Yay! Massive physical donations with no money to manage them! A complex problem with no easy solution. I can't speak directly to your quoted cost of digitization as the devil is in the details. The cost per negative is a competitive pricing issue, of course, but also tied directly to quality. It is mostly labor. Are the negatives being checked and cleaned, and scanned in a clean environment on high-quality equipment to minimize dust and dirt? That costs money. At what resolution? The higher the quality, the slower the scan and the bigger the file. The appropriate scan quality (file size) is tied to the quality of the negatives themselves: size, color, clarity, etc... There is a point of diminishing returns, but it may be difficult to determine that globally for a collection of that size.
One critical step is triage. Is it worth scanning the entire collection? The first step in archiving (and the most difficult) is determining what NOT to keep. Consider whether a process of pre-vetting the collection would be cost-effective. Or at least prioritizing the digitization process. It may be that vast swathes of the collection are not worth digitizing at full archival quality, especially if you will be preserving the negatives. Maybe contact sheets would be sufficient for reference, with the analog negatives held available for high-quality digitizing if needed.
Don't digitize black-and-white photos in color. Seems obvious, but it's not. Color files are much larger than black and white "grayscale."
Consider the value of setting up your own digitization workflow, allowing you to digitize as your resources allow, or on demand, rather than trying to finance a large outside cost. You may want this even if the initial digitization is done by an outside service.
You are right about compression. While TIFF is the gold standard, it's not cost-effective for archival. JPG2000 is a better choice. How much space you will save depends on how much compression you're willing to tolerate. You might tolerate more compression if the negatives will be preserved and accessible.
Consider the value of tiering storage. Near-line storage (immediately accessible) is much more expensive than offline or "cold" storage. You may want to preserve larger archival masters in cold storage while keeping only smaller compressed versions available online. Most end-users require far less quality than an archival master. Users who require full archival quality may be willing to pay for the service of pulling and sending the archival files, or even pulling and digitizing the negative at higher quality.
Just a few ideas. I'm happy to talk more if you like. Feel free to contact me directly.
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Tod Hopkins
Hoptod LLC
443-472-5978
todhopkins@me.com------------------------------
Original Message:
Sent: 04-03-2023 03:30 PM
From: Julie Emig
Subject: Bulk Convert TIFF files to JPG2000
Hello, colleagues--
I am following this thread with much interest and have some related questions given the expertise and experience of those who have commented. Our local newspaper donated approximately 1.5 million negatives for us to preserve and digitize (with metadata). Preservation is complete. However, we have only digitized a fraction of the collection. We have been using an excellent Dutch company, Picturae, for the digitization; we then add metadata and make images available for free via the Illinois Digital Archives.
Our challenge is cost. The current digitization estimate is $3,871, 887 ($2.72 per negative x 1,423,488 = $3,871,887).
--For those who are digitizing large volumes of data, how are you managing the expense of digitization while ensuring a high level of quality?
--How are you handling storage capacity? We are quickly running out of server space! We were planning to convert our TIFF files to JPG2000, which we understand may save us 50%, but we're still looking at $40,000 annually for cloud storage.
Thanks for any insight...I'm happy to connect offline, too. My email address is jemig@mchistory.org.
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Julie Emig
Executive Director
McLean County Museum of History
Bloomington IL
Original Message:
Sent: 03-31-2023 10:20 AM
From: Tod Hopkins
Subject: Bulk Convert TIFF files to JPG2000
One more vote for Irfanview, but there is no Mac version. There are many alternatives on Mac, but conversion is built into the Mac OS so you don't need one. First, if you want standard JPG (not JPG2000) there is already a built-in "Quick Action." Select a file or files, right-click, select Quick Action>Convert Image. Select your destination format. Wait. Two problems with this built in conversion. It doesn't include JPG2000 as and option, and it duplicates the file so as not to overwrite the original. If you are doing hundreds of files, you'll want to create a custom function with Automator, which is pretty easy, once you get the hang of it. And it's easy to find tutorials. Here's a simple step-by-step for your workflow. This creates a folder that automatically converts any image file you put into it. https://www.macrumors.com/how-to/make-image-converting-folder-macos/
As for JPG2000, the format has qualitative advantages which make it a preferred format for high-end applications, particularly archival preservation. Since the OP is converting hundreds of files, I would presume that these will being hosted by a CMS that prefers JPG2000.
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Tod Hopkins
Hoptod LLC
443-472-5978
todhopkins@me.com
Original Message:
Sent: 03-28-2023 09:25 AM
From: Jeanne Sojka
Subject: Bulk Convert TIFF files to JPG2000
Hello,
We have been scanning hundreds of library documents as high resolution TIFF files. Is there a company or service that will batch convert them to JPG2000 for use on a website?
Thank you,
Jeanne Sojka, Business Manager
Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association
413-774-7476, x 260
Please add my new email address to your contacts list.