This document details the long process of saving and transitioning the archives of Israel Broadcasting Authority (IBA) to the new public broadcaster Israel Public Broadcasting Corporation (IPBC). It involved passing new legislation, securing budgets, packing and moving the physical archives, digitizing content, and transitioning metadata and workflows between the old and new systems. Over several years, the archive staff worked tirelessly to save 49 years of IBA broadcasts and transition them to the new home at IPBC despite many challenges along the way. They have now started the large-scale process of digitizing the physical archives to preserve the content for future generations.

1. The Long Journey to a safe
Haven
Saving IBA TV & Radio Archives
Billy Segal Gezelius-IPBC-Kan
billys@kan.org.il

2. Saving
the
Archive
strategy
New Law
Budget
Tenders
Transition
workflow
between
IBA-IPBC
Real estate
packing &
moving
Human
Resources

3. Setting foot in
legislation process
• July-August 2014- New law
closing IBA and reopening
a new public broadcaster:
IPBC (Israel Public
Broadcast Corporation)

4. November 15th 2015
Economic commission of
the Knesset- The
beginning of the saving
project…
• intiatinig a special meeting
about the situation of the film
archive and it’s future,due to a
stagnation of the archive status
and preservation plan under the
official receiver that was
managing IBA until the closing
day that kept changing …
• Fighting & getting the budget for
digitization project of the IBA
archive.
• The finance ministry agreed to
set the budget only if it will be
managed by the new Public
entity which was in construction
process.

5. 2nd legislation
round.“White
nights” meetings
in Knesset
April-May 2017-changes in new
law.
3 days of intensive meetings 20
hours each time…
Government tries to separate
News from IPBC.
Reporting live to social media as
part of strategy.

6. Summing up 49 years of IBA broadcasts:
during July-August 2016 producing 5 series
in different Genres.the Archive works on
“high voltage”…
“Laterna Magica”- 5 episodes about the
Archive’s Treasures.directed & played by a
known Comedian.and yes…he imitated
the Boss☺

7. May 13th 2017-last song and Good Bye
ESC –IBA’s last broadcst day

8. IBA’s Dissolution- How did it look when every
body is gone…May-Dec.2017

10. Welcome to IPBC-KAN 11- New Home since
May 15th. Some challeges ahead…
IBA IPBC_KAN
Real Estate Archive’s staff
Saving IBA’s HD
digital archive
Planning new
daily workflow
with new place
Saving &
migrating
Archives metadata

11. The Archive Real Estate battle…June 2017
• Again at the Economic
commission of the parlament-
the new law, demanded of IBA’s
evacuation from all property,
within 3 months after the
closure. NO WAY!!! So,We got 18

12. New Broadcaster,New Archive Workflow
IBA
• Archive at same location as TV house.
• Analog beta cassetes commutes around the building.
• HD digital files cut & edit only by Technicians.
News services
• News Research by News researchers and partly by
archive staff.
• Footage migrating by technichians.
All productions
in&out
• Research by creators & archive staff.
• Footage migrating: Analog formats by archive staff &
digital files by Technicians.
Ipbc-Kan
• Archive at different location(different
city)
• All work online by Archive staff.
News Services
• All news research by archive staff.
• All technical migration by archive staff using
Data Line for digital fies or optical Line for
analog beta cass.
All Productions
In&out
• Research by creators & archive staff.
• All footage migration by archive staff.

13. Saving IBA’s HD Digital Archive (dated
between 2013-2017)

14. Temporary new location of the Digital
Archive(October 2017)

15. The Chase to save the old Archive Metadata
programs.

16. Anyone saw the 81 years old Radio archive?
We’ve almost lost it…
“Kol Israel” Radio Archive 1936-2017
• about 40% of collections,
mustly news, was digitized by
Harvard University.
• 60% including original music,
culture and the big Arabic Radio
collections were left behind
about to be packed and stored
in a remote storage company.
400 boxes of radio recordings ,which never reached the
radio archive,were collected from journalists rooms just
before they started ruining the old buildings.

17. saved saved

18. Is it possible to pack a 49 years old TV Archive, in 6
months???
List “to do”:
• Looking for a new Location.
• A tender to find an archive packing
company.
• Designing a computer program for
the packing project, connected to
the old archive metadata –
Barcoding every single film &
packing at the same time.
• .
• Stay alert 24/7 !!!

19. Packing the TV archive-challenges
June-December 2018
• 8 teams worked at the same time
in 14 vaults- a big challeng
supervizing the process.
• “Chasing” our brilliant data guy, to
fix bugs in the barcoding program.
• Irregulars- finding daily solutions
to problematic tapes/films that
could not be barcoded because of
various reasons.

20. And some more challenges…
During barcoding process, 20,000 16 mm
films did not appear in the archive’s
computer data!
• Back to the “Data man” to
develop an option cataloguing
the films. once done, the films
were catalogued based on the
written information on the film’s
document enclosed.
• “Difficult cases” were viewed on
steenbeck,by a “veteran”
employee.

21. Last minute savings
some by fload, some in TV deserted Journalists
rooms, some in editing suits,some piles left at
archive’s door step on last days by TV employees.

22. Empty Vaults,last truck to go…

23. IPBC_KAN- New Building,New Era.

24. And again, reinstalling the Digital archive,and
the Analog Steenbeck.

25. Finally, we got there.Digitaing our Legacy!
Starting point: April 2019
16 mm Film Digitazation
So far,digitized 1980-1983(total film collection 1968-1991)
• Estimated 18,000 hours.
Beta Digitazation-300 hours a day.
So far digitized years 1996-2001
• Estimated 200,000 cass.

26. Digitazation policy
• All collections will be digitized.
• Beta cass- sd format.
• 30% uncompressed-
Documentaries and other
important cultural value
programs.
• 16 mm films-All
collections,Digitized to MXF HD,
and DPX uncopressed.
• UMATIC cass. – SD(15,000)
• 1 intch tapes- SD (10.000 taps)

27. Our Metadata Hub
1.Batches preparation program:
Enables Reading the barcode,fix mistakes,pack in a new box, monitoring all stages
of work.
Same barcode given to ll paper enclosed to the fim.the papers will be scanned
separately and will appear in Mam next to digital file.
2.ART- old IBA Analog Metadata program.(data can be edited).
3. Art WEB – New program with barcode details,shelf location, showing digitization
status of each item.
4. Eazyview- IBA’s HD digital MAM(to be migrated in future to the new MAM)
5.Viz 1- IPBC Mam.(including IBA Radio& TV legacy. Every digitized item goes
directly to Viz.)

28. Finding our way
First
digitized file
In MAM
Old MAM-EAZY VIEWNEW MAM-VIZ 1
ART WEB- Analog metadata
Digitazation Batch &Barcod
Art-old

29. Daily Routine-Between
Digitazation&Broadcast
Production
CREATORS

30. • Yes, it looks whired…Vinegar
syndrome,Dust&etc.

31. A search on the Analog program,leads
to the digitized file on the new MAM

32. Thank you for your Attention!
Billy Segal Gezelius
Head of IPBC-Kan Archives
billys@kan.org.il