Resources for the Teacher
ARL Preservation of Research Library Materials Committee. “Recognizing Digitization as a Preservation Reformatting Method,” May 2004.
A statement prepared by members of the ARL Preservation of Research Library Materials Committee, recognizing and encouraging use of digitization for preservation purposes. Includes excellent bibliography and appendixes of guidelines, standards, and the like. Instructor should also read Microform and Imaging Review 33, no. 4 (Fall 2004), which comprises responses from preservation experts to the ARL statement.
Baker, Nicholson. “Deadline: The Author’s Desperate Bid to Save America’s Past.” The New Yorker, July 24, 2000, pp. 42–61.
———. Double Fold. New York: Random House, 2001.
An opinionated investigation into what the author sees as the deception of research libraries and the preservation of their book and newspaper collections. Baker argues that reformatting costs are far more than storing the originals, and that the replacement of originals with surrogates undermines scholarly use of books and newspapers.
Chapman, Stephen, Paul Conway, and Anne R. Kenney. Digital Imaging and Preservation Microfilm: The Future of the Hybrid Approach for the Preservation of Brittle Books (DRAFT). Washington, D.C.: Council on Library and Information Resources.
Elkington, Nancy E., ed. RLG Preservation Microfilming Handbook. Mountain View, Calif.: Research Libraries Group, Inc., March 1992. Read “Overview” and “Terms” sections.
A superb resource for everything to do with preservation microfilming.
Fox, Lisa L., ed. Preservation Microfilming: A Guide for Librarians and Archivists, 2nd ed. Chicago: American Library Association, 1996.
Gwinn, Nancy E., ed. Preservation Microfilming: A Guide for Librarians and Archivists. Chicago: American Library Association, 1987.
Hazen, Dan, Jeffrey Horrell, and Jan Merrill-Oldham. Selecting Research Collections for Digitization. Washington, D.C.: Council on Library and Information Resources, August 1998.
Smith, Abby. Why Digitize? Washington, D.C.: Council on Library and Information Resources, February 1999.
An older resource that is still very relevant. This paper was written in response to discussion of digitization at meetings of the National Humanities Alliance. NHA asked CLIR to evaluate the experiences of cultural institutions with digitization projects and to summarize what had been learned. Smith, in 1999, suggested that digitization provides lots of access but is not preservation — “at least not yet.”
Weissman Preservation Center, Harvard University Library. Principles for Reformatting Collections, September 2002.
Succinctly outlines the guiding principles for reformatting analog collection materials.
Digital Capture and Evaluation
The following resources provide a basis for understanding the guidelines, best practices, and standards applicable to digital capture and evaluation.
Association of Moving Image Archivists. Fact Sheet 7. Reformatting for Preservation: Understanding Tape Formats and Other Conversion Issues, 2003.
California Digital Library. Best Practices for Image Capture? Version 2.0, November 2005.
Colet, Linda Serenson, Donald D’Amato, Franziska Frey, and Don Williams. Guides to Quality in Visual Resource Imaging. Washington, D.C.: Council on Library and Information Resources, July 2000.
Colorado Digitization Program, Digital Audio Working Group. Digital Audio Best Practices Version 2.0, November 2005.
Digital Library Federation, Benchmark Working Group (2001–2002). Benchmark for Faithful Reproduction of Monographs and Serials Version 1, 2002.
Fells, Nick, Pauline Donarchy, and Catherine Owen. Creating Digital Audio Resources: A Guide to Best Practices. Arts and Humanities Data Service.
Kenney, Anne R., and Oya Rieger. Moving Theory into Practice: Digital Imaging Tutorial. Mountain View, Calif.: Research Libraries Group, 2002–2003.
See Class 10: Creating Sustainable Digital Collections, Part 1: Digital Issues for annotation of monograph on this topic. Both resources need to be updated but remain excellent touchstones.
Reilly, James M., and Franziska S. Frey. Recommendations for the Evaluation of Digital Images Produced from Photographic, Microphotographic, and Various Paper Formats, Report to the Library of Congress, May 1996.