemens Stars, C. Loebich, D. Wueller, B. Klingen, A. Jaeger
The Useage of Digital Cameras as Luminance Meters, D. Wueller, H. Gabele
Evaluating Digital Cameras, D. Wueller
Proposal for a Standard Procedure to Test Mobile Phone Cameras, D. Wueller
Measuring Scanner Dynamic Range, D. Wueller
Three Years of Practical Experience in Using ISO Standards for Testing Digital Cameras, C. Loebich, D. Wueller
Practical Scanner Tests Based on OECF and SFR Measurements, D. Wueller, C. Loebich
Colour Characterisation of Digital Cameras by analysing the Output Data for Measuring the Spectral Response, M. Ritter, D. Wueller

Niclas Hein and Christof Krekel
3d_artscan

"How does a painting change during transport? 3D imaging allows the recording of states before and after transport, in high resolution, for comparison; transport-related changes can be displayed automatically. The project 3D Artscan the State Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart and the Institute of Applied Optics, University of Stuttgart, funded by the DFG, is concerned with a new method for the examination and evaluation of the transportation impact of artworks."


Maggie Jones & Neil Beagrie
Preservation Management of Digital Materials Workbook (Prepublication draft)

"The workbook provides a comprehensive overview of digital preservation issues and practice and will be of interest to ditigitisation projects and curators in museums, libraries, archives, and the cultural heritage, research and publishing sectors.


Jim Kennedy
Preserving History: How to Digitally Archive and Share Historical Photographs, Documents, and Audio Recordings

Topics related to imaging include:

  • Basic Principles of Archiving Photographs and Documents
  • Good and Best Practices for Making Digital Images
  • Setting Tone and Color in Master Images
  • Documentation for Historical Images
  • Preparation and Display of Historical Photographs and Documents
  • Historical Slide Shows
  • Copyrights and Other Legal Rights
  • Practical Color Management
  • Overview of Scanning Software
  • Effective Resolution of Scanners
  • Using Copy Stands with Cameras
  • Batch Processing of Images
  • Guidance on Using Scanning Software
  • Guidance on Using Slide Show Software

Kevin Kiernan, Charles Rhyne & Ron Spronk
Digital Imagery for Works of Art, Report of the Workshop on Digital Imagery for Works of Art, 2002

Patricia A. McClung
Digital Collections Inventory Report

Northeast Document Conservation Center (NEDCC)
Handbook for Digital Projects: A Managment Tool for Preservation and Access, Maxine K. Sitts, Editor

Stephen E. Ostrow
Digitizing Historical Pictorial Collections for the Internet (February 1998)

Hartmut Weber & Marianne Dörr
Digitization as a Means of Preservation? (October 1997)

Digitisation Forum Online
" A site for those working in Australian museums, libraries, art galleries and archives involved in digitisation projects. This site is supported by Australia's Cultural Network and Arts SA." :1

International Color Consortium (ICC)
Spec ICC.1:1998-09, File Format for Color Profiles (PDF file - 797 kb)
Document ICC.1A:1999-04, Addendum 2 to Spec. ICC.1:1998-09 (PDF file - 32 kb)
Contributed articles and books
Michael Has and Todd Newman
Color Management: Current Practice and The Adoption of a New Standard
Todd Newman
Improved Color for the World Wide Web: A Case Study in Color Management for Distributed Digital Media
Michael Stokes, Matthew Anderson, Srinivasan Chandrasekar, Ricardo Motta
A Standard Default Color Space for the Internet - sRGB Version 1.10, November 5 1996
Dawn Wallner
Building ICC Profiles - the Mechanics and Engineering version Alpha, Nov 7 1998

Kodak
Kodak Digital Learning Center
Reference Materials
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) (Image capture, storage, management, dissemination)
Glossary of Digital Imaging Terms

Online Courses on Digital Imaging
Digital Imaging Fundamentals
Digital Color Theory
Desktop Imaging Systems & Issues


Museum Computer Network (MCN)
Spectra, Special Imaging Issue, Fall 2001 (PDF)

Contents:

Günter Waibel
Editorial: To Preserve or to Present
Jill Marie Koelling
Revealing History - Digital Imaging the New Photographic Research Tool
Carol Hernandez and Robin Lilien
Building a Digital Archive - Digitizing for the Long Term
S. K. Hastings
What Are Digital Image Managers?
Ben Blackwell
Light Exposure to Sensitive Artworks During Digital Photography
Norbert Lossau, Martin Liebetruth
Conservation Issues in Digital Imaging
G�nter Waibel
Produce, Publish and Preserve: A Holistic Approach to Digital Assets Management
Eileen C. Mathias
The Albert M. Greenfield Digital Imaging Center for Collections Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia
Andrew Stawowczyk Long
Practical Approach to Color Management
Trudy Levy
Do You See What I See?
Bruce Fraser
Issues in Digital Archiving
Colin C. Venters and Matthew D. Cooper
Content-Based Image Retrieval: A New Paradigm for Image Retrieval?

Amaya Mendizabal
Mac, Restauración y Flippers: SandsMuseum (in Spanish)
Mac & Restoration & Pinball Machines: SandsMuseum

An interview with Michael Sands, on color management, imaging realia, and treatment of mechanical devices such as pinball machines.


National Archives and Records Administration (NARA)
NARA Guidelines for Digitizing Archival Materials for Electronic Access, Steven Puglia and Barry Roginski, January 1998 (PDF)
Matrix summarizing the specifications. (PDF)

Charles Poynton
Frequently-Asked Questions about Color
Frequently-Asked Questions about Gamma
Introduction to RIPping

Research Libraries Group (RLG)
RLG DigiNews

[A] bimonthly web-based newsletter intended to:

  • Focus on issues of particular interest and value to managers of digital initiatives with a preservation component or rationale.
  • Provide filtered guidance and pointers to relevant projects to improve our awareness of evolving practices in image conversion and digital archiving.
  • Announce publications (in any form) that will help staff attain a deeper understanding of digital issues.

Some highlights include

Donald S. Brown
Image Capture Beyond 24-Bit RGB

Stephen Chapman & William Comstock
Digital Imaging Production Services at the Harvard College Library

Stephen Chapman, Paul Conway & Anne R. Kenney
Digital Imaging and Preservation Microfilm: The Future of the Hybrid Approach for the Preservation of Brittle Books

Matthew Cook
Economies of Scale: Digitizing the Chicago Daily News

Peter B. Hirtle & Carol DeNatale
Selecting a Digital Camera: the Cornell Museum Online Project

Kevin Donovan
The Promise of the FlashPix Image File Format

Franziska Frey
Digital Imaging for Photographic Collections: Foundations for Technical Standards

Nancy Elkington & Neil Beagrie
Joint RLG and NPO Conference on Guidelines for Digital Imaging

Robert Rieger & Geri Gay
Tools and Techniques in Evaluating Digital Imaging Projects

Steve Gilheany
The Promise of DVDs for Digital Libraries

W. Brent Seales, James Griffioen, & Kevin Kiernan
The Digital Atheneum - Restoring Damaged Manuscripts

Alan Howell
Film Scanning of Newspaper Collections: International Initiatives

Anne R. Kenney
The Cornell Digital to Microfilm Conversion Project: Final Report to NEH

Anne R. Kenney & Louis Sharpe II
Illustrated Book Study: Digital Conversion Requirements of Printed Illustrations

Anne R. Kenney & Oya Y. Rieger
Using Kodak Photo CD Technology for Preservation and Access: A Guide for Librarians, Archivists, and Curators

Norbert Lossau & Frank Klaproth
Digitization Efforts at the Center for Retrospective Digitization, Gttingen University Library

Michael Lesk
Finding Pictures

Thaddeus Lipinski
Digitisation of Early Journals

Sue MacTavish
DoD-NARA Scanned Images Standards Conference

Günter Mhlberger
Digitisation of Newspaper Clippings: The LAURIN Project

Steven Puglia
The Costs of Digital Imaging Projects (1)
Fractal and Wavelet Compression

Lou Sharpe
Preservation-Quality Scanning of Bound Volumes: Integration of the Picture Elements ISE Board with the Minolta PS-3000 Book Scanner

John R. Stokes
Imaging Pictorial Collections at the Library of Congress

Imaging Production Systems at Corbis Corporation Sabine Süsstrunk

Timothy Vitale
Light Levels Used in Modern Flatbed Scanners

The William Blake Archive
The Persistence of Vision: Images and Imaging at the William Blake Archive

Don Williams
Image Quality Metrics
What is an MTF ... and Why Should You Care?
Debunking of Specsmanship



ShortCourses
Digital photography resource, including short course, e-books, etc.

Stanford University
The Digital Michelangelo Project

"Recent improvements in laser rangefinder technology, together with algorithms developed at Stanford for combining multiple range and color images, allow us to reliably and accurately digitize the external shape and surface characteristics of many physical objects. Examples include machine parts, cultural artifacts, and design models for the manufacturing, moviemaking, and video game industries.

"As an application of this technology, a team of 30 faculty, staff, and students from Stanford University and the University of Washington spent the 1998-99 academic year in Italy scanning the sculptures and architecture of Michelangelo. As a side project, we also scanned 1,163 fragments of the Forma Urbis Romae, a giant marble map of ancient Rome. We are currently back in the United States processing the data we acquired. Our goal is to produce a set of 3D computer models - one for each statue, architectural setting, and map fragment we scanned - and to make these models available to scholars worldwide."

Includes a ultraviolet fluorescence map"> of Michelangelo's David.

"Once mapped onto our 3D computer model, this data will show the location of waxes and other organic materials that have been applied to the statue over the centuries. Conservators can use this information when planning future cleanings and restorations of the statue."


G. Thomas Tanselle
Texts and artifacts in the electronic era

Wilhelm Imaging Research, Inc
"Wilhelm Imaging Research, Inc., located in Grinnell, Iowa, was founded by Henry Wilhelm and Carol Brower in 1995 and is devoted to research, consulting, and publications on the light fading, dark storage fading, and yellowish stain formation with digital pictorial output (hardcopy) materials and traditional photographic color print materials."
Of especial interest: Year's of Print Display Before Noticeable Fading Occurs"

Joint Task Force on Text and Image
Preserving the Illustrated Text (April 1992)


PEI (Photo Electronic Imaging)

Digital Camera Magazine Online Edition

Investigating the Renaissance
"Examine[s] the material aspects of three early Netherlandish paintings using digital imaging techniques? From the Introduction:

Computers and new imaging technologies are fast becoming an integral part of the work of conservation. Conservators and scientists in the Straus Center for Conservation, located in the Fogg Art Museum, have been at the forefront of research into these technologies.
This interactive program demonstrates the ways in which computer technology can be harnessed to add to our knowledge about Renaissance paintings and how they were made.


PIMA / IT9
Technical Committee on Physical Properties and Permanence of Imaging Materials

Library of Congress
American Memory Project Background Papers and Technical Information
American Memory / National Digital Library Program Background Documents and Technical Reports offers many important documents among them:

Quality Review of Document Images: Internal Training Guide. National Digital Library Program, Library of Congress, September 1996

National Digital Library Program Writer's Handbook
A guide for the preparation of essays, web pages and special presentations for American Memory Collections.

National Digital Library Program and the Conservation Division:
Conservation Implications of Digitization Projects(10 pages, PDF)
Appendix I, Handout(7 pages, PDF)

"This paper was written by a group of Library of Congress conservators who have worked closely with NDL digitization projects and NDL project leaders since the beginning of the program in 1995. The multi-faceted and precedent setting role which conservation plays in digital image conversion projects in the NDL in the areas of consultation, training, and treatment for scanning is discussed. Additional information will be added in the coming months which will provide details regarding experience with specific collections."


Core Metadata Elements: Work in progress

"Papers, tables and glossaries describing metadata discussions and development at the Library of Congress 1995 to the present."


Technical Operations Documentation
NDL Requests for Proposals for scanning and text conversion services (complete documents).
RFP96-18: "Digital Images from Original Documents, Text Conversion and SGML-Encoding" (PDF) (206 pp., printed version)
RFP96-5: "Conversion of Microfilm to Digital Images" (PDF) (104 pp., printed version)
RFP97-9: "Conversion of Pictorial Materials to Digital Images" (PDF) (130 pp., printed version)

"Contracts have been awarded for the work described in the Requests for Proposals. These versions represent the final document at the time of award, but prior to subsequent contract modifications. Therefore, they may differ somewhat from the original solicitation documents which were distributed prior to contract award."

Library of Congress RFP for Digital Images from Original Documents, Text Conversion and SGML-Encoding, National Digital Library Program

American Memory White Papers
Recommendations for the Evaluation of Digital Images Produced from Photographic, Microphotographic, and Various Paper Formats, James Reilly and Franziska Frey, June 27, 1996.

"This report was prepared for the National Digital Library Program by the Image Permanence Institute."


Digital Historical Collections: Types, Elements, and Construction (August 1996)
Digital Formats for Content Reproductions Carl Fleischhauer (July 1998)
Access Aids and Interoperability (August 1997)
Frameworks and Finding Aids: Organizing Digital Archival Collections by Carl Fleischhauer (October 1994)
Reproduction Quality Issues in a Digital Library System (December 1992)
American Memory DTD, for digitized historical documents.
The new Encoded Archival Description DTD, for archival finding aids. The Library is an active creator of EAD Finding Aids.

"These technical papers were based on the experience gained during the American Memory Pilot Project. The concepts discussed and the principles developed still guide the Library's digital conversion efforts, although some of the details have changed as digitizing technology has improved and new digital formats have been widely deployed. An update of the first paper is in preparation."


Final Report of the Library of Congress Manuscript Digitization Demonstration Project - October 1998

"This project explored the digitization of large-scale twentieth-century manuscript collections by producing images of 10,000 document pages, mostly typescripts, from the New Deal Federal Theatre collection. The project was sponsored by the Library of Congress Preservation Directorate, overseen by the National Digital Library Program, and carried out from 1994-97 by Picture Elements, Inc.

NOTE: Please consult the HTML version of the report for Appendix A. Hyperlinks to images and other information are not available in the PDF version which is offered primarily for ease of printing.


Final Report of the American Memory User Evaluation - December 1993

"This evaluation, carried out before American Memory collections were accessible over the World Wide Web, includes information on how primary-source materials are used in schools and factors that are important to teachers.

Proceedings of the Workshop on Electronic Texts - June 1992

This workshop, held at the Library of Congress, brought together many of the pioneers in electronic text and document imaging in library or archives contexts. In part, the meeting highlighted the differences in motivation and approach between those who focussed on searchable text marked up with SGML and those concerned with imaging as a part of library preservation."


University of Virginia--Electronic Text Center
Image Scanning: A Basic Helpsheet
Text Scanning: A Basic Helpsheet
Archival Digital Image Creation

Miscellaneous resources

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