Start month: 4
End month: 28
WP-Leader: MRBAB

Objectives

• Organising the digitisation process in each participating institution/for each collection
• Implementing the digitisation workflow in all partner institutions to produce same-quality digital content
• Monitoring the digitisation process in timing and quantity

Description of work

The digitisation itself will be done from the original artworks in order to provide results of the highest quality possible. This implies that the artworks need to be prepared for digitisation first (in some cases this will mean being installed) and that their state of preservation needs to be checked. This might also imply that there be some small interventions (repair / restoration). For security and insurance reasons, the digitisation of most artworks will be done at each participating institution, by subcontracted companies or by the institution itself. For cases in which easily transportable items need to be digitised, e.g. books or small posters, and the scanning equipment to do so is located outside the institution, the objects will be moved to the actual digitisation infrastructure. In general DCA will apply the Technical Guidelines for Digital Cultural Content Creation Programmes that were developed by MINERVA – the Ministerial Network for Valorising Activities in Digitisation.

Each participating institution will be responsible for the digitisation work carried out by subcontractors or by own staff personnel (e.g. photographing a painting, scanning a poster, ...). They are also in charge of the preparation of the artworks for digitisation, preservation control and smaller interventions (repairs, arranging or setting up installations etc.) if necessary. The participating institutions will also be responsible for integrating digital reproductions in their databases and for making their digital reproductions available (on local servers or other accessible systems). WP4 will provide permanent technical helpdesk assistance in order to tackle possible obstacles.

Digitisation will take place following a detailed digitisation workflow that will be developed within the WP4 during the first months of the project (D4.1. Digitisation workflow description for digitising the selected art works). This workflow will contain parameters for the digitisation, storage and display of digital images. WP4 will implement the digitisation workflow in all partner institutions to produce same-quality digital content (matching resolutions, formats, device settings, scanning or photographing…). The fact that every institution will follow the same workflow will provide a fixed level of quality of the digitised endproduct. These guidelines will be enriched with the digitisation experiences gained through the project and will eventually become one of the main subjects of dissemination (D4.2. Guidelines for an A-Z digitisation workflow for contemporary art works) within the WP7.

WP4 will provide for a continuous supervision of the digitisation process. This is necessary in order to make sure all operators follow the same parameters, and to be a step ahead of the final quality control. Practices to be followed-up include (amongst others) photographers stating what equipment (camera, lenses) they are using; all images should be delivered in formats providing for long-term archival and high quality of stored data, using a defined name convention (see D3.1. Metadata implementation guidelines for digitised contemporary art works); etc.

Before preparing and submitting data for ingestion to a dedicated portal, WP4 will perform continuous quality controls of the produced digital reproductions (completeness, quality, links with metadata, ...). This quality check will, along with an overall status of digitisation (on quantity and timings) and the availability of the metadata and the digital reproductions on publicly accessible servers and on Europeana, be described in the overall progress reports created by WP1 (D1.2.1 – D1.2.7. Progress report).

Deliverable

• D4.1. Digitisation workflow description for digitising the selected art works (M06)
• D4.2. Guidelines for an A-Z digitisation workflow for contemporary art works (M28)