When Nixon Met Elvis

When Nixon Met Elvis is an online exhibit at the National Archives.

Selection Decisions
This appears to be a permanent online exhibit compiled from documents and photographs in the National Archives. I would guess that the Archives has all of the rights for displaying the documents, and I don't think there is any copyright on the photographs since some are available for download. There is information on the site about the Archives' commitment to accessibility to all users, and it's available in both Flash and standard HTML.

Metadata
The descriptive metadata for the collection is very specific and provides lots of details about the event's place in history. Structural metadata is evident through the arrangement of the collection chronologically; also, the user can flip through the pages and photographs in order and know where they are at all times. The administrative data is rather lacking, and there is no alt text for the images.

Object Characteristics
The collection is offered in a variety of formats due to accessibility (Flash, JPEGs for HTML) and downloading (Zip files of JPEGS). Because of how close you can zoom in they appear to be high resolution. Type-over text is positioned over the hand-written documents to allow for easy reading. The file names aren't very specific, but seem to provide sequential numbering. Conveniently the correspondence is all dated, but again, no information is available about who scanned the images and when they were scanned or uploaded.

Intended Audience
This is definitely an educational exhibit and would be a great addition to a lesson plan; the history provided with the images and documents is very comprehensive.

LOC: Islamic Manuscripts from Mali

The Islamic Manuscripts from Mali is a small but impressively documented digital collection features 22 manuscripts from the Mamma Haidara Commemorative Library and the Library of Cheick Zayni Baye of Boujbeha in Timbuktu, Mali. While I will be focusing on the manuscript digitization, the website also includes links to relevant maps, photos, and other information regarding Mali culture.

Under Building the Digital Collection, the website provides administrative metadata about the collection. While the main page seems to imply that the owner and director of the Mamma Haidara Commemorative Library, Abdel Kader Haidara, provided the digital scans, it appears that the Photoduplication Service of LOC actually went to Mali to microfilm the collection. It is explained that the microfilming was expressly for archival purposes. Then, the microfilm was digitized by LOC's Digital Scan Center. The archival version was scanned as color 300dpi TIFFs. The scanning bit-depth is not provided. In addition to the master files, JPEGs of both high- and low-quality and thumbnail GIFs were produced. Interestingly, as part of the donation agreement with Haidara, only the thumbnails and the low-quality JPEGs are available online.

The provided object metadata includes such descriptive elements as title, alternate title, author/creator, notes, LOC subject headings (e.g., Arabic calligraphy, Islamic manuscripts), language, repository, and the unique digital id and handle. The manuscripts are searchable by keyword (not particularly helpful unless one knows a specific title since they all share similar subject headings), or browse by title or subject.

As stated in the section on scanning specifications, the quality of the images isn't spectacular but they are still quite decent. For example, the image to the right is viewable at 523x750 pixels. It's clear that great care was taken in microfilming the manuscripts with good overhead lighting and a black background.

This online digitization project is for exhibition purposes. It probably was one of the project proposal's end goals for the manuscript microfilming. While it is possible to study the manuscripts closely with the online versions, I would suspect that a serious scholar of such cultural materials would also make a trip to LC or Timbuktu.

The Digital South Asia Library-Images

The Digital South Asia Library-Images

The images section of this digital library actually consists of several different collections of photographs but all are searched using one search tool. The look is minimalist but there is a long list of images and it's easy to select any number of images that you'd like to see more information on and to view greater resolution files of the same images. There is a also a subject listing for the image files, so there are several ways to find the photographs that you're interested in. Although the metadata is pretty minimal, the quality of the photos is pretty good considering when they were scanned and the viewing technology present then. They evidentally tried to scan and the highest resolution that they could afford.
I like the result: fast loading, minimalist, but don't like the absence of additional Web 2.0 functions: no way to add additional tags, no way to review and rate the photographs, add metadata, etc. It would be especially nice for people who might have additional information about the historic photos to add their first person narratives or other information.
Ann

Micrography: The Hebrew Word as Art

The exhibit Micrography: The Hebrew Word as Art, collects examples of manuscripts exhibiting microgrpahic illustration from the collections of the Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. It includes a brief introduction to micrography and its history, and then presents nine examples of the technique.

1. Selection Decisions
The manuscripts were selected from the library's collection presumably (no selection criteria are detailed on the site) to illustrate fine examples of the art as well as illustrate the variance and development of the technique. In fact, given the history of micrography, the selections are fairly limited (they are mostly from the 19th and early 20th centuries).

2. Metadata
Metadata is brief and varies in detail. For the most part, where it is known, the title of the manuscript, the scribe, place of creation, and text used as illustration is given. A few more details are sometimes presented in the brief descriptions of the images.

3. Object Characteristics
The scans themselves are small, and come in only one size. They sometimes show the whole page, and sometimes just a close-up of the micrograph itself. They seem unsuitable for any real sort of study, but are large enough and of acceptable quality to casually introduce the technique.

4. Audience
The audience is certainly those who are unfamiliar with micrography, and the exhibit is meant to serve as a general introduction. As such, it could benefit from more images, culled from a much wider range of both period and place. The scope of the exhibit, given its intentions, seems limited by the library's holdings.

The Woodward and Bernstein Watergate Papers at the Harry Ransom Center

Between 1972 and 1976, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein emerged as two of the most famous journalists in America and became forever identified as the reporters who broke the biggest story in American politics. Beginning with the investigation of a "third-rate burglary" of the Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate complex, Woodward and Bernstein uncovered a system of political "dirty tricks" and crimes that eventually led to indictments of forty White House and administration officials, and ultimately to the resignation of President Richard Nixon.

Now available to the public for the first time are Woodward and Bernstein's notes from source interviews, drafts of newspaper stories and books, memos, letters, tape recordings, research materials, and other Watergate papers. Purchased by The University of Texas at Austin in 2003, the Woodward and Bernstein Watergate Papers provide students, scholars, and other researchers a unique resource for behind the scenes insight into the journalism, politics, and humanity of Watergate.

The digitized materials are a very small sample from a collection including “76 boxes, 6 oversize boxes, 3 oversize folders, 3 galley folders, 21 bound volumes (31.92 linear feet).” Some confidential and/or sensitive documents and interviews are not currently available to the public, in physical or digital form, until the death of the source or the release by Woodward and Bernstein. Twenty-nine documents and one audio interview were selected for the online exhibition, divided by topic under the linked headings of “The Washington Post,” “All The President’s Men,” “Deep Throat Revealed,” and “The Final Days.” The featured items are generally what could be considered the most sensational of the collection, and include correspondence from several high-profile figures, original clippings of the breaking news, eccentric fan mail, and personal handwritten notes by Woodward and Bernstein. Additionally, an interview of Woodward and Bernstein by the HRC is included in transcript form, and each question, as well as the entire interview, are MP3 audio links.

