The recent digitization of cassettes from the Clayman Institute for Gender Research was a reminder of the wide range of collection sizes preserved by SMPL. This entry will give a brief description of why this collection is interesting and how it relates to the multiple workflows of the Stanford Media Preservation Lab.
Over on the Library of Congress Digitial Preservation blog, the Artifact Atlas, our crowdsourced effort to document audio-video related artifacts experienced during digitization, was given a flattering profile.
During the fall of 2013, Stanford University Libraries (SUL) convened a working group to investigate the current state of access to audio and moving image materials held within its various collections, notably rare materials within its different special collections departments, along with those held at the Hoover Institution Library and Archives.
Following many weeks of investigation, the Media Access Working Group (MAWG) produced a report in December 2013 outlining its findings, along with various recommendations to help tackle the issues discovered. The group considered issues relating to use cases, copyright status, available technologies - including media streaming, and content usage.
Recently a film director from the BBC visited the Stanford Libraries while seeking content for a documentary related to the noted cetacean researcher and activist John C. Lilly (1915-2001).
Stanford University Library's (SUL) collaboration with the California Audiovisual Preservation Project (CAVPP) has yielded two more preserved objects on the Internet Archive:
The Stanford Media Preservation Lab (SMPL) has completed installation of audio and video digitization equipment in its new facilities at 425 Broadway in Redwood City, and has resumed all services. We're 100% back to work, supporting researcher access to SUL's world-class collections of sound recordings and moving images.
The Stanford Media Preservation Lab (SMPL) is making good progress in setting up shop at our new location in Redwood City.
SMPL moved from Page Mill Road in Palo Alto -- along with HighWire Press, Stanford University Press, LOCKSS, and parts of both Preservation and Special Collections -- to 425 Broadway over Labor Day weekend. (Shortly thereafter Stanford announced plans to redevelop the Redwood City site and create a major auxiliary campus.) We're very excited about the new space! It provides us with several opportunities to streamline and improve our facilities, workflows and services. More about that in a future post. For now, here are some photos illustrating our progress.
Did you know the Stanford Media Preservation Lab (SMPL) has helped create an online wiki collecting and describing audio and video artifacts one might encounter in the course of reformatting legacy media? Check out our two year update on the Atlas on Indiana University's media preservation blog.