Introduction to scanning and organizing digital photographs.
1. Introduction to Scanning and
Organizing Digital Photographs
Mariecris Gatlabayan
Archivist, Archives and Special Collections
Consortium Library, UAA/APU
2. Technology and Teams
• Scanning stations
• Get to know team members
– Why are you interested in scanning
photographs?
– What types of photographic materials will you be
scanning?
– What is the most important thing you want to
learn or take away from this workshop?
– Come up with a team name
Great minds thinking together can up with some
great answers!
5. Q1
Which provides a better quality, “zoomable,” image
taken with a 35mm camera? Make a case for the
option chosen.
*Second rule of digitization club: Your scan will only be as good as the
original.
a) 35 mm negative
b) photographic print
c) scanned image, jpeg
d) scanned image, tiff
*First rule of digitization club: Keep the original.
6. • When scanning photographic materials, the scanner can
only capture detail that is there.
• Similarly, when printing an image on paper it can only
reflect the image captured on the negative.
• While the negative can only capture what the negative is
capable of capturing.
• With math and software, like Photoshop, you can edit a
photograph or try to draw-out details from a photograph.
7. Q2
Put the media formats in order of more permanent to
least permanent? I.e. which will retain its original look
the longest? Which has the shortest life span?
a) Polaroid photo
b) JPEG on a burned CD
c) 35 mm color slide
d) JPEG on your computer hard
drive
8. Q2
Put the media formats in order of more “permanent”
to least “permanent?” I.e. which will retain its original
look the longest? Which has the shortest life span?
c) 35 mm color slide (stable color photographic process)
a) Polaroid photo (Image will be retained as long as kept in dark,
dry, cool storage. Will, however, develop a yellow stain in time.)
b) JPEG on a burned CD (7-15 years)
d) JPEG on your computer hard drive (30-50 years)
9. Digitization is not
preservation!
Shocking Truth about Thin-skinned
CDs, February 22, 2011. Family oral
history using digital tools.
http://familyoralhistory.us/news/v
iew/shocking_truth_about_thin-
skinned_cds/
11. Digitization is access and use!
Publications
• Articles, books,
websites, etc.
• Exhibits
• Marketing
• Film productions
• Art
http://www.consortiumli
brary.org/blogs/archive
s/2009/07/10/creative-
archives/
12. Digitization is access and use!
Reduce physical handling
of fragile or fading
photographs
Members of the Copper and Tanana Rivers Expedition,
1885. Fred Wildon Fickett papers. Archives and Special
Collections, Consortium Library, University of Alaska
Anchorage.
13. Why the quotes on “permanent”?
When you use the term permanent with respect to digital
storage, there is always a caveat. Permanent means
“permanent until the next migration.” That’s because there
really is no such thing as permanent digital storage. Hard
drives will wear out or become obsolete. Optical discs will
also eventually fail or become obsolete. In fact migration of
storage devices should probably happen every few years,
and almost certainly no longer than five years.
The file naming, and folder structure of your storage is a
different story. This is called the logical structure of the
archive, and if it’s designed well, it should be able to last a
long time before any migration.”
- Quote from dpBestflow: “Archives”
http://www.dpbestflow.org/file-lifecycle/archive
14. Q3
The best way to organize your
photographs is by:
a) People
b) Photographer
c) Date
d) How you know you
are going to find it
15. Q4
a)
Which image
has the highest
resolution? The
highest *ppi.
*ppi: pixels per inch
16. Q4
b)
Which image
has the highest
resolution? The
highest ppi.
17. Q4
The answer is b.
Image a is 72 ppi and 6.6
inches x 8.4inches.
Image b is 300 ppi and 6
inches by 7.5 inches.
18. Q5
What is the minimum resolution, or
dpi*, an image should have when
printing it out on paper?
a) 600 dpi
b) 300 dpi
c) 150 dpi
d) 72 dpi
*dpi: dots per inch
19. Q6
Bit depth refers to
a) The number of pixels per image
b) Range of colors represented in
photo
c) Number of bytes per image file
d) Depth represented in 3d images
20. Burning vs. Calculating Images
• Images captured on film are „burned‟ into a
photosensitive emulsion.