A thumbnail of each image is accompanied by a title, date, and short, one-sentence description. If you click on the image, it is enlarged and accompanied by a blurb written by the HRC explaining its context and significance. A specific-as-possible date is given, sometimes with a day and month, other times with just a year. In the case of the audio interview tape, an MP3 and written transcript of the recording are also available. Another link on the site “About the Papers” explains the acquisition of the papers by the HRC in 2003. The page also links to the HRC’s online finding aid for the collection, which includes a biographical sketch, an overview of the scope and contents, a complete list of all correspondents and associated materials, series descriptions, and a folder list, as well as the name of the processing archivist, finding aid ID, and RLIN record ID.

The documents are first shown as thumbnails, in the pixel range of about 80x100. Clicking on the thumbnail reveals a larger image with more metadata, at about 250-400 pixels. Clicking on the image once more enlarges it even further for a detailed view, and a size of about 600-1000 pixels. All of the images are in color, with high resolution. However, the image size is still not as large as the original object, making a viewing of the physical object necessary for any serious scholar. The interview tape digitized both in image (at the relatively small size of 250x150 pixels) and sound. The image is linked to a Quicktime audio file, which opens and plays on a separate webpage.

The intended audience is probably students of government, political science, or American history interested in learning more about this time period- perhaps those who cannot physically come to Austin to view the papers. Other interested parties may include those who lived through this time and want to learn more about the Watergate scandal, or people who are simply interested in knowing more about all of the resources the Harry Ransom Center has to offer.

National Music Museum

National Music Museum

The website for the National Music Museum says that it is "America's Shrine to Music on the Campus of The University of South Dakota"

1. The physical museum itself contains 13,500 American, European, and non-Western instruments. However, they do admit that the online holdings are a far smaller number. I can't really tell why they chose what they did to put online but I would take a guess that it was their more interesting looking pieces (notice the sweet mandolin on the right).

2. Each picture came with a very nice explanation of what the piece was, when it was made, who it belonged to (if known) as well as the source they used to obtain all of the information in case a scholar wished to more research. There wasn't any metadata concerning the dimension of the instrument or anything physical about it but the website treated the viewer as if they were taking a virtual museum tour and gave them information accordingly.

3. The objects appear to be digitized very nicely. They are not simply photographed where they sat in the museum but rather against a solid background so that the viewer can appreciate the detailing of the piece. Some of the photos allow one click zooming but many do not. Still others have close up pictures provide of sections of the instrument that the museum belives are of the most interest. I was a little confused when I first arrived at the site. Navigation is daunting. There seem to be too many links and too many ways to view the collection and not enough order or direction. There is not a search engine of any king but rather lists of links. You can search by type of instrument, the maker, the archive that houses the instrument, or once you are viewing an object there is a icon that allows you to just proceed to the next photograph. Really very confusing but once you figure out the navigation the collection is quite nice.

4. musical instrument scholars, music history scholars, students, library patrons who wish to take a closer look at a particular instrument but mostly the students of the University.

The Imperial War Museum

The Imperial War Museum in London, which is my all-time favorite, has online exhibitions covering many of the themes of the physical exhibits. Like many of the other digital collections we've looked at, the online collections (here) are searchable--and the IWM's are also organized into topics of interest. Each record has metadata that includes the date of creation, the copyright restrictions, the location of the object within the IWM system, and a description of the object. You can also add items to a personal list, which can then be manipulated. The images themselves are watermarked, although at least in the ones I viewed was not too distracting. Unfortunately the images cannot be enlarged, leading to a significant absence of detail in some of them, and there is no metadata available on the digitization process, standards, etc. However, the breadth of the collections, especially on the IWM's strengths such as trench warfare, and the ease of both browsing and searching make the online archives a powerful resource. In addition, like the museum itself, there are represntations of many physical objects such as weapons. Here is a WWI pistol, for example, with excellent description for nonexperts to contextualize it. The database contains 150,00 objects so far. The national importance of the museum, and its governmental support, suggests sustainability will not be a problem going forward. The IWM also has collaborative projects, such as the inventory of UK war memorials, which speak to the cohesiveness of the British historical narrative.

While the database is thorough and usable, as with many of the digital collections we have examined the IWM is less successful in taking advantage of the unique properties of the digital medium. I am interested in WWI and as such chose the online exhibition of the Battle of the Somme, which is covered quite extensively in the London museum. One of the problems I at least have with reading military history is having to flip back and forth from the text to the map in order to follow troop movements: I hoped the online Battle of the Somme would address this. It was disappointing. The exhibition covers three main areas: the battle, the personal stories of participants, and current historical interpretations and suggestions on visiting the site. I had hoped to be able to see an interactive map, maybe one that would integrate narratives, and instead each section stands alone. The sole exception to this lack of integration is The Battlefield Today which suggests tours that integrate elements from the personal stories. However, they are not interactive, which seems to waste an ideal opportunity to move around: from the site today, the battle, the stories, and back again, or follow the battle as it progresses through time. Hopefully this kind of functionality will follow, to enhance the usability of an excellent archival collection.

FRONTERA COLLECTION OF MEXICAN AND MEXICAN AMERICAN RECORDINGS

THE ARHOOLIE FOUNDATION'S STRACHWITZ FRONTERA COLLECTION OF MEXICAN AND MEXICAN AMERICAN RECORDING

This collection is the plans to become, is the largest repository of Mexican and Mexican-American vernacular recordings in existence. This project is housed at THE UCLA Chicano Research Studies Center and sponsored by the Tigres Del Norte Fund, The Fund for Folk Record, Arhoolie Records. The projects objective is to provide access to reaserchers of Mexican and Mexican-American and The general public.

The collection is supposed to provide limited access outside the UCLA campus by allowing patrons to listen to clips of the collection. However, it seems that there is currently an error in providing this access. Otherwise, one can visit the campus and gain full access to all recording. The technology that the records are being digitized into seems to be Real Media since the extensions point to .Ram files which would obviously redirect to a Real Media format.

The website does not provide any information as to the selection of which materials digitize, however it seems that they have a pretty lofty goal in having already digitized 100,000 individual recordings on cassettes and 78 rpm, 45 rpm, and 33 1/3 rpm long-playing (lp) records all of which go back as far as the early 1900's to today.

Auschwitz Through the Lens of the SS

Auschwitz Through the Lens of the SS is the online exhibit of a photo album recently acquired by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. It was originally created by Karl Höcker, a member of the SS stationed at Auschwitz from roughly 1944-45, which as the Introduction to the exhibit points out was the deadliest time at the camp. The album came to the USHMM via a retired American Army man who worked for the Counter Intelligence Corps and wished to donate the collection anonymously.

Selection Process

As far as I know the USHMM digitized and put on exhibit the entirety of the photo album. The pictures detail what life was like for the Nazis who were at Auschwitz. The exhibit features photos of people carrying on with life-as-usual as well as of ceremonies, funerals, and other military proceedings.

Object Characteristics

There are a few different ways the website allows the viewer to engage these photos. One way is to simply view a slideshow of the album. In total there are 146 photos in the slideshow. However, a number of these are details of individual photos that may appear on the same page of the album. Alternatively, the site also gives one the opportunity to read up on Höcker and the history of Auschwitz and view the photos as an accompaniment. In this case there are thumbnails within the text which lead to pop-ups of larger images.

