October 2nd - Speaking with IT about NOMA's digital asset management capabilities

Today there were a few little hiccups to iron out. I went back and cropped all of SB3 after looking at old spreadsheet entries and realizing the "Extent" field varied greatly in dimensions in the past; when I and Maureen arrived here, however, the most recent entries had been un-cropped, with the default Extent being 5120xXXXX. I reviewed the guiding document set up by previous interns and realized that we and someone preceding us had not been cropping the files at all, but it had been outlined to do so in the document. Sometime words are hard ;)!

I talked to Seth today about the NOMA collection asset management and Web display, as Sheila was concerned that implementing Subject headings in the spreadsheet might interfere with the museum's art collection's digital access goals in the future. Seth explained to me that NOMA is working on implementing Piction for internal asset management and public Website collections, and the library was welcome to hop on in NOMA's second wave of implementation in a year or so to add a collection for the scrapbooks. The nice thing about Piction is that specific file groups, such as, say, the scrapbooks, can customize their own metadata spreadsheets however they like! So if LDL and CONTENTdm do not prove to be the content management system where the scrapbooks are ultimately made accessible, Piction can easily be adapted to the spreadsheet we are creating, and vice-versa. It proved a wonderful back-up plan if LDL can't start offering free hosting in the future, which is one of the necessities for the NOMA scrapbook project.

I then tackled the creation of a mini style guide for our collection. I added it into the existing Scrapbook project guide, which now looks something like this under the fields/elements explanation:

Field Explanations:

1.      Relation [formerly Related Item type=host; required field for LDL] : What is this file from? Scrapbook #, page #

2.      Extent : Pixel size of file. Can be accessed by viewing properties on image file.

3.      Object File Name : File name must match the image file name, with .jpg added on in the spreadsheet field.

4.      Title [required by LDL] : Title and subtitles of articles. Space on either side of “:” if used. If no title is given, create title that summarizes article.

5.      Creator (Author) : The author of the article; leave blank if unknown.

6.      Description : A 1-3 sentence summary of the article.

7.      Publisher : Newspaper publisher (New Orleans States, The Times-Picayune, New Orleans Item-Tribune…) If unknown, leave blank.

8.      Date Issued : year-month-day (1930-01-12). You should be able to gauge the year if nothing else, so just that is fine.

9.      Subjects : This field can be left blank if you do not have experience with subject cataloging. Any proper noun—a unique person, place, or thing—or other LCSH/Authority Files, TGM, TGN or AAT subject mentioned in the article. Regina is currently pulling terms of interest and placing them in the Word document Finding Aids, so you can always check those for potential subject terms to search these sources for, or to add to our unique controlled vocabulary spreadsheet (more on that below). If you have experience with subject cataloging, here are further directions:

a.       The four main standardized subject sources you should consult and choose from are as follows:

                                                              i.      LCSH (Library of Congress Subject Headings) and Name Authority Files  http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects.html

                                                           ii.      AAT (Getty’s Art & Architecture Thesaurus) http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/vocabularies/aat/

                                                         iii.      TGN (Getty’s Thesaurus of Geographic Names) http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/vocabularies/tgn/

                                                         iv.      TGM (Thesaurus for Graphic Materials) http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/tgm/

b.      If a subject heading is not available in any of the four standardized sources (LCSH/Authority Files, TGM, TGN or AAT), good catalogs to search for the person/place/thing include Tulane Howard-Tilton Memorial Library’s website (http://library.tulane.edu/); LSU Hill Memorial Library’s website (https://lsu.louislibraries.org/uhtbin/cgisirsi/?ps=HEAreU91ud/MIDL-MAIN/143570099/60/70/X); or New Orleans Public Library’s website (http://catalog.neworleanspubliclibrary.org/polaris/). You may copy and paste from their subject lists directly into the field.

c.      Some people, artworks, associations, and other proper nouns will not be findable in any of the sources mentioned, but should still be made into subjects for our purposes. If this is the case, please create a new subject according to AACR2 formatting and add it to the Excel spreadsheet “NOMA Scrapbook Controlled Vocabulary”, located in the NOMA SCRAPBOOKS -> Images folder.

d.      Separate each subject you enter into this field with a semicolon and a space, e.g.:            Degas, Edgar, 1834-1917; oil paint (paint); Impressionism (Art)

e.       Make sure the format for each subject is EXACTLY THE SAME for every item you add it to, or they will not link to one another when the project is finally uploaded to LDL or Piction.

f.         ALWAYS check the “NOMA Scrapbook Controlled Vocabulary” spreadsheet AFTER the other sources, but BEFORE you attempt to create your own subjects, and always save new subjects to the spreadsheet.

10.  conditionNotes : Make any notes about deteriorations in the article that have made text unreadable, such as “page torn” or “ink rubbed off”

11.  Internet Media Type : What is this item? Probably “Text”, “Still Image” or “Text, Still Image”

12.  Format : JPEG

13.  Identifier (required by LDL) : Always type: See "reference url" on the navigation bar.

14.  Source (required by LDL) : Always type: Felix J. Dreyfous Library (https://noma.org/learn/felix-j-dreyfous-library/) (unless the URL for the library’s page on the NOMA website has changed; if so, please update).

15.  Language : This is probably “en” for English. Sometimes “fr” for French. Optional.

16.  physicalLocation: Isaac Delgado Museum of Art, New Orleans Museum of Art

17.  Coverage-Spatial : New Orleans (La.)

18.  Rights : Always type: Physical rights are retained by The Felix J. Dreyfous Library. Copyright is retained in accordance with U.S. Copyright laws

19.  Contact Info (required by LDL) : SCork@NOMA.org

20.  Image Resolution : “600 dpi”

21.  Color Mode : Color

22.  Hardware : What did you use to scan the articles? Most likely the VuPoint Magic Wand.

23.  Digitized by : Who scanned the item? If unknown, leave blank.

24.  Digitized date : Fill in date of scan, if known. Some of this information may be available in Regina’s finding aids.

It's huge, eh? At least it'll be more up to snuff, if it can be completed!

I realize now that my favored subject for my capstone paper for the Certificate in Archives and Special Collections will most likely concern digital archives, with focuses on images, metadata, and management and display systems. It could possibly have much to do with what I've learned at both practicums, in terms of management, workflow, and choices.