• Images captured digitally or scanned are made using
math.
– Color values are calculated into
• Bits of bytes: 0s and 1s
• Digits for digitization
– Images are put together with pixels
• Resolution= pixels per inch (ppi)
• The higher the resolution, the more pixels per inch, the
more fine detail, and the bigger the file
21. Q7
Which scanner is better suited
for scanning slides?
a) Canon CanoScan 9000F Color
Image Scanner
b) Epson B11B178011 Perfection
V700 Photo Scanner
c) Braun Multimag Slide Scanner
4000 for 35mm Transparencies
22. Q7
Scanner a and b are flatbed scanners that have the capability to
scan slides. If you have a large number of slides to scan, you may
be interested in option b which can do 12 slides, rather than option
a. It all depends on the size of your scanning project.
a) Canon CanoScan 9000F Color Image Scanner
b) Epson B11B178011 Perfection V700 Photo Scanner
For preservation purposes, option c is not a good option for
scanning slides. Unlike a flatbed scanner in which a slide lies still and
the scanner does all the work, this scanner has the slides moving
which increases the possibility of slides getting stuck or damaged in
the process.
c) Braun Multimag Slide Scanner 4000 for 35mm Transparencies
23. Q8
I should refresh (i.e. transfer my files) to a new
medium (includes hard drive, CD) every:
a) 6 months
b) Year
c) 5 years
d) When I get a new
computer
24. Q9
To ensure long term access to photographs taken
with a digital camera, it is best to save the
downloaded image as
a) The camera's raw format
b) Pdf-A
c) Jpeg
d) tiff
25. Q10
How many copies of scanned or born-digital image
should you save?
a) 5
b) 4
c) 3 (3-2-1 rule: 3 copies. 1
access copy. 2
preservation copies.
d) 2
27. • What do you want to scan?
– Are you scanning family photos? What events are the
typical subjects or contents of the photographs?
Birthdays? Vacations?
• Why do you want to scan your photographic
materials? What will they be used for?
– Help determine what format and resolution you should
save your access copy.
• Where do you want to store them?
– Make sure you have the media to save the preservation
copy, a back-up copy, and an access copy.
28. Basic steps of digitization, organizing, editing,
and preserving images.
Before Digitization
• Select images for digitization.
• Figure out how you want to organize images. What categories do they naturally fall in?
Can you organize them by date, photographer, event? What arrangement will work best
for you to find images.
• Put the photographic materials in the order/arrangement you plan to save the digitized
images.
• Determine a naming convention for the file names. Also start thinking about tags you
would use to describe your photos.
Digitization
• Scan images using technical details outlined in slide 31.
• Create 3 copies of the file. Save 2 preservation copies tiffs: 1 on your computer and the
other on a CD, flash drive, external hard drive, or cloud server etc. And save 1 access
copy (usually a high resolution jpeg) that you will edit and make copies from to share with
family and friends.
After Digitization
• Add your tags, captions, and extra description using Windows Explorer, Picasa, Adobe
Lightroom, or any other organizing software.
• Start editing photos using the access copy.
29. What do you want to scan?
• What are the major groupings reflected in the
photos?
• Recommend organizing by date an image was
taken or date downloaded.
– Ex. Save photos to different folders, different „buckets.‟
Folder title like 1950s, 1960s, 2010s. Can breakdown
hierarchy further by year… like 1951, 1952, 1953, etc.
30. Create a naming
convention/structure
Naming convention for photo:
year-descriptive title.tiff
Description title should be short
and clear.
Differentiate different copies by
adding a “p” for preservation
copy and “a” for access copy.
P-198x-swimming-at-lake.tiff
A-198x-swimming-at-lake.jpeg
Take time to write down file
name for the photo you will be
scanning today. *Do not forget
that you can add extra
description by tagging the
photos.
31. Time to scan
• Open scanning software.
• Set it to professional scanning mode
or advanced scanner settings.
