As has been noted, storage is cheap, whether online or offline.  Sure, you could re-scan the originals, but how many times to you want to do that?  If you have to rescan an item every time someone wants something different, you'll spend a lot of time.  Staff time to locate and rescan items should also be taken into consideration, and it sounds like your director isn't considering the total cost, which includes indirect costs as well as actual dollars spent.

 

My suggestion is to keep them on a larger hard disk, either internal or external, and burn CD/DVD backups.  If you've invested a considerable amount of time scanning them the first time, you don't want to go back and do it again (and again ... and again ...) so store one of those sets of backups offsite.  If disk storage is a problem, consider using LZW compression, or another lossless compression format such as PNG or JPEG2000.

 

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

 

James Stimpert
Archivist (Arts and Sciences)        E-mail:    [log in to unmask]
MSE Library
Johns Hopkins University             Voice:     (410) 516-8323
3400 North Charles Street
Baltimore, MD  21218                  Fax:       (410) 516-7202


>>> "Ellen H. Fladger" <[log in to unmask]> 06/12/06 9:48 AM >>>

Good Morning,

   We're about to begin a project here involving scanning postcards from our
collection for use on the library web site.  I've been having a discussion with
the director about the retention of TIFF files.  It's been my understanding
that the TIFF files are retained as a kind of archival surrogate.  He maintains
that we don't need to keep them because we have the originals and can always
rescan for higher resolution images if we need them.  I do understand that the
TIFF files are quite large and I'm wondering about storage for them.
   Any suggestions, on or offlist, are welcome.
         Thanks very much,

Ellen
*************
Ellen H. Fladger
Head of Special Collections
Schaffer Library
Union College
Schenectady, NY  12308

518-388-6616
518-388-6641 (fax)
[log in to unmask]
-------------------------------------------------
This mail sent through IMP: http://horde.org/imp/

A posting from the Archives & Archivists LISTSERV List sponsored by the Society of American Archivists, www.archivists.org.
For the terms of participation, please refer to http://www.archivists.org/listservs/arch_listserv_terms.asp.

To subscribe or unsubscribe, send e-mail to [log in to unmask]
      In body of message:  SUB ARCHIVES firstname lastname
                    *or*:  UNSUB ARCHIVES
To post a message, send e-mail to [log in to unmask]

Or to do *anything* (and enjoy doing it!), use the web interface at
   &nbs! p; http:// listserv.muohio.edu/archives/archives.html

Problems?  Send e-mail to Robert F Schmidt <[log in to unmask]>