DAMsmart DIGITAL NEWS
DAMsmart Assist The Scots College To Preserve Valuable School Heritage
SYDNEY, 17 March 2009 – The Scots College in Bellevue Hill, Sydney, is one of Australia's oldest and most respected schools. Over the 106 year history of the school, a vast collection of film, video and audio has been collected and deposited within the School's archive.
Deborah Crowe, Archivist at the Scots College, was aware of the growing problem of managing large volumes of valuable, yet fragile media in the archive. The school had no replay equipment for many of the older formats, and tape hydrolysis was present in much of the collection. In September 2008, Deborah approached DAMsmart to help identify a preservation solution for this valuable school resource.
“We had lots of old videotapes on formats like Umatic, Betamax and old Betacam format, and we had no way of replaying the tapes or accessing them at all. This audiovisual collection is an incredibly valuable document of the School's history, and we knew something had to be done, or we would lose it forever”, Crowe said.
After discussions with DAMsmart, The Scots College decided to proceed with a digital migration strategy that saw original magnetic videotapes repaired, cleaned and rejuvenated before encoding into several file formats.
Stage 1 of the project included hydrolysed Betamax, Betacam, VHS and U-Matic videotapes, some of which needed extensive conservation treatments before migration. Once repaired and cleaned, the tapes were encoded into MPEG2 master files and Windows Media streaming files using the automated SAMMA Solo videotape to file migration platform. The SAMMA platform permits high levels of automated quality control, and simultaneous encoding to multiple file formats. Extensive video analysis and QC reports in XML format were included as part of the service, and this information will be used by the school in future restoration and repurposing activities.
Some of the material preserved in the initial stage of the project included high profile school performances at the Edinburgh Military Tattoo, VIP visitors to the school, a range of sporting events, new student intakes, awards ceremonies and excursions.
Stage 2 of the project will include many original 35 and 16mm film prints, and several other video formats. The goal for the school is to have the entire audiovisual collection migrated to digital file formats and made accessible to identified locations within the school's IT network.
“DAMsmart have provided the school with a great service at an affordable price. They have helped the school preserve some of our heritage, and assisted us to ensure we can provide the whole school community with access to this wonderful historical resource”, Crowe said.
DAMsmart can assist your organisation to save valuable audiovisual collections. For further details, call Joe Kelly on (02) 6242 6456 or email joe@damsmart.com.au