Decapod is an interesting project with partners from Germany, Canada, and Anarbor, MI and funded through The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

From the site:

The solution will address these problem areas:

1. Allow the camera based capture of bound material by using computer vision techniques to produce flat, clean page images equivalent to those produced from a flat bed scanner.
2. Remove the need for extensive operator intervention in the capture process by detecting scan problems and allowing the operator to rectify the scan immediately.
3. Reduce user intervention in the conversion process by using advanced document understanding techniques to remove almost all intervention, and by reducing the remainder to very simple “1-click” operations.
4. PDF/A outputs will be visually faithful to the original, searchable, and widely usable.
5. Allow the output to be viewable on mobile devices that support PDF reflow.
6. Remove the need for deep software, hardware or digitization skills by integrating all software components into a turnkey end-to-end solution.
7. Remove capital cost barriers by using consumer grade cameras.

Tito Sierra has a very interesting presentation on building library web apps, gave recently for the JHU Libraries Assembly. Lots of good references cited.

Sierra, T. (forthcoming). “Opportunities for Mobile Enhanced Library Services and Collections”, Johns Hopkins University Libraries Assembly 2010, Baltimore, MD, May 21, 2010. [ppt]

via NCSU DLI

Here are the slides from my recent presentation at the 2010 Northwest Archivists conference in April. This tells of the technical and “mindset” decisions we made for our 2009 digitization project at the National Archives. Great experience in Seattle, I’m glad I attended.

CNET has a good run-down of free and fee-based file sharing services:

There are now a handful of free and paid services that make it easy to host these gigantic files and send them to a friend, family member, or business associate.

Here’s a quick chart that specifies the amount of disk space a single scanned 8.5″ x 11″ master file will take up. Pixels per inch (PPI) and bit levels were taken largely from the BCR best practices document. These estimates were generated with PhotoShop CS4.

Steinhoff, Sascha. Scanning Negatives and Slides: Digitizing your Photographic Archive, 2e. Rocky Nook.  2009. 240p. ISBN 978-1-933952-30-7. pap. $44.95

This book is a valuable addition to the field of digitizing negatives and slides. It covers a wide range of topics, including hardware considerations (from scanners and digital SLR cameras to flatbed and specialized film scanners); readers will also find a nice overview, with workflows, of image capture and editing software. The author goes beyond standard fare such as bit depth and dynamic ranges to explain various types of RAW formats, and includes a useful section on the recovery of images damaged by scratches and dust. Scanning Negatives and Slides is not intended as a stand-alone title for inexperienced readers, or for those without at least some familiarity with digitization issues; it will be most appropriate for photographers, professional archivists, and digital librarians. Recommended for medium to large libraries, museums, and archives with an active digitization program, as well as for special libraries that collect for photographers and/or art galleries.

Steve McCann is the Digital Projects Librarian at The Maureen and Mike Mansfield Library, The University of Montana.

This review is archived from The Tech Static

I’m working with a colleague to finalize a usability study on the effect of image scans in art journals, which will be published sometime this year with any luck. One of the preliminary findings is that researchers want to be able to migrate from a journal article to a higher quality image somewhere, anywhere. Also, Google Images is a tool that’s being used for taking this step.

Found via DigitalKoans, Google Labs has just released a “similar images” search engine. If a researcher were to search for “Van Gogh” and then select “similar images” under the Cafe at Night image, they are then presented with a screen showing the following complete with varying sizes and quality of scans. Very cool, and potentially very useful for art students.

Similar Cafe at Night images

This Instructables set by Daniel Reetz is an exciting hack. He lays out a plan for building a two-camera book scanner with V-shaped platen. While the quality is not perfect, the whole concept should be applauded. Read the comments, as well, to see links to similar projects.

• A short Harvard Business Review article highlights the importance of ethnographic studies to inform strategy.
• Via Experientia, Christian Lindholm identifies three layers of UX in mobile phone design: Bling, Control, and Utility
• Andy Rutledge analyzes the CNN page design for something he labels “quiet structure”.
• Spoonfed Design identifies six measures of goodness in Apple’s site usability.
• Here’s an interesting collection of UX Quotes
• Very handy resource here: 20 User Experience Deliverables
• Gabriel Svennerberg identifies the rise of Zooming User Interfaces
• Sol Lederman of Federated Search Blog has a two part review of Library Hi Tech’s “One Box to Search Them All” pre-print article.
• Information Architecture for Libraries identifies the purpose of library websites: everything
• Quince is a UX pattern library explorer that’s a lot of fun to use.

I’m archiving this review, originally published on The Tech Static:

Dalston, Teresa R. and Michael Pullin. Virtual Reference on a Budget: Case Studies. Linworth. 2008. 191p. ISBN 1-58683-287-5. pap. $44.95.

This book stems from an advanced LIS course taken by twenty doctoral students at the University of North Texas SLIS in 2005. The group focused on freely available virtual reference tools for their class projects, and five of the resulting course essays were edited and included here. Virtual Reference on a Budget is useful for any professional librarian whose responsibilities include planning or implementing a virtual reference service at their library. The essays are well-researched and provide extensive bibliographies as well as concrete details, while the case studies include examples from a special needs implementation, K-12 libraries, and an academic library.  Public libraries are notably absent, however, but the findings presented should extend to all types of libraries. Also included is a detailed step-by-step description of the process of setting up a virtual reference service, although Virtual Reference on a Budget is not a technical title. Recommended for purchase for academic libraries, as well as for the personal libraries of professional librarians with an interest in the topic.

Steve McCann is the Digital Projects Librarian at The Maureen and Mike Mansfield Library, The University of Montana.