Presentation given by Tim Keefe, Head of Digital Resources and Imaging Services (DRIS) at Trinity College Dublin, on March 15th, 2016 in the Royal Irish Academy, Dublin, as part of the DRI Training Series 'Preparing Your Collection for DRI'. This seminar introduces attendees to the basics of digitising heritage material, efficient workflows and some information on equipment requirements, as well as file format compatibility with DRI.

1. DRI Training: Preparing Your Collection for DRI
2. Digitising Your Collection
Digital Imaging – Introduction, components, process.
Tim Keefe, Head of Digital Resources and Imaging Services, Trinity
College Dublin
keefet@tcd.ie

2. Questions we all need to ask ??
When beginning a digitization project it is
easy to ignore the basic questions, those
questions that we all assume we know the
answers to … however these questions are
often the most important, and need to
addressed formally.

3. Questions to ask
 What is the purpose of this project?
 What is the scope of the digitization
activity?
 What is the intended lifetime of the
digital files?
 Who is the intended audience?

4. Purpose
 What is the purpose of this project?
 Why are we digitizing the material
 Need/Trend
 Access
 Research
 Education
 Who are the champions for this project
 Local
 External
 Who or what are the barriers to the
implementation of this project
 Human
 Resource
 Procedural/Political

5. Scope
 What is the scope of the digitization activity
 What is to be digitized
 What is not to be digitized
 Why?
 Who is likely to demand operation outside of
these criteria

6. Intended Audience
 Who is the intended audience for the digital
resources
 What are their needs
 How will they access the material
 Who else will be interested
 Are you prepared for a new audience (known or
unknown) to self select to become the primary audience
 Do you wish to prevent any audience from having access
to the resources

7. Image Lifetime
 What is the intended lifetime for the
digital records
 This question is critical to the appropriate
development of the digitization activity
 Significant resource implications
 Significant planning implications
 Significant digitization process implications

8. So Why Digitize?
 Access
 Electronic mediums provide the most dynamic assess
 Digital data structures offer the opportunity for truly
dynamic new research and educational models offering
unique new capabilities to existing methodologies
 Preservation
 Digital files designed to proper specifications can be true
surrogates for delicate source materials for all but a hand
full of advanced research needs
 Manipulation
 Non Linear
 Digital resources allow for easy modification to image
characteristics
 Digital files easily cross medium boundaries providing
opportunities for new use models

9. Problems with digitization
 Pace of technological change is constantly
increasing the digital attributes bar
 Not human readable
 Lack of best practices / attribute recommendations
 Long term digital preservation is a newly
emerging field, solutions just beginning to emerge
 Much more complex than having IS Services make a
backup copy
 Extremely costly activity
 TCO not well understood, few models

10. Capture for What?
 In TCD we designate the capture activity on
the object intent
 Capturing for Content
 Speed and cost most important
 Quality less important
 Capturing the Object
 Quality most important
 Meeting the needs of the researcher… researching
anything

11. Components
 The primary components of an average
imaging system:
 Digital capture device
 Light source if not included in the capture system
 Optics if not included in the capture system
 Color Calibration System
 Image Capture/Image Processing Computer
System(s)
 Software packages
 Data Storage Systems

12. Digital Capture Systems
 Scanners

13. Digital Capture Systems
 Flatbed
 Reflective /transmissive capabilities
 Infra red dust and scratch removal systems (ICE)
 Linear/Tri linear or CCD systems
 Low productivity
 Inclusive of software

14. Digital Capture Systems
 Flatbed (limitations)
 Works best with two-dimensional materials.
 Not recommended for use with fragile or tightly
bound material.
 Limited scan area.
 Very slow

15. Digital Capture Systems
 35mm Photographic

16. Digital Capture Systems
 Digital Photographic systems
 35mm format
 CCD / CMOS digital capture sensors
 Full Frame or Reduced frame sensors
 1.5 to 1.33 avg. magnification values
 High productivity
 Limited resolution
 Limited bit depth (8-14 bit)
 Cost effective
 Good starting solution

17. Digital Capture Systems
 Medium format (MF digital back)

18. Digital Capture Systems
 Medium format (MF digital back)
 CCD sensors
 6 x 4.5cm to 6 x 7cm sensor size
 With and with/out micro-lenses
 High bit depth (16bit)
 High productivity
 High Cost
 Requires high level of studio
photographic experience
 Additional software needs.
 Associated Equipment also expensive

19. Digital Capture Systems
 Dedicated Book Scanning Systems
 One size fits all… and all its limitations
 Limited source material input
 Material handling and support
 Possible automation
 page turning ,
 image management
 Linear or CCD based
 Digital Camera based
 High to very high productivity

20. Digital Capture Systems
 Dedicated Book Scanning Systems
 Linear CCD based, generally with included
software. (flatbed in different form factor)

21. Digital Capture Systems
 Dedicated Book Scanning Systems
 Digital Camera based
 Robotic Scanners

22. Robots…Really?

23. Computer Technology
 What to buy
 Image processing is one of the more intensive
computing tasks
 Recommendation is to buy the fastest most
modern computer that you can afford right now
 Memory requirements are often more critical than
processor speed (multi core technology is not being
fully advantaged by software yet)
 Graphics Card often more important than processor
 Have a minimum RAM of 4x your largest file
size… 8x recommended
 Will cost 2-5x more than normal office computer

24. Computer Technology
 Consider the software needs of the digital
capture system you have chosen.
 Is software for generating the files required by
your Project Scenario or device type?
 Some MF camera systems require unique software
 Will it be necessary to purchase additional
image editing software packages (e.g. Adobe
Creative Suite/ Photoshop) or file management
software (Lightroom, Bridge, etc.)
 Many of these software packages are now
subscription based

25. Storage Technology
 RAID (Redundant array of inexpensive disks)
 Level 0 (striped) – Speed and performance increases
 Data is broken up and is written across several disks, taking
advantage of multiple writing heads to improve data
throughput (often used for video processing)
 Level 1 (mirrored) – Security through redundancy
 Data is identically written to more than one disk, allowing
for backup protection should any single disk fail
 The overall all data storage volume of the system is halved
when a level one raid is activated
 Local Hard drive (under the desk solution)
 Low cost, lowest preservation (use only when required)

26. Digital Vocabulary
File Structure
 File types
 Compression
 Spatial resolution
 Bit Depth
 Dynamic range
 Color mode

27. File Types
 Tiff (Tagged Image File Format)
 Large file size
 Standard format
 Lossless compression LZW (and lossy options)
 Jpeg (Joint Photographic Experts Group)
 Smaller file sizes
 Lossy compression in most cases but newest
versions support lossless (Rarely supported)
 Standard format
 Jpeg 2000 (Lossless and or Lossy)
 Multiple file sizes embedded within single
digital record
 Emerging format (adoption very slow, caution)

28. File Types cont.
 PDF (Portable Document Format - Adobe Acrobat)
 Advanced Cross Platform Compatibility
 Ability to support complex document generation
 Text, images, notes, embedded graphics, etc,
 Support for advanced printing
 Support for sharing and dissemination
 Standard file type
 Caution as there are a wide variety of versions and variants
 Digital preservation ISO standard acrobat type A files
 Adoption rate very low
 Some believe that this standard had political / corporate influence
driving recommendation
 GIF
 Dying file format, not recommended

29. File Compression
Two basic types of compression Lossy and Lossless
 Lossy
 Image structure is changed (damaged) by the compression
activity, but not in a perceptual way
 Jpeg is the most common format using lossy compression
 Every file save increases the damage
 file conversion/save into a lossy format should always be the final step in
the digitization and image processing process
 Large reduction in file size

30. File Saving
 Save Order
 When working with files that use or will use a
lossy compression (Jpeg) it is important that the
very last step in the process is the file save
 Each save recompresses the data and causes
further image degradation
 It is best practice to work in a lossless format such
as Tiff, and save out the final Jpeg as a last step.
This workflow will minimize the impact of the
compression artifacts

31. Compression cont.
 Lossless
 Image file structure is not changed in any way
by the compression activity
 The Tiff file format with LZW compression is
the most widely used lossless compression
format
 Note, the tiff file format can be also generated with
no compression or lossy compression

32. Compression examples

33. Resolution
 This metric is generally stated as pixels per inch
(ppi), or the total number of individual picture
elements that will fit in a 1 x 1 inch sample
 This is sometimes confused with dots per inch (dpi)
which is a printing specific metric
 Spatial resolution requires dimensional
measurements and ppi sample rate
 Screen resolution is 72 ppi (newest technology screens
now exceeding 125ppi)
 High resolution commercial printing requires 300-650
ppi image files
 General internet jpg files 72-150ppi

34. Bit Depth
 Bit depth is the number of samples provided
within each image channel (RGB, CMYK)
 This term is often confused with dynamic range
 They are not the same however there is an
interaction between them
 The number of discrete steps between black and
white

35. Bit Depth
 Bit depth is stated in the number of bits of data per
channel
 Bit depth is 2 (binary measure) raised to the power of
the bit depth number so 4 bit color will have 16 steps
between the black and white values
** note that bit depth is stated in either the number of bits
per channel as in 8 bit color or by the sum of all the
channels combined (R+G+B) = 24bit color… this can
be confusing

36. Bit Depth
 8 bits per channel (or 24 bit color)
 256 value steps in each channel
 16.8 million possible colors
 16 bit per channel (or 48 bit color)
 65536 value steps in each channel
 281.5 trillion possible colors
 Many manufacturers talk about interim bit
depths (12- 14), but the final output is often
reduced to 8 bits per channel
 you cannot add missing data by moving to a
higher bit depth

37. Dynamic range
 Dynamic range is the ability of a sensor to
simultaneously capture dark detail, and light detail
 This is an inherent weakness of digital capture
 Decisions are made to set device to support either a greater
tonal range of dark densities(more common) or light
 Commonly confused with bit depth
 They are separate characteristics despite all the contrary
information out there (much of it from reputable sources)… I
promise
 Greater bit depth will not automatically provide greater
Dynamic Range (however improvements in bit depth often
accompany other sensor improvements that include increased
DR)

38. Dynamic Range
 Clipping
 Clipping is a failure state of a digital image as
the limited dynamic range of a device is
unable to correctly capture either very light
or very dark tones

39. Color Mode
 RGB (Red/Green/Blue color channels)
 Additive color
 Most common color mode for digital images
 Mimics human visual system

40. Color Mode
 CMYK (Cyan/Magenta/Yellow/Black)
 Subtractive color
 Commercial Printing standard
 Most desktop color printers support RGB color files
(CMYK conversion is internally managed)
 Limited color gamut

41. Color Mode
 Lab color
 Single luminance (grey scale
channel) and 2 opposing color
channels
 Loosely represents the range of
human vision
 Good for transforms

42. Color Profile Standards
 The user defined color profile assigned to the
image files supports several informal standard
configurations
 sRGB
 Profile developed more than a decade ago by HP and
Microsoft. Represents the Gamut of an average CRT
monitor
 Very Limited color palette
 New output devices currently capable of exceeding this space
 Most commonly used profile (usually the default if not stated)

43. Color Profile Standards
 Adobe RGB 1998
 Newer profile designed to support wider palette of
colors to support higher quality printing
 Lower use than sRGB, but well recognized
 Maintains a color appearance consistent with sRGB devices
 ProPhoto RGB
 A wide gamut color space designed for very high
quality printing of photographic images
 Color appearance is highly inconsistent when use with devices
not color managed, or set to sRGB standards
 Despite the benefits of this color space, its use is quite limited
due to the setup and management requirements
 Caution in its use, as inaccurate color characteristics can occur
with improperly managed devices

44. Image Processing
Post capture modifications and
manipulations to the original digital
image file structure

45. The Controversy
 Two primary schools of thought
 The digital master image files should remain
untouched as they emerge from the capture
device and all subsequent processing should
occur only on the surrogates
 Image processing will occur on the master
capture file with the intent of matching the
original source material as closely as
possible at the time of capture

46. Color Mode
 RGB
 Standard image space for files
 Common, not likely to change
 CMYK
 Avoid this space for all but specific commercial
printing activities (even then try to ignore it)
 Lab
 Great for processing transforms that can benefit
from a luminance channel
 Sharpening
 Noise removal
 No color profile

47. File Formats
 Master
 This is the high quality large image
generated from the capture device
 Surrogates
 These are secondary files generated from the
master file to be used for specific purposes

48. File format Sets
 Master
 Tiff
 This is intended to be the highest quality image
 Represents the asset derived from the € spent
 Lossless compression recommended
 Compressed Jpg’s
 File size reduced for easier management, and
dissemination, and to manage costs
 Lossy compression is acceptable within the use cases
 Often several sizes (Large, small, thumbnail)
 Used for public display

