DIGITISATIONLIFE CYCLE

1/5 – Introduction

Workflow

Digitisation of a photographThe purpose of this resource is to delineate the range of procedures for the digitisation of two-dimensional documents, in conformity with best practices and with national and international standards for quality reproduction of documents.

In essence, digitisation projects should be consistent with one or more of the following general aims:

  • deriving maximum possible advantage from documents preserved in archives, museums and libraries
  • widening public access to documents and their content for scientific and cultural purposes
  • facilitating interdisciplinary studies and promoting collaboration between different institutions
  • promoting awareness of local or unique collections, through large-scale dissemination of their content
  • creating virtual collections through the integration of different formats or materials distributed in different locations
  • limiting direct consultation of original documents in particularly critical conditions
  • facilitating access to typically inaccessible material
  • ensuring that documents will be made available to future generations of students, scholars and members of the general public

A case study at the University of Padua

Preservation of a photographThe Botanists portrait collection includes 2,380 portraits of Italian and foreign botanists from the second half of the 17th century to the first half of the 20th century. The collection is made up of photographs (salted paper prints, albumen prints, aristotypes, platinum prints, gelatin silver prints), glass negatives, engravings, watercolours, drawings, paintings and photomechanical prints. The collection is preserved in the Padua Botanical Garden Library.

In 2005, the Botanical Garden Library and the Ancient and special collections section of the Padua University Library System initiated a project designed to derive maximum benefit from the collection. The aims of the project are to ensure long-term preservation and on-line access of the catalogued and digitised collection. The project envisages six steps: inventory and selection, legal aspects, preservation, cataloguing, digitisation, on-line access.

Explore

Information of the Botanists portrait collection

Examples from the Botanists portrait collection: Nadar's photographs: