Making the Most of Moving Image Metadata

Making the most of moving image metadataHow the Scottish Screen Archive is describing, digitising and displaying

film from the national collection

Scotland’s Moving Image Collection

• Set up in 1976 to locate, preserve & provide access to Scotland’s moving image heritage

• Part of the National Library of Scotland, 2007

• Documentary, promotional, amateur home movie, newsreel, experimental shorts… and everything in between!

• Film, video and born digital

Turning Detective - some cataloguing challenges

• Unique, fragile material & obsolete formats• Lack of (or too much!) supporting data• Title / Date / Place / Personality /

Organisation• Shotlisting• Completeness

• Who?

• What?

• Why?

• Where?

• When?

Digitising• Analogue to Digital transfer• Speed correction• Quality control• Filenaming• In-house or Outsource?

Keeping track of it all = more metadata

Displaying

• Copyright

• Quality

• Ethics• Storage costs / IT infrastructure

Some web resources

• http://ssa.nls.uk/

• http://discover.nls.uk/

• http://www.sabsonline.com

• http://scotlandonscreen.org.uk

• http://www.youtube.com/user/NLofScotland

Balancing act!Time vs Resources

Yes, we can!• Technical challenges, rights management,

cost… there are lots of reasons ‘not to’…. • … but Scotland’s film heritage is for

everyone to share in and learn about• Remain professional, embrace change, seek

partnerships or funding opportunities• Just do it.

Contactann.cameron@nls.uk

http://ssa.nls.uk