32. Scanning technical details
• Bit depth
– 8 bit grayscale for black and white images
– 24 bit color for color images
• Scan the image at a high resolution to preserve
detail:
– 600ppi for photographs
– 1200ppi for slides or negatives
• Dimensions:
– 4000 pixels on the longest side for photographs
– 4800 pixels on the longest side for slides or negatives
• Save as a tiff. Make preservation and access copy.
Save to appropriate media.
33. Editing and Tagging
• There are multiple photo editors and
organizing software.
• Freeware: Microsoft Windows Explorer,
Google Picassa, Apple iPhoto, and
Gimp (photo editor only).
• Software for purchase: Adobe
Elements, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe
Bridge, and Corel Ulead PhotoImpact.
34. Embedding
description/metadata with
Windows Explorer
• Open file in windows explorer
• Click on “Organize” “Properties” “Details”
• Fill in the different fields. Can include title, tags,
descriptions, subject, and comments.
• Limited searchability. Cannot search by the
different fields.
35. Editing with Google Picasa
• Can organize and edit photographs.
• Can share images on the web.
• Can create slide shows.
• Editing functions: cropping, resizing files,
clone/patch stamp to repair tears and
blemishes, and special photo effects.
• Download Picasa at:
http://picasa.google.com/
36. Editing with Adobe Photoshop
• To provide flexibility in editing, Photoshop uses layers.
• You can edit layers so if you decide later on that you
weren‟t sure about an edit you made 20 steps ago, you
can back and adjust it.
• Photoshop can do a lot of amazing things. But there is a
high learning curve and it can be pretty pricey. Consider
buying if you anticipate editing, manipulating, and
creating materials that integrate digital photographs.
• All is not lost! There are plenty of online tutorials to walk
you through your projects.
37. Scanning, editing, and organizing
photographs resources
• “Creating & Editing Digital Photos: Tips for Scanning & Restoring. By Kimberly Powell.”
http://genealogy.about.com/cs/digitalphoto/a/digital_photos.htm
• “Scanning Software, Tips and Help.”
http://graphicssoft.about.com/od/scanning/Scanning_Software_Tips_and_Help.htm
• “Adding Descriptions to Digital Photos: Your Gift to the Future.”
http://www.digitalpreservation.gov/multimedia/videos/personalarchiving-
photometadata.html ; pdf transcript:
http://www.digitalpreservation.gov/multimedia/documents/photometadata_script.pdf
• “Repairing and Restoring Damaged Photos in Photoshop.”
http://graphicssoft.about.com/od/photoshoptutorialsrepair/Repairing_and_Restoring_Da
maged_Photos_in_Photoshop.htm
• “Guides to Quality in Visual Resource Imaging: Selecting a scanner,” Don Williams. 2000
Council on Library and Information Resources. * This guide was mean for intuitions looking
to digitize materials.
http://www.oclc.org/research/publications/library/visguides/visguide2.html
• “Moving Theory into Practice: Digital Imaging Tutorial” Cornel University Library/Research
Department. *This tutorial was meant for institutions looking to digitize their materials.
http://www.library.cornell.edu/preservation/tutorial/contents.html
38. Photo preservation resources
• The Permanence and Care of Color Photographs: Traditional and Digital Color Prints,
Color Negatives, Slides, and Motion Pictures by Henry Wilhelm with contributing author
Carol Bower. http://www.wilhelm-research.com/book_toc.html
• “How Long Will Digital Storage Media Last.” Personal Digital Archiving Series. Library of
Congress.
http://www.digitalpreservation.gov/personalarchiving/documents/media_durability.pdf
• “Personal Archiving: Preserving Your Digital Memories: How to Preserve Your Own Digital
Materials.” Library of Congress
http://www.digitalpreservation.gov/personalarchiving/index.html
• Wilhelm Image Research: http://www.wilhelm-research.com/
• “Archive,” by Peter Krogh. dpBestFlow, http://www.dpbestflow.org/file-lifecycle/archive
• “File Format Migration.” by Peter Krogh. dpBestFlow.
http://www.dpbestflow.org/node/386
