Making Contact
If you find images, audio or video files, or textual documents outside of EXPLORE, contact the owning institutions directly to ask for digitized media files and metadata. Archivists may send content to you via email or by depositing items in a Box folder. More information on requesting and organizing content can be found in the next section, Workflow for Uploading to Scalar.
We urge you to be understanding of the institution's workload and digitization capabilities and build in plenty of time for this step. The Digital Exhibits Committee can help facilitate digitization where possible and send you institutional contact information if you can't find it.
If you know you need more content, but are not sure exactly who to ask, please discuss with your Digital Exhibits liaison - they will work with you to petition institutions (general or specific) for additional media and metadata.
Digitization Standards
For more comprehensive guidelines on digitizing materials, see CARLI's Guidelines for the Creation of Digital Collections and the Technical Guidelines for Digitizing Cultural Heritage Materials from the Federal Agencies Digital Guidelines Initiative (FADGI.) Below are the recommended specifications for Chicago Collections exhibits in Scalar.
Recommended formats
- Image: JPEG, PNG, GIF, DZI
- Text: HTML, JavaScript, Java, TXT, XML, PDF
- Audio: MPEG-3, Ogg, WAV
- Video: FLV, M4V, MPEG-4, Ogg, WebM, QuickTime
- Maps: KML
Other specifications
- Derivative (not storage) file formats
- File size less than 100 MB
- Scalar can't store files larger than 100 MB. If you have derivative images or audio or video files that exceed this size, you'll need to link to them in their native environment (YouTube, Avalon, etc.)
- 500 pixels minimum width or height
- 1980 pixels maximum width
- High resolution or 300 dpi/ppi (pixels/dots per inch) recommended
- If you are using Photoshop, select the "Save for Web" option, saving at 70 Quality
Expanded documentation and guidelines on using audio and video files in Scalar will be provided after we hear back from people incorporating them in their exhibits.
Metadata Guidelines
Minimum required metadata
If you use an image or images from EXPLORE, the following metadata will already be included in the online record. If you're collecting metadata for media files not in EXPLORE, please follow the guidelines below.
- Owning institution or repository: If the archivist doesn't include this information in the metadata, you can populate the field yourself.
- Title: Do not guess at the title or modify the title the archivist provides. The archivist MUST assign a title, even if it's made up for the purpose of the exhibit. Scalar gives you the option to pull the image title into a caption.
- Local identifier: The local file name of the object in the owning institution's repository or content management system (e.g. roykoimage.jpg.) You may extrapolate local identifiers from the files the archivist emails or deposits in Box.
- Rights information: To ensure that all materials are legally allowed to be displayed online and protect Chicago Collections and its member institutions from being sued for breach of copyright, we require either a RightsStatements.org statement or a custom rights statement. Do not guess the copyright status of an object. The archivist MUST provide this information for your exhibit even if it doesn't appear in their local repository.
Optional metadata
Libraries and archives follow a wide variety of practices for describing archival material, so the media you use in your exhibit may or may not include the following metadata fields. Some information may be extrapolated from a title or other contextual information, which you may add yourself, and some information may simply be unknown. When in doubt contact the owning institution, but please be understanding of the archivists' workload.
Brief guidelines for each field are provided below.
- Creator: Usually a photographer or author. There may be multiple entries for Creator. Do not invert personal names; see the Appendix - Metadata Guidelines page for more information.
- Creator role: Role may be useful for clarifying how the Creator was involved in making the object, e.g. lithographer, illustrator, cartographer, etc.
- Date: Use consistent date formats, especially if you think you'll be using the timeline widget.
- Description: This field provides an explanation and context for the item, most likely written by an archivist with knowledge of the subject or by someone who has done extensive research. Scalar gives you the option to pull the image description into a caption.
- Subject terms: We recommend assigning at least one subject term per object. Controlled vocabularies are preferred but not required.
- Geographic location: Location may be narrow (neighborhood, town, etc.) or broad (state, country, etc.) Controlled vocabularies are preferred but not required.
- Other contributors: A person, people or corporate body(ies) that played a secondary role in the creation of the object.
- Alternate title: The archivist may want to submit a short title for items with very lengthy titles or overly vague titles.
- Collection: The archival collection where the image or media file "lives."
- Other repository information: Additional information about the institution, for example, a named archive that houses the collection or the name of a university library when the university is listed as the owning institution.
See the Appendix - Metadata Guidelines page for metadata mappings and more thorough guidelines on populating these fields. In the next section, Workflow for Uploading to Scalar, you'll find a sample spreadsheet that you can use as a metadata template.