Follow federal standards and best practices whenever possible.

• Brief guide to digitization specifications followed by the UCSC library
  • DPI & Resolution (original, modified, derivatives)
• Federal Agencies Digitization Guidelines Initiative (FADGI) still Image Working Group. Technical Guidelines for Digitizing Cultural Heritage Materials 2015

• Scan in batches (easier to upload)
• Crop, rotate, dust, color correct, sharpen, images as necessary
• Add file name to spreadsheet
• Create derivatives if necessary
• Do periodic scanning QA (don't leave to end)
• Check File naming

• DSC Lab Equipment & Software
• Digital Production Studio

File Naming

• Decide on a naming convention before data collection starts
• Use descriptive file names
  • Example: ms0405_harry_mayo
  • Combine item format with an accession number and collection name
  • ms = manuscripts; 0405 = accession number; harry_mayo = collection name
• Use underscores instead of spaces
• Avoid special characters such as: " / \ : * ? < > [] & $ .
• Use the dating convention: YYYY-MM-DD
• Be consistent

Organization

• Use a folder structure to organize for raw, modified & derivative files
• Use spreadsheets for organizing information and sharing with project team
• Blogs can be helpful to keep track of group projects

What if you took a bunch of photos in an archive and came home with a lot of files with unintelligible names? Batch processing tools help easily rename those files to match a more sensible file naming strategy.

• Mac OS X:
  • Rename files, folders, and disks -- already installed on Yosemite, El Capitan 
• PC
  • Batch rename files -- use already installed software on Windows 10/8/7 
  • Bulk Rename Utility -- download free software