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Another DAM Podcast interview with Jennifer Sellar on Digital Asset Management

Jennifer Sellar discusses Digital Asset Management

 

 

Transcript:

Henrik de Gyor:  [0:01] This is Another DAM Podcast about Digital Asset Management. I’m Henrik de Gyor. Today, I’m speaking with Jennifer Sellar. Jennifer, how are you?

Jennifer Sellar:  [0:10] I’m good, thanks.

Henrik:  [0:11] Jennifer, how are you involved with Digital Asset Management?

Jennifer:  [0:14] I am the Senior Digital Image Archivist at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. I’ve been here almost nine years. I started out working in more traditional archives. I’m working with photography and film collections. I have an MLIS. And then, a job opened up, when I moved to New York at MoMA. They were looking for someone to organize the workflow and the digital images they were taking in the imaging studio.

[0:43] When I came in, they were originally working with the Excel Spreadsheet, some basic metadata that they were adding in, while they were shooting images. My job was initially to organize the studio, and get all of their workflow, so that it was set up, so that they weren’t using [laughs] spreadsheets. We’re able to track all their images. At the same time, the museum actually started the processing of getting a DAM System, and had chosen one using a committee through various people at the museum.

[1:13] Once that was established, I was the primary person to the front-end of the DAM at the museum. I work with all of the different departments, working with their workflow, and getting their materials into the DAM. Then, I work with a committee and various people through the museum, primarily in IT, so that the DAM is running on a daily basis.

Henrik:  [1:36] Jennifer, how does a modern art museum use Digital Asset Management?

Jennifer:  [1:41] We use it as a workflow for all of our images. Actually now, not just imaging materials, but all sort of multimedia materials in the museum. We started out, as I’ve said, in the imaging studio, because the imaging studio’s responsible for taking all the images of the artwork. Those are used for publications, retail or anything at the museum. We would use it for the website.

[2:11] Once we got that established, we started using it for all imaging. It’s been slowly growing, retail, graphics, the conservation department. All of their images are also in there and fully searchable. Everyone at the museum has some sort of access. Most users have a basic access to be able to download a JPEG from the [DAM] system.

[2:36] We actually have our rights management outsourced to two companies. One is Scala, which is in Italy, the other one is Art Resources, which is based in New York. They oversee our Rights Management, but that flows through my department and through me. They are able to use the DAM System, to be able to find what we have for their researchers. It allows them to do research, where we don’t have to do it on our end, and then they’re responsible for overseeing the rights, and getting the images out to other people.

[3:07] We also use it as a workflow to get our images to our main museum database, TMS, which is used throughout the museum world. That also allows the website to be able to get images as well. We are now recently using another new system in the museum called “The Digital Repository for Museum Collections” which we call DRMC, which is basically a system archive and preserve any original digital artwork in the museum. They actually are providing access copies of those works that are available in the DAM for users. If a curator wants to watch one of those, they’re able to watch those in our DAM System.

[3:45] We, primarily, pull a lot of our data from the TMS System automatically. We put that in place. The TMS System has rights in regards to the artwork and uses in any of those documentation.

[3:57] That’s pulled into the Asset Management System. Our resources in Scala will be able to see what the images are, if they have any issues. Again, we’re providing the image. If a person is using that, they would actually go to the artists’ estate or the artist themselves, and then get their additional permission. It’s fairly complicated.

[4:18] We’ve actually looked into some additional rights system, because you’ll hear from a lot of people with DAM Systems. One DAM doesn’t usually fit everything perfectly. Rights seems to be a big issue. We have some basic rights information, but obviously, as you get into things like video, which we just started pulling in, rights gets much more complicated than with just one artist. It becomes very complicated.

[4:45] We’re looking at different ways of putting that in through using a documentation that would be attached with the asset, versus it necessarily being searchable directly as a field in the DAM. That’s one thing when you’re working in a museum, especially in modern museums. Somewhere like The Met, someone that’s dealing with stuff that’s out of copyright, it’s a little bit easier, but we have to be very concern about how our permissions are set.

[5:08] A lot of times, people don’t realize all the rights involved, when you’re working with people. They want to go ahead and use the image [laughs] , if they have full access to it or are able to download it very easily without going through a process of someone with checks and balances. A lot of that is set through permissions.

[5:26] Primarily, there are very few people in the museum who have full access to be able to download. Those people tend to be people who are working in departments who would understand rights, so publications obviously, they understand that they can’t just take an image and automatically use it.