49. Image Manipulations
 Tone Scale
 To adjust tone scale you need to push or pull
predetermined black and white values to defined
positions on the histogram
 This requires the use of a calibrated reference target placed
within the image

50. Image Manipulations
 Sharpening
 Sharpening works by increasing the contrast between edges in an
image. This change in contrast fools the human visual system into
believing that the image is sharper

51. Image Manipulation
 Sharpening

52. Cropping
 Cropping
 Cropping is the permanent removal of unwanted parts
of the image
 Formally determine where the boarders of your images
should be
 For research purposes the entire page should be represented
 For access and content related scanning cropping to the
textural areas of the page may be desired
 Failure modes
 What determines a crop or image capture that is unacceptable
requiring reprocessing or a new capture
 Formalize this

53. Skew/Rotation
 Skew/Rotation
 When the source material is not perpendicular
to the edges of the digital image
 Failure mode
 Determine what percent is unacceptable
 Formalize this criteria

54. White Balance
 White balance is a color balancing function used
to address the color differences imparted by
varying light sources.
 The human visual system does this automatically in the
brain, removing the real color cast imparted by source
illuminant and giving us the perception that most lights
are white.
 Think of the differences evident when you have a
desktop incandescent bulb in a room lit by fluorescent
 This is also important in the environment where your image
processing occurs

55. White Balance
 Most white balance is preset within the capture system, however fine
tuning or custom profiles can be applied in the processing stage
 Neutral 18% grey references are used to generate a custom balance
 When adjusting tone scale in Photoshop, neutral grey adjustment can be
used to correct White Balance inconsistencies

56. Quality Control/Assurance
Imaging and image processing are a highly
repetitive, human dependent set of processes
and are therefore highly susceptible to
regular error

57. Control vs. Assurance
 Control is in process activities to ensure
quality in the creation of the products
( digital images)
 Assurance is focused on an evaluation of
the processes used and generally takes place
outside of the creation process

58. Quality Control
 Processes built into the imaging work flow
to ensure that the creation of digital images
is
 Consistent
 Accurate
 Repeatable
 Often automated these processes are
inherently part of the imaging workflow

59. Quality Assurance
 The Quality Assurance Audit
 Formal.. Informal just does not work
 Existing toolsets developed for a variety of
manufacturing based industries are highly
effective
 TQM
 Six Sigma
 Etc.
 Takes place fully outside of the imaging
processes

60. Quality Assurance Testing
 What to test for
 Imaging
 File structure metrics
 Naming, page counts
 System/Network (positioning, backup
etc.)
 Metadata
 Structure
 Accuracy
 Completeness

61. Color Management
One of the most critical, and often
ignored, components of a successful
digitization project is a well planned
color management strategy

62. Color Management
Within any imaging and processing system you need
to ensure that consistent color is displayed from
device to device, and that a files color metrics are
electronically recognized
 Technology Required
 Capture reference targets
 Color profiles / icc

63. Color Reference Targets
 Allows a formal measured reverence to be
associated with the image (future proofing)

64. Color Management Technology
 Color meters (Basic screen calibration)
 Absorptive measurements
 Less dynamic than Spectrophotometers
 Spectrophotometers (Advanced CM)
 Can measure the intensity of light as a
function of the wavelength of the light
 Light absorption
 Diffuse
 Specular

65. CM Standards
 ICC (international color consortium)
 Works through a standardized Color Matching
Module (CMM) connection space
 Not an ideal solution, but one that has been very
well adopted by most imaging related hardware
and software vendors
 ColorSync (Apple Computer)
 Apple solution to color management
 Part of the Macintosh system software
 Generally plays well with others, occasionally
some fiddling is necessary (ICC integrated)
 Hands off approach

66. Further Reading and Resources
 DRI and Digital File Format Choices Factsheet:
http://dri.ie/sites/default/files/files/dri-factsheets-file-formats.pdf
 DRI Long-Term Digital Preservation Factsheet:
http://tinyurl.com/hbp28xe
 Online Resources for Digitisation Projects:
http://dri.ie/digitisation-resources
- includes resources for Project Planning, File Formats, Audio &
Audiovisual, Hardware, Metadata & Vocabularies and Policy.
 Trinity College Dublin Digital Collections Repository:
https://www.tcd.ie/Library/dris/digital.php