This Reminds Me...

Two short articles.

From NPR's Picture Show: "Find Me A Dodo...". (This reminds me of a few requests I've gotten...)

From NPR's On The Media: "Librarians Gone Wild." (I can relate!)

I Revise and iPhoto

After a few discussions with archivists, the audio guidelines are complete at the Archives level. Next step-setting up meetings with the people in the library who will support the development of technology needed for this project.

The Archives just bought a new digital camera to take photos of exhibits, presentations, etc., so I spent some time with Library IT (computers are admin only privileges) who tried to get the software loaded on the virtual PC (it was PC-only) on my Mac to try and make things easier for my co-workers who aren't used to Macs.

After trying to get the virtual PC to recognize the camera, trying to get it the software to recognize the camera as an import location, trying to load the photos correctly (and many times of turning the camera on and off), he got it to work. We decided that the process will be much too confusing for anyone to easily learn (if I'm not around to load the photos), and decided iPhoto is a much better option. You plug in the camera, turn it on, iPhoto loads automatically, imports the photos where you want, and then you do whatever you want with them. Maybe these problems are Parallels-related, but if I've learned anything from working with Macs and PCs, it's that Macs do it better, and with fewer headaches!

I'm teaching the staff how to use iPhoto at next week's staff meeting.

Friday Productivity!

I started my second practicum student today, who was really excited about the photo collection (which made me super excited). I had her reading background information on Fred J. Maroon, and had her look over his 1990 CUA photo book, as well as browse the collection to visualize series. We discussed this afterwards, and unlike I and the rest of the staff thought, most of the vintage CUA prints are not from his time as a student, but apparently he did for-hire work for the Hartke Players on tour in the 1950s and 1960s, including some of their USO tours! I also covered photographic material handling. I'm going to start her on preventative preservation next Friday, and EAD the following week. She was really enjoying the gorgeous prints!

I guess all the excitement and positive vibes today shocked my brain into action because I was actually able to make sense of my technical information today, and wrote two sections of the Archives Procedural Manual for Audio Preservation today! I also took notes to include in the following three sections. I'm so glad I was able to make progress this week because I hit a wall last week. After I write this procedure, I need to present it to the supervisors, to see of the technical recommendations for the storage are achievable by CUA, and for their approval for implementation. I'm definitely pushing the barrier for the Archives.
(And to think, on Wednesday I was just happy that I was able to get the rogue reels transferred to the Archives...)

I Got Flowers :-)

Over the summer and during the beginning of last semester, I helped CUA Alum and author, with a book on the photographic history of CUA (I did a lot of scanning and metadata, and a little digging in unprocessed collections). Today, I received flowers and a thank you note, saying the book is going to be published May 17! Look for it from Arcadia books!

500 GB

I spent a large portion of the day transferring digital photos on 58 DVDs (full DVDs) (the Publications office saved their photos to DVDs each month) to my computer (500GB Mac) and to the Archives server. The reason I had to do this was that the between yesterday's accession and today's accession, I have used up about 500GB of space, and the Archives server needs additional memory, as does our backup server in the library. My computer is backed up on a different backup server, fortunately.

I just can't believe that five years of professionally taken digital photographs is about 500GB, and that I've transferred that much in two days...

In the Process...

Today was a photo day. Sort of.

I had every intention of working on my audio project, but between meetings about a large request using the Office of Public Affairs Photo Collection (a very LARGE collection, in the process of being processed), a photo digitization project (finalizing requirements and the statement of work with a vendor), transferring almost 300 GB (yes, I do mean GigaByte) of digital photos, and preparing for the transfer of almost that much more, and going through records concerning photos, it became a photo day.

Today I felt like a lot of my projects would be staying "in the process" for a while...

A Little Bit of Everything...

Yesterday I spent the day finalizing all of the information for the film preservation vendor and scrapbook digitization vendor, and making a few last edits to the a/v website. Other than audio preservation research, it seems like I'm just waiting for my student assistant to return so I can start her on new projects (which are accumulating). I've been working on requests, but they're either in the pre- or post-digitization stage, so I've been make a supply wishlist for panoramic photos and audio reels.

So... today I'm catching up on odds and ends, and reading Sound Directions. It feels like a Friday. Maybe I'm subconsciously hoping for a snow day tomorrow.

Back to Work!

It's Monday and I'm back at work after a two-week vacation! I was compiling projects for the upcoming semester. What's on deck?

*Digitizing two scrapbooks from a alumni's father (the father was also an alumni), and creating the corresponding photo digital collections;
*School of Music audio recording project, consisting of organizing, re-housing, processing, researching digitization and digital preservation standards, digitizing, and cataloging;
*Department of Athletics film preservation and digitization project, consisting of working with a vendor to preserve and digitize the films, and then marketing the films to the university community properly to acquire funds to digitize more films;
*Finish EAD finding aids for two large university photo collections;
*Finish the A/V website coding (one page left!);
*Re-house a large portion of the audio and moving image media in the archives (when moving materials, I discovered the poor housing was leading to deterioration of some audio and films);
*Not go crazy attempting to finish all of this by May-ish.
Goals vs. what will actually be completed... Let's see how much I can do!

I Can't Escape!

I'm visiting family in PA for "late Christmas," and I'm at my Grandmother's house and what happens? She happens to have several old photos from an older relative's house that need a new home and she doesn't know what she's going to do with them!

Uh... What do I do for a living?!

I have inherited three framed and about 6 unframed large photos from the early 1900s of family, mostly from my Lebanese side (including a rare photo taken of my great-great-aunt in presumably her wedding dress, a few months before she prematurely died)! As soon as I return to DC, I'm going to the closest Michaels and looking into having the unframed ones re-framed with UV filtering glass. I am also going to perform some minor repair work on one unframed photo that has become torn (Japanese tissue paper to the rescue). As for the three that are framed, well, I'm going to try to find an appraiser that can give me advice on having them de-framed and keeping the frames while replacing the glass with UV filtering glass. But for now, I have the perfect darker hallway in my apartment for my family!

I have seriously hit the jackpot!

The best of both loves...

Here's a story I found on Slate about the vaudeville singer Eva Tanguay, who has faded into obscurity, but was really one of the premiere US "rock stars" in the early 1900s! I also loved the slide show of old photographs. The digitization was done very well. I could almost smell the deteriorating paper backing! Anyway, this story combines a lot of my "loves"... Old photographs, vaudeville and historic music theater, and old recordings!

Audio Visual? A disclaimer...

My title is "Audio Visual Archivist." What is meant by "Audio Visual?"

It depends...

I work at a small university, where the Archives has a professional staff of 4.5, one (life-saving) paraprofessional, one full-time graduate library professional, and five part-time graduate student workers (history and library science).

My duties include: solicit, accession, manage, process, preserve, serve as reference archivist, and request manager for all non-paper formats except microfilm, but only if the microfilm is a preservation format of a manuscript or university collection (because those fall under their respective larger categories.

I am also the in-house go-to person for any technical questions including computer, hardware, software, and digital formats, though not specifically surrogates or born-digital audio visual formats (even though the main library has computer tech support). I also manage and train students in audio visual knowledge.

Most of my day is spent doing photo requests (corresponding, reference, searching, scanning, metadata). I rarely do anything with audio or moving image media, due to our lack of equipment.

This is my job.

Every Audio Visual Archivist I talk to has a unique experience, and different duties. Every job is defined differently. If you want to be work with any kind of non-paper format, ask a lot of questions first.