Henrik:  [5:42] Jennifer, what are the biggest challenges and successes you’ve seen with DAM?

Jennifer:  [5:45] For us, and this is a challenge, no matter where you are, people are producing so much content at this point. I’ve been in the studio. We’ve seen the number of growth images we do. It’s massive, the amount that we do now, compared to what we did eight years ago. Again, same thing with video and audio in the museum. Every department is producing more and more materials, honestly with less people.

[6:13] It’s very difficult to get people to buy into being able to put, to give us the information or materials in a way that will actually work in the Asset Management System. Also, a lot of times, the people we work with don’t necessarily even have the ability to do it. In the studio, we have great resources. We have Photoshop. We have Bridge.

[6:34] We have all of these ways to put in metadata, and set up metadata to automatically go into materials. There are a lot of people working in the museum who can’t even open a TIF image [laughs] on their machines. A lot of times, they’ll look at a disc from an outside photographer, and they won’t be able to even to do anything with them.

[6:53] A big goal for us is to try to figure out a good space, where those people can view enough information and have workflows that they can get that material to us in a way that it works in the DAM. It’s finding that sweet spot between that, which always very difficult.

[7:10] We have the luxury of being able to implement our DAM fairly slowly. We’ve been able to go to departments and realize when they’re ready and when they’re not [laughs] , because if not, if people just throw you materials, it doesn’t work very well with the DAM, because while you can put them in there, they’re not usable if they don’t have their correct data or organization with them. I would say that’s probably the biggest challenge for us.

[7:32] It’s being able to handle all the materials that are coming in with the amount of people working. We’ve had a lot of success. Because of that issue, we’ve been really successful of being able to integrate any systems that were available already, which I talked a little bit about TMS. We are able to pull a lot of data from that database, because it’s really rich.

[7:56] There are people who are working with that full‑time, who really know the art, the artists and all that information. It makes sense. We can do that with artwork. We have an object ID that’s unique. We’re able to pull all that information about the artwork automatically in every day. Also, we’ve been able to do a workflow, where we’ve been able to automate pulling and approving the materials.

[8:19] As we go along each step, we’ve been able to automate more and more. A curator has to proof an image, and it goes automatically to the database into the website, without them having to do a lot of work. That’s been a great success. Also, just putting the materials into the DAM System has allowed us to see overlaps in different departments, because departments tend to not necessarily always speak to each other.

[8:43] There were some departments who are taking similar images of each other, so that they could actually realize that they didn’t need to rehire a photographer to shoot something, since we already had it. They’re able also to understand a little bit more at the front end that rights are important. There used to be a lot of handshake agreements [laughs].

[9:02] They realize now if they’re going to pay an outside photographer for images that it would be great, if we can get the rights for those, and get people to sign off releases. It’s helped the museum realize that kind of thing that will help in the long run for these assets to be used more than once.

Henrik:  [9:21] Jennifer, what advice would you like to share with DAM professionals and people aspiring to become DAM professionals?

Jennifer:  [9:25] For people who are trying to go into the industry, I would say there is more and more course work raised on DAMs, but there is so much out there, if you are already working, so I wouldn’t go a more traditional library field. There are things, like the DAM meetups in New York, which are great. It’s really amazing. You can meet people. You can learn about the industry. It’s a great place for contacts, any meetups.

[9:46] I was going to the other day, there’s a meetup for that, if you need to learn about scripting, if you need to learn about taxonomy. Those are amazing groups, and they’re great resources. Now, there’s so much more material on the Web.

[9:59] I was looking at film and video. It’s not my strong suit and background, NYU has a film archiving program. They put all their syllabus online now. You can see all the course material. A lot of times, there’s links. Sometimes, there’s lectures.

[10:18] It’s really amazing from when I went to library school 15 years ago, what is out there and free. There is so many more ways to network than there were 10 years ago even. Just use every kind of person that you can go out there.

[10:32] I would also recommend getting internships. We always have interns. I’ve gotten a couple of interns actually from the DAM meet up for people who are interested. Some people were like adult returning students, and not necessarily who would have originally started out in that background. If you’re in a city or anywhere, there’s Asset Management Systems in every field. It’s a growing industry.

[10:51] For people who already work in Asset Management, for us the largest success for us is to look through the museum and see we don’t have a large staff. That’s very common, especially in non‑profits and museums. We’ve been able to collaborate and use other departments to get a lot of things done. That’s what I look at. That’s been successful here for us.

Henrik:  [11:14] Thanks, Jennifer.

