For this assignment, I decided to look at the Yale University digital repository at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library and the Science and Society Picture Library which is a repository for the visual material of England’s National Museums of Science and Industry.
I started my search by looking for images by particular photographers. First, I was looking for images by Albert Kahn and Alfred Stieglitz because I heard about them in class and wanted to see more of their work. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find any library or museum websites that were a good source of images for Khan. On the other hand, I did find a lot of collections of Stieglitz’s work. The one that I chose for this assignment is a collection at Yale of both Stieglitz and Georgia O’Keefe’s photographs. I forget how I came across the Science and Society Picture Library but I found a collection of images by (WIlliam) Henry Fox Talbot to use for this assignment.
The Beinecke Library has a database of its Digital Collections. This collection is separate from the Yale University Library’s main catalog except that there are links in the main catalog to finding aids that are in the Beinecke catalog. The resources housed at the Beinecke Library can be searched using Yale’s Finding Aid Database, by Digital Collections or by a search tool that includes title, creator, subject and call number. The results can be filtered by subject, material types and genres that are very specific to graphic materials. For example, one search in the Digital Collections database will give the options for narrowing the type of material as text, still image, mixed material or three dimensional object whereas the main catalog would give book, journal, maps, movies, music and sound.
The Science and Society Picture Library has one website that contains mainly images. It can be searched by keyword, collection, theme or image number. There are no filters or ways to organize search results.This is my favorite image from the Stieglitz/O’Keefe Collection:
From: Alfred Stieglitz / Georgia O'Keeffe archive
Stieglitz Image
I think that it is a great picture. The title makes sense. It explains that the picture is of a man named Bly who was a gardener at Lake George; although it would be nice to have the full name somewhere in the record. There is no date listed. I think that Yale should do some research and at least give a date range for this photograph. The subject seems to be from the Library of Congress and is linked to other images from Lake George. I think it would be helpful for researchers to have links to other types of resources on this topic, too. Likewise, I think it would make sense to connect this catalog with the main catalog more so that more people will find images when searching for information. The genre and type of resource describe the image. Finally, there is a description of the collection and a link to the finding aid for the collection that this is a part of that does a great job at informing users about this collection.
Overall, I liked searching in this database. The collection has a finding aid that I think is very useful. It gives a detailed overview of the collection, it tells exactly what is in the collection, it gives a link to the digitized material from the collection and it is fairly easy to navigate. I also liked the experience of looking at individual images. Each image was clear. Plus, Yale has an amazing zoom tool. I think that this is a very important aspect of being able to look at photographs online. It allows users to look at every detail of an image. My only complaint about the Yale collections is that I wanted to know more about each image. I didn’t feel like I got the whole story from the metadata in each record.
Guy Baxter wrote that, “Resources are seldom adequate to catalogue all collections to item level, and item level handling should exist within a framework provided by comprehensive group level description.” It's true that there are not enough resources to catalog every photograph but it is important to catalog the individual photographs that are most important to any library's collection. For Yale, this would definitely include the images in the Stieglitz/O’Keefe collection.
This is another example of a photograph that I think could use more detailed descriptions: http://brbl-dl.library.yale.edu/vufind/Record/3529051. It mentions O’Keefe in the subject but it doesn’t state that this was a photograph that was sent, if not taken by her. I think it is assumed based on the collection, but the library should verify and add this information for its users. I want to know more about this picture than the catalog record gives. I understand that cataloging individual records can be expensive, but it wouldn’t take too much time to add some basic details to these descriptions.
This is my favorite image from the Talbot collection:
Salt paper print from a calotype negative by William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-1877).
Talbot Image
Even though it isn’t as clear as some of the other images in this collection, I like the content the best. As our textbook suggests, catalog records should explain “Who, What, Where, Why, When,” and occasionally “How.” (Ritzenthaler & Vogt-O’Connor, 2006) This photograph does just that. It tells who created it, what it is a picture of, where it was taken, when it was taken and how it was taken. Since this website is for more of a science and art oriented audience, it makes sense to add how this picture was taken so there is information about the photographic process that would interest these two communities. Also, there is a large list of searchable keywords that will help users access this image.
I liked this collection, although it is not organized as well as I would like it to be. This collection has no overview, the main page is just images. When you click on the link for the collection, it brings up 98 images and no biography or information about Talbot. Even though there is a lot of background information listed with each picture, I think it would make more sense to have at least a paragraph about Talbot on the opening page of the collection. Further, the images have a very small resolution. It is difficult to really look at the image. Even worse, there is a watermark across each picture that makes it much harder to see, and, obviously, reproduce. In order for users to view a high resolution image, they have to purchase a license which cost at least 30 euros. I emailed the website and asked if I could get a high resolution copy of these images for a school project. Although I had to spend some time verifying that I was in fact using this for educational purposes, I eventually got two of the low resolution images without the watermark so it is much easier to see:
William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-1877)
Original Seed Image
I like that their customer service representative was willing to share better quality photos to support an educational activity. Another thing that I like about this website is that it has a very comprehensive subject (in this website it is called keyword) index. There are dozens of relevant keywords associated with each image. Plus, it is possible to check off any number of the keywords from the search results and find other images on the topics listed. Finally, these are a lot of great images on this website. This is an image of the oldest surviving cameras made in Britain and thought to be used by Talobt. It is estimated that these cameras are from 1835: Two W H F Talbot ‘mousetrap’ cameras, c 1835. There are some really important and useful photos for studying photography on this site.
Additionally, I think it makes sense for libraries to collaborate more with researchers. I heard a little mention of it in some of our readings. I think if people are using library resources and they verify information about images, it would be helpful to share it somewhere in the catalog. It would be similar in concept to tagging, but the information would be authenticated. This might solve part of the problem of the cost of adding item level information plus I think that the researchers would like to contribute. It would be a win-win situation.
Works Cited:
Baxter, G. (2003). The historical photograph: Record, information source, object, resource. Art Libraries Journal 28(2), 4-12.
Ritzenthaler, M., & Vogt-O’Connor, D. (2006). Photographs: Archival care and management. Chicago: Society of American Archivists.
No comments:
Post a Comment