Metadata

Regardless of which way one chooses to view the album listings of who is in the photograph, what the scene depicts, and any caption that may have been provided are offered when available. Additionally, the item number for the photos is also provided in the event that one would choose to do further research in the USHMM archives.

Intended Audience

As the introduction to the album points out this is a very historic and significant collection of photographs, being only one of two that depicts life at Auschwitz. As such I would imagine this exhibit would be of great interest to WWII and Holocaust historians, as well as Holocaust survivors and their descendants.

Seattle Museum of Flight

The Museum of Flight in Seattle, WA has made viewable part of their collection of air and spacecraft. The museum website boasts photos and information on approximately 150 models. They have also digitized more than 100 rare and historic airline logos.

Selection Decisions
It appears that the museum chose a sampling of their physical holdings and tried to represent each airline and a variety of craft types. For example, the collection includes an aerocar (half plane, half automobile), jet planes, a lunar roving vehicle, reconnaissance aircraft, gliders, and seaplanes. There are not enough models from each manufacturer to warrant research, and they likely chose these models because of their rarity and the likelihood of public interest.

Metadata
Each set of photos is accompanied by metadata including manufacturer, model, year, registration, location, whether the plane is viewable, and physical characteristics including wingspan, cruise speed, and range. The pages also give historical context for the plane and the current status of each model. Viewers can search by manufacturer or model, or they can work through the collection in alphabetical order by manufacturer. The airline logos include no metadata apart from the airline name and are ordered alphabetically. Without knowing the year or history of the logos, they are out of context.

Object Characteristics
Most of the crafts are represented by two photos – one archival photo of the plane from the period in which it was in general use (black and white photos primarily), and another of the craft today (color). One cannot use a zoom tool, but most can be enlarged to double the original size with the same resolution. The images are rather low-quality (about 100 dpi) jpegs.

Audience
The sizes of the photos are not research-quality by any means, and researchers undoubtedly would require multiple views of the interior and exterior of the planes. However, the collection could be very useful to enthusiasts or the general public looking to visit the museum. For both the airline logo and craft collections, the staff included a short overview of what viewers might want to see from the collection in Seattle under the heading “Come to the Museum of Flight and see more.”

Nippon in the World

http://www.ndl.go.jp/site_nippon/e/default.html


I found this site by doing a basic Google search for "digitized exhibition." It was a collaborative project between BBCC (Broadband-network Business Chance & Culture Creation) and the National Diet Library of Japan. The images are mostly of Japanese block prints, but also include photographs and cultural objects. The images and information come from the National Diet Library as well as a few Japanese museums, libraries and universities. I couldn't really figure out why this exhibition in particular was launched, or even what a diet library has to do with art, history and culture.

Selection
The project curators (2 university professors) had a few themes about Japanese culture which they chose to highlight. In the secion "Scenic Mementos of Japan" topics include: Nature and Outdoors, Amusement, Work, Festivals, People and appearance. They have works pertaining to the Osaka region adn the Edo region, and either from the Edo period or the Meiji period. There is also a section on the "Vienna International Exposition" (the first in which the Japanese participated) and another on "Japanese Political History." Why they chose these 3 topics to combine in one exhibition, I don't know. The first section was mostly block prints, the second mostly photos, and the third was mostly artifacts. I don't know why this is so. What was really confusing was that each of these 3 main sections has a completely different layout and means of navigation. None of the sections had a good search tool. If you narrow down the topic and era you are interested in, you must then just sift through their list of items to see if anything strikes you.

Object Characteristics.
Each image has a thumbnail and a larger view. I don't know what dpi or filetypes were used. The only technical information they provide is the file size in KB. The images vary greatly in quality. Some were very blurry and some had decent resolution. All enlarged images had an annoying watermark in the lower right corner. Some had historical facts to explain the object, some had nothing. One neat idea was a then and now comparison--a modern photo of the same location of the old artwork; however the photo opened in a new window whereas having the 2 images side by side would have been more useful. Some images were also accompanied by movies, which sounded fun, but I could not open these on my computer.

Metadata
Metadata is pretty limited and very inconsistent on this site. In the "Scenic Mementos" section, most images have a link to "bibliographic data" which has a matrix to include: call code, source name, year of publication, subject of illustration, artist, place of publication, publisher, size, NDC [whatever that means], and owned by. However, most of the images I checked had a least a couple of these fields missing, and many didn't even have very specific titles. In the other 2 sections, bibliographic information was different and even more limited (if provided at all).

Audience
I'm not sure who the audience is here, really, since I couldn't even get a clear idea of why the National Diet Library would be an acceptible authority to create an exhibition on art and culture. I guess anyone with a superficial interest in Japanese history might find this site interesting, but no one can get much use out of it. There is not a lot of historical information, and if you did find an image you were interested in studying further, the metadata is so limited it would be hard pursue. Some parts of the website were only accessible in Japanese. Perhaps part of the problem is a limited translation? But why would they trouble to translate it at all if they didn't do it completely and fully?

American Popular Song Sheets, 1890-1922

The New York Public Library offers the American Popular Song Sheets, 1890-1922 digital collection.

The library has over 400,000 titles in its holdings. Thousands of these are represented in the digital collection, but I can't determine how they selected their sampling. For instance, the year 1922 has only 2 songsheets represented, but the year 1900 has digitized 620 songsheets.

The JPEG digital images are about 225 x 300 pixels initially, but expand to about 560 x 760 pixels when the image is enlarged. There's also the option to view a printer friendly version, or to purchase the image as a print or gift.

A wealth of metadata is provided for this collection. In addition to listing the creator, title, date, and digital image ID, the NYPL Call Number and a link to the Library Catalog Record are also available.

Anyone interested in this subject matter would certaintly appreciate this collection, and anyone just browsing the library's online collection could enjoy it as well. I personally enjoyed exploring the collection, the songsheets can be quite interesting, and also humorous at times.

Jüdische Zeitschriften In NS-Deutschland – Jewish newspapers in National Socialist Germany

Jüdische Zeitschriften In NS-Deutschland is available on the website of the German National Library (Deutsche Nationalbibliothek). I chose this because I wanted to see a digital project in a language other than English, from the point of view of an English-speaking person. My own German-language skills are rusty, from not having used it in many years, though I have been surprised at how much comes back to me. Still, I should not be considered as having any proficiency in the language. Parts of the site are translated into English, which made my task considerably easier. I also used an online German-English dictionary for assistance.

A brief description of the project is on the main page listed above. By clicking on “Direktzugriff” at the bottom of the page, one is directed to the digital content. There is a search feature in a frame on the left side of this page. When one enters various search parameters, the documents appear in a frame on the right side of the page. One can search by title (Zeitschrift), year (Jahrgang), edition (Ausgabe), page (Seite), and view (Ansicht) (PDF or GIFs at 25%, 50%, 75%, 100% size). After entering these criteria, one must click on “Anzeigen”. One can also perform advanced searches by clicking on “Suche”.