Jennifer:  [11:15] Thanks.

Henrik:  [11:16] For more on this and other Digital Asset Management topics, go to anotherdamblog.com. If you have any comments or questions, please feel free to email me at anotherdamblog@gmail.com. For this and 150 other podcast episodes, including transcripts of every interview, go to anotherdampodcast.com. Thanks again.

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Another DAM Podcast interview with Mitch Brodsky on Digital Asset Management

Mitch Brodsky discusses Digital Asset Management

Here are the questions asked:

  • How are you involved with Digital Asset Management?
  • How does the Philharmonic use Digital Asset Management?
  • What are the biggest challenges and successes you have seen with DAM?
  • What advice would you like to share with DAM Professionals and people aspiring to become DAM Professionals?

Transcript:

Henrik de Gyor: [0:00] This is Another DAM Podcast about Digital Asset
Management. I’m Henrik de Gyor. Today, I’m speaking with Mitch Brodsky.
Mitch, how are you?
Mitch Brodsky: [0:09] Great. How are you?
Henrik: [0:11] Good. Mitch, how are you involved with Digital Asset
Management?
Mitch: [0:14] I work for the New York Philharmonic. My official title here is Digital
Archives Manager. I was hired to manage the three year project with support
from the Leon Levy Foundation to digitize 1.3 million pages of historical material
here in the archives between the years 1943 to 1970. My role has largely been
project manager for that project. However, I have branched out into other responsibilities,
such as web archiving, electronic records management, and other
sorts of Digital Asset Management issues here within the organization.
Henrik: [0:52] How does the Philharmonic use Digital Asset Management?
Mitch: [0:55] As the result of our digitization project, we have a website that was
launched in February 2011. You can find it at archives.nyphil.org. That is a site
where you can view the 1.3 million pages that we’ve digitized, and that is under
an Alfresco Repository. That’s one element of what we do, is to manage that
large repository and continue to grow it into the future. [1:22] We have printed
music, which includes scores and orchestral parts used and marked by Leonard
Bernstein, Andre Kostelanetz, and other conductors. And, of course, the parts
are marked by the orchestral musicians. We also have every printed program,
which you can flip through online. We are beginning to go back and complete
the digitization of 1842 through yesterday’s program. We do have online right
now everything from 1943 to 1970.
[1:58] In addition, we have all of the photographs from that time period, glass
lantern slides that were used in the first Young People’s Concerts, and business
records, which is actually the bulk of the material. What we call business records
are correspondence, contracts, financial documents, anything related to the
daily running of the Philharmonic. This is really what we, as records managers,
accession every day from the administration of the organization.
[2:33] We have digitized everything in TIFF and JPEG . All the images that you’re
seeing online are JPEGs that are being represented in the Internet archives
book reader, which I believe now is hosted on the Open Library. We adapted
that book reader to pull the JPEGs associated with assets you’re looking for
into it so you can flip through it as though it’s on the reading room table in
front of you.
[2:58] That said, since we have digitized everything from 1943 to 1970, we are
continuing to go back and digitize everything from 1842, now, to 1943. We will
be eventually completing the digitization of all of the historical assets owned by
the Philharmonic.
[3:20] In addition to that, we’re beginning the process of sessioning born digital
material into the archives. The idea is that, at one point in time, we will have a
single repository that contains all of the intellectual assets of the organization
from 1842 through today. We’ll be able to facilitate the discovery of items that
follow certain themes throughout the entire history of the institution.
[3:47] We do utilize assets relating to certain issues through time. This will be
one day a discovery tool to be able to pull things out that relate to overall topics
as we might be dealing with today, but we had also dealt with in the ‘70s or the
‘40s or the ‘20s, and so on.
Henrik: [4:08] What are the biggest challenges and successes you’ve seen with
Digital Asset Management?
Mitch: [4:12] The biggest challenge is definitely workflow. Now, our case in
Digital Asset Management might be a little bit different from what first would
appear to someone’s mind when hearing that term. [4:27] To me, Digital Asset
Management largely means born digital material that is sessioned into a repository
and managed and then later leveraged however the organization sees fit.
[4:41] What I’ve had most experience with here is digitizing analog material into
digital assets. There’s an enormous amount of challenge from the workflow, because
we have to prepare items for digitization, then it has to be photographed
by our in house photographers. Then every page has to be proofed, which
means compared with the original item.
[5:09] We have this very complex workflow, both in terms of physical logistics,
but also, software, where in between those steps, I have to ingest all these
assets into the system at an enormous rate, create derivative files, and then
put approved items into a queue for release and then finally, release when we
decide to do our point releases.
[5:36] My job as the project manager is to make sure that all the people involved
here have work to do every day and that we’re not backed up or too far
ahead in one part of the process or another. That’s the biggest challenge from
where I sit.
[5:53] The biggest success, well, it’s amazing when you work so hard on a project
like this and the site goes online and it’s living and breathing. The most amazing
thing, to me, is the comments that come in from people, how much they’re
using this now in their research.
[6:15] Only a year, I guess, a year and a half into the project, we are working with
some Columbia sociologists to look at subscription seating through the history
of our ticket sales. They’ve been crunching some of or data and transcribing our
subscriber feed books to determine where people sat in the association to their
status in New York society. It’s a really interesting project that we would never
have dreamed would’ve come out of this, especially so soon and after the initial
release of the digital archives.
[7:03] That’s just one example of many very serious researchers write us and tell
us that they want to use our data for some extraordinary project that will add to
the information that’s out there. I’m just very proud of that.
[7:19] I suppose that’s the greatest success that I see, is just that this thing is out
there and people are utilizing it and they’re responding to it. Every time we’ve
done a release, we’ve seen our numbers almost double in terms of our analytics,
and this has been very telling for us, that people really are interested in this.
[7:42] We are in a really good position with our metadata when we started the
project. Our metadata is housed in two different databases, depending on the
type of material, but these databases have been curated and utilized since the
‘80s. Our metadata is in very good shape.
[8:04] What we do is we have metadata on what we call the asset level. For business
folders, we have metadata on the folding level. For music scores, we have
it on the score level, so each bound volume is described with metadata.
[8:21] We don’t do page level description because we simply would never have
gotten it done. When we started out with the project, our metadata was pretty
clean and so as part of the proofing process, as we were proofing images, the
people who were doing that were also checking to make sure that the metadata
was standardized and cleaning up whatever needed to be cleaned up.
[8:51] Our printed music and our performance history for program metadata
are in an in-house, homebuilt, multivalue database system. Our business records
and metadata is in Inmagic’s DB/TextWorks. We’ve had good success
with those.
[9:14] The way the process works is, when we photograph the analog material,
and I ingest those JPEGS into our Alfresco repository. I also do an export of the
metadata from our legacy systems and import those as well. Everything is tied
by ID. If we do have to revise metadata, we do it in our in-house databases and
then re-import again.
[9:44] One day, we will be doing direct metadata entry in the Alfresco interface,
although we just haven’t started that yet. It’s important to note that these are
not archival databases. The databases that we use, that feed into our digital
archives, are used really by the entire organization for different purposes. For
those people who are listening to this as archivists, we don’t distinguish between
what is our archival and what is current.
[10:15] I think that goes to the same point of, the purpose of this project, to
make one large repository, one continuum of information of history of the
Philharmonic. The information that was being created by the institution in 1842
is just as relevant and just as important as the documents that are being created
right now by our executive director or managers of various sorts.
Henrik: [10:45] What advice would you like to share with DAM professionals and
people aspiring to become DAM professionals?
Mitch: [10:49] I would say learn as much as you can about different systems,
different types of repositories and different program languages. I’m not a “developer.”
That’s not my training background. I have a degree in library science,
that I also have a music degree. [11:13] I was also a geek. I loved tinkering with
computers for my whole life. In the early ‘90s when HTML started to become
a thing and the web started to happen, I had a big book of…the HTML Bible. I
went front to back and I learned it. I had no idea, then, that that would form the
foundation for my career in the future. Now, it doesn’t stop. I go home and I
do online JavaScript tutorials and I do online jQuery tutorials and whatever else
because it just never stops, the amount that you can learn.
[11:53] The benefit of being a professional, especially a technology-oriented
professional in today’s world is that there’s so much open source software and
there’s so much community around learning these things. There are plenty of
free or very inexpensive ways, if you’re willing to put the time in, to keep up with
what’s going on out there.
[12:16] I love Codecademy. It’s not huge yet, but the examples in the tutorials
that I have on there have really helped refresh some things for me and in other
cases, learn from scratch. I would definitely recommend it. I try to take my own
advice, in that case, and do it myself.
[12:36] It’s so easy. For instance, Alfresco is a great example. You can download
for free, community version of Alfresco and learn how it works and what are the
pros and cons of it. You can do that with any number of repository systems.
[12:53] Knowing about what’s out there is really important because when an
option comes up in your job, you have to make a decision between one system
or technique or another system or technique. To know all the options that are
out there and why one would choose one over the other is just really important.
Henrik: [13:12] Very true. That sounds like a great example of how you made a
personal commitment to invest in yourself in learning those skills.
Mitch: [13:20] Absolutely. There’s no reason not to.
Henrik: [13:22] Excellent. Well, thanks, Mitch.
Mitch: [13:25] You’re welcome.
Henrik: [13:26] For more on this and other Digital Asset Management topics,
log onto AnotherDAMblog.com. Another DAM Podcast is available in
Audioboom and iTunes. If you have any comments or questions, feel free to email
me at AnotherDAMblog@gmail.com.Thanks again.

