Digital preserving of multimedia and photographic collections of Raman Research Institute Library : A case Study

Abstract

Digitization has become important part of libraries because it increases accessibility through internet and intranet. Raman Research Institute (RRI) library is currently working on digitization of multimedia and photographic collections. This paper aims to provide an overview of the challenges imposed in preserving, organizing, accessing and storing digitized documents of RRI library. The organization of non-print resources poses lot of challenges to institute library authorities. There are two types of arrangement physical and classified (arrangement by subject content). RRI library classified non-print resources according to their physical format and then assigned accession number. Physical format includes videocassettes, sound recordings, slides, tape films, filmstrips, etc. They require gadgets such as film projectors, video cassette/players, slide projectors, audio cassette players to access the information contained in them. Despite many of these gadgets are obsolete RRI library provides access through digitization. This paper addresses issues related in digitizing and providing access to multimedia documents constituting audio video (AV) resources and photographs.