The subject is obviously one of major significance in German, Jewish, and world history. I counted 25 different titles, from locations such as Berlin, Hamburg, Vienna, and Prague, so the geographic dispersal is fairly wide. The dates covered are from 1933 to 1938, which covers much of the period when Jews were still allowed to publish newspapers. I am not knowledgeable in this area, so I have no way of knowing how complete the coverage is. There is a great deal of material present, so there do not seem to have been too many filters applied.

The items are presented as either PDF files or GIF images in black and white. Since to the best of my knowledge none of the newspapers published anything in color at this time, as this would have been a major expense that a persecuted minority population could not afford, this decision seems to have been a good one. The images are highly legible. All that is needed to read them is reading knowledge of German – there are no translations into any other languages.

By clicking on a button on the search engine (identified with an “i”), one can view the metadata. It is in German, but is fairly extensive.

The intended audience is for serious researchers. There are not any bells and whistles, it doesn’t look attractive, but the subject matter is extremely interesting. The amount of material is extensive, so anyone wanting to conduct intensive research can do so online.

Overall, the website is very good. I was able to find my way around it without instruction; I figured out how to use the search engine by trial and error. My knowledge of German (low as it is) was helpful, and it is necessary to conduct research. It was helpful that part of the site was in English.

The Living Room Candidate

The Living Room Candidate at the Museum of the Moving Image in NY is an online collection of presidential campaign television ads from 1952-2004.

Selection
This collection consists of all of the presidential ads since 1952, the year of the first presidential ads. The material is still under copyright and is provided by several other institutions, including many presidential libraries. The collection is funded through the Liman Foundation and through a video-hosting donation from Mirror Image Internet, so it has on-going funding. It seems the collection is intended to be as comprehensive as possible. Playing the videos requires Windows Media Player or RealPlayer, and instructions are provided for how to view on both a Mac and a PC.
Object Characteristics
The objects are accompanied by enough metadata that the user can be confident that an object is what it claims to be. They have been produced in a way that endeavors to provide access to the widest population of users - both PC and Mac, using two software programs. Even if the videos can't play, text is provided that describes the background of both the campaign and the ads themselves, and complete transcripts are also available. The user can search the collection, and sorting options are available: by issue (war, taxes), type of commercial (biographical, fear, real people), and election year. You can look through related commercials as well.
Metadata
Extensive metadata is provided about the original object, but little is listed for the digital object - I would like to see information about how it was digitized (using what software) and when it was digitized. There is a Site Guide/Help page that gives background to the collection creation as well as specifications and navigation instructions.
Intended Audience
This is a very educational site, and entertaining as well. It would be useful for researchers in both political science as well as RTF/communications. It's culturally significant as well. The Museum obviously hopes/expects that teachers will take advantage of it in their classrooms because there is a Teacher page that provides lesson plans. Very fun and entertaining site. (You can see how ads have adapted to the average TV viewer's shrinking attention span.)

California Ethnic and Multicultural Archives

I visited the California Ethnic and Multicultural Archives (CEMA), which is a division of the Special Collections Department of the University Libraries at the University of California. The collection is meant as a scholarly collection of primary research materials, and is made available for use in many contexts.

1) Selection Decisions

The images used on this website are a "representative sampling" of the archival slides held by the CEMA, and includes 1,362 images. These images were chosen as a representative cross-section of the larger archive of 14,000 slides. It is stated that the items were selected based on consultation between CEMA and the cultural centers from whose collection the images came. It is not clear what factors were used in deciding which items were digitized, but it is implied that items were chosen to provide an overall understanding of the larger collection.

2) Metadata

Succinct and comprehensive metatdata is provided for the items listed in the digital archive, and includes artist, title, date, medium, where the item is located, and a brief description of the work. If applicable, it also describes the number of slides used and the dimensions of the item. The information is displayed in a consistent manner for all of the items, and is easily read and understood.

3) Object Characteristics

The images in the archive are scans of slides from a variety of cultural centers. The resolution of the images is 72 d.p.i.. The website states that there are higher resolution copies (600 d.p.i. and 1350 d.p.i.), but these are kept off the web and remain the property of the copyright holders. The visual quality varies due to the varying quality of the slides from which they were pulled. Most slides are digital photographs of the items, and often show background. It is possible to enlarge the images by clicking on them, and on some items you can zoom in to see more detail.

4) Intended Audience

The stated aim of the digital collection is to "make Chicano art more accessible to the general public". The images available would be useful to both casual viewers who have a developing interest in Chicano art, and to students (maybe of art history) who are looking for access to items they are studying. There is enough metadata provided to encourage scholarly use of the images.

The Luso-Hispanic New World in Early Prints and Photographs

http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/explore/dgexplore.cfm?topic=history&collection=TheLusoHispanicNewWo&col_id=208
“Hundreds of photographs and prints, in albums and rare published volumes, present the territories and countries associated with Portugal and Spain in the New World, from Mexico to Argentina, and parts of the Caribbean. “

This is a sampling to the New York Public Library’s pictorial Latin American holdings. It contains photographs, prints and illustrations.

Selection Decisions:
This collection focuses on the Spanish and Portuguese expeditions of discovery and the landscape, natural history and culture of Latin America. The choice of what to digitize are apparently the books with the most impressive illustrations in the NYPL. The Collection is meant to grow as time goes on to provide a richer source of visual information.

Metadata:
Includes the title, author and date of publication for the book the illustrations are taken from. The data for the image itself includes Creator:, Image Caption:, In: (what book), Library Division:, Description:, Item/Page/Plate Number:, Medium:, Subject(s):, Additional Name(s):, Collection Guide:, Digital Image ID:, Digital Record ID:, Digital Record Published: (date), NYPL Call Number:, and a link to the Library Catalog Record. There is also a Thumbnail of course.

Object Characteristics:
The JPGs available on the web are around 650 x 700 give or take a hundred depending on the shape. File names are linked to toe digital ID number. The size is a bit small for analysis, especially reading text, however high quality TIFFs or large prints may be purchased. No information on how the originals were scanned.

Intended Audience:
Audience looks to be the general public, anyone interested in this type of historical illustration or subject. Anybody looking to decorate a room with these types of images could purchase all they wanted from the NYPL.

Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project

This week, I looked at UCSB's Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project. This project focuses on the digitization and preservation of cylinder recordings, the earliest form of commercial audio recordings.

Selection Decisions: As far as I understand from the descriptions on the Web site, the UCSB Library digitized their entire collection of cylinder recordings (over 7,000), as well as donations from individuals and other institutions. Since the technology for cylinder recordings is so old and was used for only a brief period of time, it was essential to digitize these recordings in order to preserve them for future use. This project does a great job of making these recordings available to the general public, posting them in 3 different forms (streaming, MP3, and wav files), so it is apparent that access was also an important factor driving the project.

Metadata: This collection does a great job of making all known information available to the user. It provides the essential information about the original recording (date, performer, title, original format) while also making the technical information (file size and type) available. The site gives a thorough overview of the digitization process and software, as well as some reviews of their process and products. Search abilities are also very thorough, allowing browsing by genre, instrument, subject, and ethnic roots, and searching by several different areas.

