Information for Consortium Members

 

Are you a member of a UP heritage organization that wants to learn more about joining UPLINK? Learn about how UPLINK can benefit your organization here.

 

How to Plan a Digitization Project

UPLINK staff are always happy to provide one-on-one consultation and training about digitization projects! Contact Annika Peterson, UPLINK Digital Project Manager, at annipete@nmu.edu or (906) 227-1225 to set up a meeting.

 

Deciding What to Prioritize for Digitization: UPLINK does not dictate to members what they should put online. If the item documents the history and culture of the UP and publishing it online does not violate copyright or privacy law, we will put it online. 

However, if you would like help deciding which collections to prioritize for digitization, UPLINK staff can offer suggestions. Here are a few general things to consider:

  • Can you digitize it?
  • Should you digitize it?
    • Any item with preservation/condition concerns should be prioritized for digitization. This includes AV materials, negatives stored in poor environmental conditions, items with mold/mildew, and fragile/oversized items at risk of damage from too much handling.
    • Would digitization make it easier to do research with the collection? For instance, digitizing a newspaper makes it full-text searchable.
    • Is the collection particularly popular with researchers?
    • Get more detailed tips on how to prioritize collections for digitization here.

 

Preparing a Collection for Digitization: You can digitize a collection before it is inventoried and organized, but it will be a much more difficult process. We recommend the following:

  • If you do not have an inventory/accession of the collection, create one. Make sure to note any items with copyright or privacy concerns. Decide if you want to digitize every item in the collection or only part of it. It is more efficient to figure this out before you start scanning.
  • Ideally, you would also finish "processing" the collection if processing is part of your organization's workflow. We are aware that many UPLINK members are not archives and archival processing may not be the best way to organize your collections. However, if you would like more information about traditional archival processing, see our Arrangement and Description guide here.

 

Digitization and Creating Metadata: Creating a digital collection requires both digitizing the original items and creating standardized descriptions to go with them (metadata) so that those items will show up in the database's search engine.

Organizations can do their own digitization and metadata or pay UPLINK to do it. UPLINK staff are happy to help you decide which will work best for your organization.

 

  • Digitization:
    • Digitize your own collections in-house. 
      • If you don't want to purchase your own digitization equipment, UPLINK has flatbed scanners, photo and negative scanners, digital cameras, and audio recorders available for members to borrow free of charge.
      • If you want to digitize your collections but don't know how, UPLINK can provide training and suggested digitization standards.
      • If you want to purchase your own equipment but need help deciding what to buy, UPLINK can help you choose a scanner.
    • Pay UPLINK to digitize your collections for you. 
      • See the fees page for details.
      • Please keep in mind that UPLINK has a limited number of staff and student assistants. Digitization may take a while depending on how many other projects we have going on. We will attempt to give you an estimated completion date, but we are often wrong. 
      • However, our fees are very inexpensive--about one-third of our labor costs. The rest is subsidized by Northern Michigan University.

 

  • Metadata:
    • Create your own metadata (descriptions of collections in a standardized format). UPLINK will provide a template for the metadata and we can also provide any necessary training.
      • If you are uncomfortable with using a spreadsheet, you may also hand-write your metadata or put it into a Word document. UPLINK staff can re-format it for you free of charge.
    • Pay UPLINK to create metadata for you. 
      • See the fees page for details.
      • As with digitization, please keep in mind that UPLINK has a limited number of staff and student assistants. Digitization may take a while depending on how many other projects we have going on. We will attempt to give you an estimated completion date, but we are often wrong. 
      • However, our fees are very inexpensive--about one-third of our labor costs. The rest is subsidized by Northern Michigan University.
      • In addition, volunteers at your heritage organization are likely better suited to create descriptions than UPLINK staff due to their local knowledge of the people, places, and events in the records. We strongly encourage heritage organizations to consider creating their own metadata!

 

Ingesting Collections into the Database: Once your collection has been digitized and described, it needs to be added into the UPLINK database. We do charge a minimal fee for uploading items. See the "ingest only" section of the fee page for details.

 

Ongoing Digital Preservation: Digitization does not in and of itself equal preservation! Making sure that digital files are unchanged over time requires active maintenance, just like physical records.

  • UPLINK is committed to basic digital preservation for all of our collections. Learn more on our Policies and Procedures page.
  • For additional protection, UPLINK can give you a copy of your digital files so that you can maintain your own backups.
  • To learn more about digital preservation practices and why they matter, see here.

 

Frequently Asked Questions

  • We want to charge for photograph publication but still let the public see our photographs. Can we still add our photographs to UPLINK?
    • Yes, you can. We cannot embargo access to items or put them behind a paywall, but we can upload images with watermarks or low dpi to discourage use. However, people will still be able to download or screenshot the low-quality version of the photograph.
  • Can we publish portions of a collection?
    • Yes! Feel free to pick just a few items of a collection to digitize.
  • There is a collection that we can't digitize because of copyright/privacy/cost, but we want more researchers to find out about it and use it. Can we mention it on our page on the UPLINK website? 
    • Absolutely! We can upload indexes, inventories, finding aids, accessions, or other descriptive records to UPLINK so that researchers will find out about your collections while searching the database.
  • Can we put brochures on our UPLINK page?
    • Yes, you can customize the content on your organization's landing page, including adding information about hours and events or putting up formal brochures and other ads. Just contact Annika Peterson at annipete@nmu.edu to change the information on your organization's page.

 

External Resources

Grant Opportunities:

Need help funding a project? A few particularly relevant grant opportunities are listed below. Marcus Robyns (mrobyns@nmu.edu) can also provide assistance with finding and applying for grants.

Check out the great resources at the Library of Michigan website! In addition to grant opportunities, they also offer consultations, training, digitization equipment, and resources on digitization and digital preservation.

The Save Michigan History grant program is another great option. It can provide up up to $2,500 for care, management, and access to archival collections as well as a consultation with a visiting archivist to help you prioritize and plan projects.

 

Digitization Resources from the Library of Michigan:

  • Digitization Equipment Selection Matrix: if you're looking to buy your own digitization equipment, this guide can help you to choose which scanner is right for your organization
  • Digitization Project Planning Guide: a guide to help you think through what to digitize next and create a step-by-step list of what you'll need to do to complete the project
  • Digitization Webinars: webinars on every aspect of digitization, from choosing what to digitize, how to digitize, copyright, and metadata
  • Digitization Office Hours: pick the brain of digitization and digital preservation experts from across the state! The Zoom call is held on the first Wednesday of each month at 2:30 PM.
  • Other Library of Michigan programs and resources can be found here.