The document discusses digitization efforts at the Tasmanian Archive and Heritage Office (TAHO). It provides an overview of digitization concepts and outlines TAHO's initial pilot projects to digitize different formats. These included newspaper images, media center negatives, and microfilm. The document also discusses partnerships with other institutions and the need to develop integrated storage, search, and delivery systems. Finally, it briefly summarizes the UK Parliament's efforts to digitize Hansard transcripts.

1. Digitisation
in the
Tasmanian Archive and Heritage Office
State Library of Tasmania

2. Introductions…
• Noelene Kelly
Manager (Systems Projects – Integration)
Systems Support & Development
Community Knowledge Network
• Mandy Oliver
Manager (Digital Services)
Tasmanian Archive and Heritage Office
Community Knowledge Network
State Library of Tasmania

3. What will we cover today?
• Basic digitisation concepts and options
• Key digitisation documents
• Some examples:
– Community Knowledge Network
– Parliamentary Archives - UK
State Library of Tasmania

4. Digitisation – What is it?
• ‘Converting objects or records to electronic format usually
through digital imaging or electronic recordkeeping.’
(Collections Council of Australia)
• ‘Digitising or digitisation is representing an object, image,
document or a signal (usually an analogue signal) by a
discrete set of its points or samples. The result is called
"digital representation" or, more specifically, a "digital
image", for the object, and "digital form", for the signal.’
(Wikipedia)
State Library of Tasmania

5. Digitisation…Where do we start?
• Research the concept, what others are doing and what is involved
State Library of Tasmania

6. Then…
…define for your library:
– Why?
– What?
– Who?
– How?
State Library of Tasmania

7. Why do we digitise?
To preserve our Heritage
State Library of Tasmania

8. Why do we digitise?
To provide wider access
State Library of Tasmania

9. What do you digitise?
• Organisational priorities
• Understand your holdings/collections
• Stakeholder input
State Library of Tasmania

10. Who should digitise?
• In-house
• Out-source
• Partnerships
State Library of Tasmania

11. How….The Critical Components
• Equipment
• Standards
• Storage
• Delivery
State Library of Tasmania

12. Equipment
State Library of Tasmania

13. Some desktop requirements…
State Library of Tasmania

14. Digitisation Standards
• Minimum standards based on National
Library of Australia
http://www.nla.gov.au/digital/capture.html
• Preservation standards
State Library of Tasmania

15. Storage and Management
• Where will you store the digital objects?
• Cost of storage
• Backup and Recovery
• Preservation Issues
State Library of Tasmania

16. Search and Delivery
• Copyright/ownership
• Easy to access
• Search Engines – discovery & relevancy
• Integration with other sites
• OCR
State Library of Tasmania

17. Key Documents
• Digitisation Policy
• Digitisation Standards
• Annual Plan - Digitisation Program
• Communication & Marketing plan
State Library of Tasmania

18. Australian Strategies
State Library of Tasmania

19. What is CKN doing?
• Community Knowledge Network
encompasses:
– State Library of Tasmania
– Archives Office of Tasmania
– Adult Education
– Online Access Centres
State Library of Tasmania

20. Tasmanian Archive and Heritage
Office
• Tasmanian Archive and Heritage Office
(TAHO) sits within State Library of
Tasmania
• Digital Services sits within TAHO and has
responsibility for Digitisation,
Reprographics, e-Heritage and STORS
State Library of Tasmania

21. What is TAHO doing?
• Prior to October 2007, some digitisation
of images, plans and audio tapes within the
Heritage Collection
• Six pilot projects were selected to test
digitisation of various formats, resourcing
models and equipment
State Library of Tasmania

22. Media Centre Negatives…
State Library of Tasmania

23. State Library of Tasmania

24. Pictorial Newspaper Images
• Weekly Courier and
Tasmanian Mail
newspapers.
• Culturally significant
• High demand
State Library of Tasmania

25. State Library of Tasmania

26. State Library of Tasmania

27. State Library of Tasmania

28. Digitised Microfilm
• Digitise from Microfilm or original?
• Outsourcing vs in-house
• OCR
• Review microfilming strategy
State Library of Tasmania

29. State Library of Tasmania

30. Partnerships
• Melbourne University & University of
Tasmania – convict records
• Archives CD Books – Police Gazettes
• eHeritage – local history organisations
State Library of Tasmania

31. Storage and Management
• Currently a number of systems:
– Access Databases
– File Shares
– DigiTool
• Moving to an integrated Archives and
Heritage approach
State Library of Tasmania

32. Search and Delivery
• Currently separate searching and
delivery
• Links to bibliographic or index
records
• Towards integrated searching
State Library of Tasmania

33. Search and Delivery
State Library of Tasmania

34. Parliamentary Archives UK
• Digitisation Strategy
• Digitisation Policy
• Digitisation Programme
State Library of Tasmania

35. Digitisation of Hansard
• UK Parliament close to completing
• Primary reasons – access, enabling free-text
searching and preservation
• OCR outsourced to India with 99.5% accuracy
• Images captured as TIFF files at a resolution of
300dpi
• Copies are made as JPEG files
State Library of Tasmania

36. Digitisation of Hansard
• OCR carried out using a triple-compare process
developed by the contractors
• Metadata generated automatically
• As of March 2008, with the exception of a few
volumes requiring rescanning, the complete run
of Hansards (1803-general election of 2005)
captured – about 2.75 million pages
State Library of Tasmania

37. Hansard - Useful Sites
• Text files on Internet for free download
(about 1/3 available as of March 08) :
– http://www.parliament.uk.publications/archives.cfm
• Experimental database and search
interface available on Internet :
– http://hansard.millbanksystems.com
State Library of Tasmania

38. Preservation
• Starting to look at this issue
• TIFF files for digitised Hansard constitute
about 40TB data (stored on portable
hard drives)
State Library of Tasmania

39. Where to from here?
• Develop a digitisation strategy
• A few key questions will get you started:
– What do you want to digitise and why
– Do you have the expertise and equipment in-house?
– Can you develop partnerships with other
organisations/parliamentary libraries
– How will you store, manage and deliver the digitised
objects?
– Develop a Digitisation PROGRAM not a Project
State Library of Tasmania

40. Thank you!!
State Library of Tasmania