Object Characteristics: It's hard for me to know exactly what quality of digital object is demonstrated by this site, as I don't know firsthand what a cylinder recording usually sounds like. The "Project Overview" section on the Web site explains the extensive process undertaken to clarify sound throughout the digitization project, so I would guess that all of the crackling and sound distortion is typical to this kind of recording. As I mentioned before, it's useful that the recordings are available in three different formats that are all readily available and perform without glitches. Some of the entries did not have sound recordings available online, for a reason unknown to me. I'm guessing it's because of issues of copyright, but I can't be sure- the finding aid doesn't make this clear to the user.

Intended Audience: This site states clearly that its primary intended users are the academic community- university students and professors. It provides valuable resources for historical, sociological and musicological research. However, this site is also very accessible for anyone in the public who has an interest in these recordings on the basis of social, historical, or musical interests. In fact, it has several streaming radio stations based on subject. It's overall a very user-friendly resource, and my favorite project thus far.

Drawing From Life

Drawing From Life is a selection of caricatures and cartoons from the American Art / Portrait Gallery (AA/PG) Library Collection at the Smithsonian Libraries. The volumes in the AA/PG date from 1800.

Selection Decisions:
They appear to have digitized portions of 11 books by 11 different artists…and this makes up the entire online exhibition. They chose artists whose illustrations contained a cross section of popular themes like golf, travel, and the US Congress. With over 600 volumes of cartoons to choose from, it must have been difficult to choose only 11 books.

The online exhibition can be explored by book/artist, subject, or viewed all at once. There is no search function. The design has some odd elements like a link to the home page at the very bottom of the left hand navigation. It also contains a broken link in the main navigation.

Object Characteristics:
Individual cartoons can be slightly enlarged, though not quite to the point of readability in some cases. They are saved as low-res jpegs at 72 dpi.

The images all appear against a sickly pale yellow background that looks dated and amateurish even though this site was developed in 2003 and claims to receive periodic updates.

Many of the images do not contain alt text which is probably illegal. The pages do not even contain DOCTYPEs.

Metadata:
Each object is labeled with author, date, title, caption, book, and the list of subjects assigned to the image. The subjects are like tags and should be hyperlinked to other images with the same tags but they are not.

The most useful page on the site is probably the credits, which lists the digital imaging information. The scans were captured originally as TIFFs at 300 dpi. They used a Hasselblad 35mm camera and an Epson Perfection flatbed scanner. It says they reduced the images to 750 pixels on the short side and reduced them to 256 colors for web display.

Audience:
Because this is such a puny collection that can barely be considered a representative sample of the AA/PG’s collection of cartoons, and because the images can barely be read (let alone studied), and because the design is so displeasing and the usability so lacking, I predict that this collection’s audience is no one (except maybe for digitization students looking for exhibitions to pick on).

Provoking Magic: Lighting of Ingo Maurer

At the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in NYC, there is an exhibit of Ingo Maurer's work. Maurer is a world-famous German-born artist and designer who "constructs luminous atmospheres that play with traditional concepts of color, brightness, and shadow". I thought this would be an interesting case study because Maurer's installation work is heavily dependent on light and space (3-dimensionality), two things that are not easily captured by digital imagery. Indeed, I found that while the images were sufficiently detailed and I appreciated the multiple angles and close-ups, I do not think that the online exhibition could fully convey the scope of Maurer's work.

In terms of selection decisions, I believe that the Cooper-Hewitt included digital images of all of Maurer's works that are on display at the museum. For each piece, there is one larger image that shows the entire installation and then two smaller images that show alternate viewpoints, including details of the materials used.

The provided metadata for each image is slim: title, artist, date, media, and occasionally additional information such as if the piece is site-specific to the Cooper-Hewitt. It is difficult to get an idea of the size of the works, as they are often room-sized or bigger installations and no metadata regarding dimensions of the originals is given. And like all of the other online exhibits I have seen, no digital image specifications are given. The museum, which is part of the Smithsonian, includes its copyright policy via a link.

The JPG digital images range from are 430 x 700 pixels to 250 x 250 pixels. JPGs were clearly chosen as the image format because they are web-friendly. The images are quite good and clear, but as mentioned before, definitely lack the ability to convey fully the moods of these works. For example, Maurer has a whole series of LED furniture and walls (as seen to the right). In one of the photos, you can see Maurer himself either standing behind one of the twinkling walls or being reflected in it. The magical quality of his work is somewhat conveyed, but I think the photos simply make the viewer want to see the exhibit herself and interact with the installations.

The online exhibition is clearly intended for the casual viewer who wants to see what is going on at the Cooper-Hewitt and/or is deciding whether or not to go. In this case, I think the ineffectualness of the digital images to immerse the viewer in Maurer's work is actually a positive in that they attract the viewer but leaving enough unknown to encourage attendance.

The William Conte Collection

Within the Coins and Medals collection of the Fitzwilliam Museum at the University of Cambridge, the William Conte Collection consists of Norman and Angevin coins dating from 1066 to 1279, each of which has been digitized, the images placed within the museum's impressive OPAC.

1. Selection Decisions
The coins come from the collection of William Conte, a leading authority on Norman coinage, purchased by the Fitzwilliam through national grants. The collection contains many unique and very rare coins, and the entire collection was digitized as it was entered into the collection. Together, the collection seems to be one of the most complete, and is considered to be of great condition and relative completion. Given the Fitzwilliam's funding, I don't imagine there was much debate about digitizing it in its entirety.

2. Metadata
This is where the collection really shines. The coins have been integrated into the online catalog of the museum, and as you can see, each object has an impressive number of access points for search. Ruler, state, mint, denomination, materials, and period can all be searched for. And once found, for each coin there is provenance, dimensions, a full physical description including marks, etc, and both an accession and reference number. The online catalog at the Fitzwilliam seems impressively well designed and meticulous.

3. Object Characteristics
The scans of the coins themselves show both obverse and reverse. They appear in three sizes. When a search is displayed by image results, smaller thumbnails are used. The coin's entry itself has a medium sized image that can then be clicked through to a larger image. The largest image is not incredibly high-resolution, but seems large enough for casual study and perhaps some scholarship based solely on composition and marks.

4. Audience
While I think the primary intended audience is eventual users of the museum, and the digitizations are meant to serve as a reference for those who would go on to observe the object itself, the digitizations seem very useful in themselves. They are detailed enough, and supported by enough metadata that I could easily imagine a scholarly interest being satisfied without having to move on to the physical objects themselves.

British Library treasures in full: Magna Carta

British Library treasures in full: Magna Carta

This online exhibition by the British Library is part of the "Treasures in Full" section on the Library's website, which provides digital versions of important British texts in their entirety. Also included in this group are Caxton's Chaucer, two copies of the Gutenberg Bible, and 93 copies of 21 quarto versions of the plays of Shakespeare.

Collection Principles: The purpose of the "Treasures in Full" exhibition seems to be to share with the public some of the most important and popular holdings of the British Library. Additionally, these works all share the characteristic of being rare; there are only four surviving copies of the original drafting of the Magna Carta in 1215. If the purpose of this online digital collection is to share these resources with the world, why, then, is the Treasures in Full homepage so difficult to get to from the British Library main page? I bookmarked the Magna Carta page when I first found it, which is lucky since I was unable to find it again from the BL homepage. From the BL homepage, you have to navigate to the Online Gallery page, then click on the "Showcases" link where you choose "Historical Texts" from the list of collections, then click on "Magna Carta," which takes you to a description of the Magna Carta with a single image of the document. If you look to the right you will see a link that says "Treasures in Full" under the heading "Tell Me More." This will take you to the "Treasures in Full" Magna Carta page. From there you can click on the "Other Treasures in Full" link to find the rest of the documents in this collection. If there is a more direct way to find the "Treasures in Full" homepage, I was not able to find it. The British Library does attend, however, to intellectual property issues. At the bottom of each page of the "Treasures in Full" exhibition are the links "Disclaimer," "Copyright," and "Privacy."

Object Characteristics: The "Treasures in Full" site for the Magna Carta allows you to manipulate the digital version of this single-page document by zooming. There is the capability to move to the next image once you have zoomed in, but you cannot actually pan. This is a bit frustrating, since, if you have zoomed in as far as possible, moving to the adjacent images causes you to lose your place. These capabilities are perfectly suitable for the purpose of this digital object, and absolutely spectacular for anyone who wants to examine the document in more detail but can't manage to make it the British Library. In fact, you can examine the document in greater detail in its digital manifestation than in its physical one. The more you zoom, the lower the quality of the digital image. 4x zoom is the limit, and at this point the image is already quite fuzzy. You probably wouldn't want to zoom in any further without a higher resolution digital image. Also provided is an English translation of the Latin text. The "Treasures in Full" homepage does not provide any information on how these documents were digitized, when they were digitized, or any other information related to the digital objects as objects in themselves. Neither was I able to find any information about this on the Online Gallery homepage or the British Library website main page.

Metadata: The only metadata related to the digital object is the statement underneath it that indicates that its copyright belongs to the British Library Board. If you click on the image to zoom in, you are given instructions on how to use the viewer with which the document is presented. On the "Treasures in Full" Magna Carta page no information is provided about the physical object. However, if you find the Magna Carta page under the "Historical Texts" link from the "Showcases" page of the Online Gallery, the image of the Magna Carta there is from BL Cotton MS Augustus II. 106. However, since the British Library has two copies of the Magna Carta, one cannot be sure if the digitial object in the "Treasures in Full" exhibition is also BL Cotton MS Augustus II. 106. As previously mentioned, information on copyright and terms of use are provided via the links at the foot of the pages.

Intended Audience: I think that the general public is the intended audience for this digital version of the Magna Carta. It's purpose seems to be to showcase one of the library's most important holdings, to share it with a community that is not limited to those who can physically visit the Library. This digital object is intended for the use of anyone and everyone, for those people who are looking for it particularly and for those who just happen to come accross it. This digital version of the Magna Carta is clearly not intended for intense scholarly use. For example, the poor resolution at high magnification suggests that the Library did not have paleographers in mind when they chose how to digitize the document. That does not mean, however, that this digital version of the Magna Carta is entirely useless to scholars. It does provide a way for anyone to have access to this important document in way that they cannot have access to the physical object.

Travelers in the Middle East Archive

The Travelers in the Middle East Archive is a collection of digital images documenting travels by Westerners to Egypt during the 19th and 20th centuries. In addition to images of photographs and hand-drawn pictures, the collection includes historical and GIS (Geographic Information Systems) maps, museum catalogs, and travel publications.

Although the title of the collection reads “Middle East,” the creators have so far focused on Egypt, as that country was most popular with foreign travelers. The site is run through Rice University and they have digitized materials from their university as well as the Houston Public Library and the University of South Florida Library. The creators chose documents that provide key texts by leading scholars in Egyptology, including rare materials. Where appropriate, they included multiple editions to enable comparative work. They also sought out a wide range of documents, all within the public domain.

The creators wish to provide as much metadata as possible to scholars. They have used the Dublin Core standard throughout because of its versatility. One can browse or search by place name (or on a Google map), title, creator, type, or date. The search tool yields thumbnail views of the search results along with creator and date information and excerpt of their descriptions. After selecting a given document, the page provides in-depth metadata.

According to the website, they scanned the objects using “a Betterlight scanning back with a Rodenstock lens, TTI copy stand, and TTI book cradle to capture the highest quality scans and minimize wear and tear on the original books and artifacts. Images are scanned at 24-bit color, 600 dpi, while text pages are scanned at 400 dpi, 24-bit color.” Text is encoded with TEI-Lite to enable better access by scholars.

Under “Scope and Scholarly Objectives” in the “About” section, the creators identify their target audience. First, they wish to reach scholars from a variety of disciplines and backgrounds, as this site provides wide-ranging research material. They are also interested in teachers and students. They include educational modules to facilitate this use. They also welcome museum professionals, contemporary travelers, and digitization professionals interested in collaboration.

American Indians of The Pacific Northwest Database

American Indians of The Pacific Northwest Database



The American Indians of The Pacific Northwest Database is an online collection of materials from various libraries and collections that include the University of Washington Libraries, University of Washington Faculty and University Departments. The collection consists mainly of photographs but includes other materials such as associated texts and commentaries of objects, as well as maps.

The Objective of the project is allow greater access to these collections for patrons that otherwise not be able to gain access to these materials. The Collections also states that one of the main users that they have focused on is k-12 teachers and students. As such the photo collection policy asses the usefulness of the objects specifically to to K-12 teachers and students. The collection also is focused on materials that predate 1920, and have made it a goal to not display similar content such as photographs that are similar in content and theme. As for the collected texts, the function of the selected texts were to compliment photographs in some manner of form. The Criteria for selecting texts was to only display content that was free of copyright or other rights management problems.

All photographs were digitized into Jpeg format very basic and stable format. Resolutions ranged from 600 to 400 dots per inch, according to image size. The texts were digitized into GIF format using flatbed scanners and in varying resolutions in both color and greyscale. The authenticity and uncorrupted state of the documented is exhibted by way of the documents resemblance to what one would encounter if they were to view the document in person. The commentary that was written on the photographs shows that this is an actual document that has not been manipulated or corrupted . Although the site states that the images were edited using adobe photoshop but fails to clarify what was edited.

with active links to search It is fairly obvious that the creators of this database made great effort to properly organize and define the characteristics of the collection. The Meta-data for this collection allows users to view associated subject descriptorssimilar objects that fall under the defined categories, Metadata concerning restrictions, format, associated place names, and document type are stated with each object. Also, the creators have included metadata about the object's physical identifiers so that one may look up and request items in person.

The Bear Flag Museum

The Bear Flag Museum is dedicated to the state flag of California.

This online museum has a variety of content related to the state flag. They include historical images, contemporary artwork, historical quotes and chronology of the flag, flag trivia, and rules and statutes for flying the flag. This digital collection is a museum online only, the website is based on the inspiration of California resident Bill Trenkel. This "museum" doesn't have any actual physical holdings.
The gallery section contains a variety of images: various versions of the flag, maps, political cartoons, photographs, etc. The quality of some of these images is not very good, and there's no option to further enlarge the image or zoom in. The purpose of the galleries seems to be merely to provide images for the slideshow on the homepage. The graphics section contains selected artwork from a featured artist. These images are at least larger in size, and therefore are able to show more detail in the artwork.

The metadata for the gallery images is weak, it's sort of hit or miss. Some images list a description, date, and dimenstions, other images merely list a title or the website address of where the image came from. "Item for sale on EBay" is the only info listed at all for several of the images. The artwork in the graphics section has better metadata, listing the title, year, dimensions, and the mediums used to create the art.

This website is very user friendly for the general public. Anyone curious about the California state flag would find this website an interesting resource. Anyone wanting to do serious research would need to take advantage of the bibliography and links provided on the website.

Huntington Library

Treasures of the Huntington Library

http://www.huntington.org/LibraryDiv/LibImages.html

The Huntington Library is not in the business of sharing its collection with the general public. Only PhD’s and PhD candidates are invited to apply for reading room privileges so much of their collection stays on its shelves. Where it seems they like it.

Collection Principles:

Being that the collection is not accessible to the common person I was expecting the online branch of their collection to be wide so that the general public could enjoy it. Not really. The Huntington boasts of housing 5,400 incunabula (2^nd only to the Library of Congress) and thousands of other rare books yet only digitized 16 images of various books and manuscripts. There is no introduction or background information about the images nor is their selection explained. They even have a microfilm copy of the Dead Sea Scrolls (written between 200 B.C. and A.D. 68) – a major attraction, but no images. Nothing.

Metadata:

There is metadata provided with each digitized object: title, author, what material the text was printed on (only listed twice), place of publication and date. There also appears to be what might be the item’s call number.

Object Characteristics:

Each digitized image is a thumbnail that can be enlarged. The images are of manuscripts, rare books and black and white photographs. Some images appear to be scanned (color) others appear to have been images taken by a digital camera. File format is unknown – jpeg, tiff???

Who is the intended audience?

Everyone the Huntington wants to keep away from their reading room. The Huntington doesn’t seem too concerned with sharing its collection at the library or on their webpage.

Colorado Digitization Project

For my second blog I will discuss the Colorado Digitization Project, which is an attempt to coordinate the resources of myriad archives, historical societies, museums and libraries statewide in an effort to provide the most wide ranging possible collection of Colorado-focused digital objects.

Selection Procedure: The digital objects in the Colorado Digitization project cover 22 different topics, form cattle trails to tourism, one of which is sports. The overall project has links to photographs, maps, documents, and sound recordings. Under the category sports the user can select from 10 different avocations. I chose to look at baseball. There are 781 records under the topic baseball. The images are nearly all in Colorado repositories, but some reside in Utah.

Object Characteristics: At least in the baseball section of the project, black and white images seem to dominate. The ability to manipulate them varies by the institution, though I could not find any that I could enlarge by clicking on them. However, all the images can be saved or printed, and many can be ordered as photographs, just like at the New York Public Library Transit collection which I blogged on previously.

Metadata: Depends on the institution in which the record is found. The first image of the Parker, Colorado baseball team is from the Douglas County History Research Center and has an extensive caption naming all the people on the team, telling the dates, and even mentioning who likely provided the names. An image number is provided as well. There are also links present to help the user browse images from all over Douglas County. Another image that has the logo of the Colorado Digitization Project on its page has metadata including image content, image approximate date, image number, the repository in which it resides, a caption, and links the user can type into their web browser to see thumbnail or enlarged views. One problem with the digitization project is that it uses so many different institutions. For instance, some links to images from the Lafayette, Colorado Library returned an error 404 not found message, so obviously keeping up with all of the repositories involved is a challenge. Nevertheless, I believe it is a challenge worth taking in an effort to provide the widest ranging digital collection possible. A few of the images are from the collection of the Marriott Library at the University of Utah, indicating that the Colorado Digitization Project, while focused on in-state organizations, does not feel compelled to get every image from within Colorado's borders.

Intended Audience: I believe that given both the wide range of topics and of institutions that the Colorado Digitization Project subsumes, that its audience is the public, foremost of Colorado, and secondly on the internet. Coloradans are likely to have the most interest because these are records relating to their home state, whether from state, county or city archives, libraries, or museums. But any user interested in the people and history of Colorado can benefit from the breadth of topics that the objects in the Colorado Digitization Project cover. Since many links to each image allows the user to go to the homepage of the repository in which that image resides, the way the Digitization Project is constructed allows for great possibilities of discovery with regard to the inhabitants and heritage of the state of Colorado, both for residents and others.

A.I.R. Gallery Online

A.I.R. Gallery Online
The A.I.R Gallery was founded in 1972 as the first artist-run, not-for-profit gallery for women artists in the US. It's mission is to advance the status of women artists.

1. selection decisions: They seem to have digitized any artist that has had a work of art in their gallery at one time or another. The list of artists is pretty long and is broken up into New York City Artists, National Artists, Gallery Alumnae. All of the artists are women.

2. metadata: The A.I.R site doesn't provide much of anything in the way of metadata but many of the works have links to the artist's homepage and there you can find the date and size of the artwork as well as other works by the artist.

3. You are allowed to zoom in to each picture but some of the zoomed in versions seem a little fuzzy. Maybe it's just my eyes. Also, you were allowed to zoom in really close for some works but not as close with others. I liked how on all of the pages there was a scrolling marque of works at the bottom. That was helpful if you were just happened upon the site and wanted to see what they had but you were not familiar with any of the artists. Also, I liked how they often provided the links to the artist homepage so you can further explore any one particular artist.

4. The intended audience is anyone who likes women artists or who has been to the gallery itself and would like to see works from past exhibits.

The 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and Fire

The 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and Fire

This online exhibit features a sampling of the resources that the National Archives - Pacific Region has pertaining to this historic natural disaster. It retells the events through primary sources such as meeting minutes, telegrams, and case files. With the exception of the front page of the website, it is composed almost entirely of scanned images of these items.

Selection Decisions

On the Introduction page of the website it states that all of the items featured in the exhibit are "from the files created or received by Federal agencies in or around San Francisco at the time of the disaster." Though they do not speak to why they chose to display these particular items on the website, my guess would be to achieve as well-rounded and succinct a sampling as possible in an effort to advertise the variety of material contained in their archives.

Metadata

With each thumbnail is listed the title of the item, the name and location of the creating entity, and the date. There is also a brief statement regarding what the item details and how it contributes to the broader story of the disaster. In addition, the physical location of the item within the National Archives is listed in the event that one should want to request it for further research.

Object Characteristics

The exhibit is set up to be more or less chronological, with items detailing the disaster being followed by those pertaining to the immediate aftermath, and finally the rebuilding period that ensued in the weeks thereafter. Each thumbnail leads to a larger size image of the scanned item. However, there is no zoom feature, which would be helpful since some of the materials are not in the best shape and can be hard to decipher (for example, the linked image above). One is able to order copies of the records. However, they encourage one to do so in person, as it is easier to do so with exact citations.

Intended Audience

The audience is the general public who may be interested in the history of San Francisco, specifically the 1906 disaster, or who are interested in what the National Archives has to offer on the subject. Accompanying each larger image is a link leading to further resources pertaining not only to San Francisco earthquake, but the National Archives in general.

Rivers, Edens, Empires: Lewis & Clark and the Revealing of America

Rivers, Edens, Empires: Lewis & Clark and the Revealing of America

This Library of Congress online exhibition gives a prologue and is split into three segments: before, during, and after the Lewis & Clark Expedition of 1805-1806. A physical exhibit occurred in the past (when is not immediately clear). The online exhibition showcases a portion of what was displayed in the physical exhibit. The online exhibit includes a virtual tour and a handful of Flash animations.

Selection Decisions:

Many of the physical objects they had to work with are maps so the collection is heavy on cartographic materials. There are also photographs of some interesting artifacts from the expedition like tomahawks and guns. They chose to digitize and display a cross-section of materials that clustered around the themes they wanted to highlight: cartographic formulation and mapping of the Western frontier, “discovering diplomacy” (relations with the Native Americans), botanical specimens, early survey photographs, etc. It’s hard to tell what percentage of the total physical exhibition got digitized, largely because there are not hyperlinks from the object checklist to the digitized objects where they do exist.

Metadata:

Title, date, author, subject, medium, and any additional info are included. The metadata doesn’t follow a clear structure and isn’t particularly easy to read/digest. This is probably what leads to the issues I found with the search function, which has no advanced options and did well on some full-text searches and missed on others.

Object Characteristics:

Maps, document, and photos of artifacts are jpgs. The ability to enlarge is hit and miss and they don’t allow viewing of much detail. The exception is the maps. They can be enlarged at 6 different levels of zoom. A navigator view allows dragging of the viewing box to the portion of interest. There is the option of downloading a very large MrSID file but when I tried, there was no program on my computer that knew how to open it.

Audience:

The audience is the general public that is interested in the history of North America. There is a special section about making it more interesting for children and sections “especially for teachers” and “especially for students.” Serious scholarly research does not seem possible with most of the materials except maybe with some of the zoomable maps.

Soviet Poster Collection

This week, I looked at Swarthmore College's Soviet Poster Collection. It is a collection of Soviet propaganda posters from three different periods of active collection for the purpose of building Swarthmore College's Peace Collection. About half of the posters refer to maternal and child health issues, and the other half promote Stalin's Five Year Plans. This is part of the Triptych digitization project of Bryn Mawr, Haverford, and Swarthmore Universities.

Selection Decisions: They've seemingly digitized the entire collection, as far as I can tell from the collection description. They've digitized posters of all conditions, so preservation doesn't appear to be a primary motivation. The Peace Collection itself was created for the purpose of promoting peaceful social action strategies by displaying artifacts of such action around the world (apparently, the collectors weren't yet aware of how Stalin went about enacting his Plans), so I might guess that this collection has been digitized to increase awareness of the project and collection.

Metadata: The metadata is very descriptive for each poster. The database provides the English translation of the entire text on the poster, along with as many descriptive facts as known about the item. In addition, it also provides the condition and location of the original. The majority of key words in the description are links which take the user to a search of that specific keyword within the collection, which I think is a really useful tool. Unfortunately, it's not possible to search by any Russian keywords, so if anyone is interested in doing a more exact search for Russian language use, this database is not useful. Also, there is no specific metadata about the digital object, like pixel specifics, or about the project itself.

Characteristics of the Digital Object: The big disappointment of this digitization project is that it's not possible to enlarge the images, and the quality of the scans is generally low, so there's a huge loss of clarity. Many of these posters have lots of small print that it is impossible to see with the image quality that's provided. So, if a user is researching to read the Russian text or view the detail of the pictures, this site is largely not of use. Any really in-depth study would thus require hands-on contact with the original.

Intended Audience: As I mentioned above, the intended audience of the Peace Collection is probably the general public, with the purpose of educating about social change. I would say that this collection would be useful for scholars of history, women's studies, and Russian studies, but the low quality of imaging doesn't ever allow for really in-depth study. So, this is probably just a general exhibit about certain social issues within Soviet history.

Greetings! A Pictorial History of Minnesota through the Postcard

“Greetings! A Pictorial History of Minnesota through the Postcard” contains samples from a physical exhibit currently on display at the Minnesota Historical Society in St. Paul, Minnesota. The exhibit contains postcards, mainly from the first half of the 20th century, of scenes from various locations and activities common in Minnesota. It is one of about 13 exhibits presently available on the website, though past exhibits are also available.

Approximately 400 postcards are present in the physical exhibit; thumbnails of 72 of these are available online. All of the images were taken from the MHS holdings. They appear to have been chosen to represent different geographical areas of the state, as well as well as different time periods. The subject matter differs as well. Some of the images were chosen because they depict specific locations or events, but others were chosen because they show important economic activities in the state.

On the main page of the exhibit, one has the opportunity to look at postcards of scenes from three broad categories: One has images from various cities and towns around the state of Minnesota, one has images featuring various tourist destinations and celebrations held in the state, and one features scenes from various significant industries in the state – mining, lumbering, and transportation. Also on the main page, one is able to send e-cards with images from a small sample of postcards.

Once the viewer clicks on one of these categories, they are presented with thumbnail images of postcards. Clicking on a thumbnail brings up a larger version of the image. The images are arranged in groups of eight. By clicking on one image in each group, a viewer can look at each image within that group by clicking on buttons for previous or next images.

The metadata is limited. When one clicks on the thumbnail image, the viewer gets, in addition to a somewhat larger image, a very brief description, the collection at the MHS where the image came from, the date of the image, and the “Location number”, which appears to be an item number that has been assigned to each image.

In addition to the thumbnails, a viewer of the website can search the MHS Visual Resources Database, where she can gain access to the entire list of cataloged postcards at the MHS. Visitors to the website can search by date of postcard, or conduct more advanced searches. More complete metadata is available when doing this. One is also able to view thumbnails, and, if desired, a larger version of the images found here. This is the really valuable part of the exhibit. True online research is possible when using this tool.

The images available online are not high quality. However, this appears to be the case so that viewers will not be able to print images they find. One does have the option of purchasing copies of images they find online. A price list of various products offered, including different sized prints as well as scans, is available. The MHS also charges for the type of use, such as personal, commercial, educational, or publication in various different types of media and size of publications.

The intended audience is, not surprisingly, Minnesota residents from throughout the state. This can include both casual users who are interested in browsing, and researchers who want images for various uses.

I found the exhibit to be very effective. An attention-grabbing mix of subject matter has the ability to pique the interest of most viewers. It was obviously well-designed, with input from a number of different divisions within the organization.