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Another DAM Podcast interview with Jill Hurst-Wahl on Digital Asset Management

Here are the questions asked:

  • How are you involved with Digital Asset Management?
  • You teach at Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies. What is different about what you teach?
  • You have popular blog. Tell us more about this.
  • What advice would you like to share with DAM Professionals and people aspiring to become DAM Professionals?

Transcript:

Henrik de Gyor: [0:01] This is Another DAM Podcast about Digital Asset
Management. I’m Henrik de Gyor.
[0:07] Today we’re speaking with Jill Hurst-Wahl. Jill, how are you?
Jill Hurst-Wahl: [0:10] I’m good.
Henrik: [0:12] Jill, how are you involved with Digital Asset Management?
Jill: [0:16] Well, I don’t actually do Digital Asset Management. But in my workshops
and in my blogging and in my teaching, I try to make people aware of
the need to think long-term. Not to just focus on the short-term health of their
digital assets, but to think about which digital assets they might want to have
access to long-term. Then how they’re going to make those things accessible in
the long-term.
Henrik: [0:52] Makes sense. You teach at Syracuse University’s School of
Information Studies. What is different about what you teach there?
Jill: [1:00] I think many of the library science programs have very similar curriculum
because of the American Library’s Association accreditation. But the
iSchools are all different, and Syracuse University has an iSchool, School for
Information Studies. We have six degree programs. [1:25] I think what makes us
a bit different is our, not only being library science, but also our classes around
information management and telecommunications and network management.
[1:38] We think more, perhaps, about the management of information, which
includes what’s going to happen to it long-term. In library science, or library and
information science, that thinking comes in the digital libraries area.
[2:08] But you would get, perhaps, similar and different thinking about the topic
from students and their information management program who are future information
managers, not necessarily working in the library archive or museum, but
working in businesses throughout the world.
Henrik: [2:27] Makes sense. You have a popular blog. Tell us more about this.
Jill: [2:32] I have a blog called “Digitization 101,” started in 2004, and started
as a way to make people aware of what I do and my thinking around digitization.
[2:48] I do consulting, helping people get their digitization programs off the
ground. Often times, just helping them with their planning process, but helping
them sometimes acquire equipment, think about actual process, implement,
find vendors, find whatever they need to get their projects up and going, their
programs up and going. Because these are not short-term events.
[3:18] The blog was started as a way of letting more people know about what
I do and what I think. Over the years, it’s become something I’m really known
for, having this blog that talks about digitization. I talk about all aspects of
digitization.
[3:38] The name “Digitization 101,” if you’re in college, a 101 class is really basic.
But the blog has gone beyond being just talking about basic digitization and
talking about the things that we’re all focused on in digitizing and making sure
that our digital assets are available long-term.
[4:04] I’ve got, I don’t remember how many blog posts. I think over 2,000
blog posts at this point. I used to blog once a day. Because I now teach full-
time, I don’t blog as frequently. But a new series that I’ve started is Way Back
Wednesdays. A way of kind of resurfacing things that are in the archives of
“Digitization 101” that are still relevant and making people aware of those older
blog posts. Trying to keep those older blog posts alive just the way we try to
keep our other digital assets alive.
Henrik: [4:48] Smart. What advice would you like to share with DAM professionals
and people aspiring to become DAM professionals?
Jill: [4:56] Well, I think for the people that aspiring to be DAM professionals, and
by the way, I love the acronym DAM.
Henrik: [5:04] Me too.
Jill: [laughter] [5:05] For people aspiring to be a DAM professional is to think
about how to talk about it in ways that don’t necessarily use the words Digital
Asset Management. I think that’s true about digitization, too. In our field, we
tend to rely on jargon. Words are very meaningful to us, not so meaningful to
other people. [5:38] I think, especially if you’re trying to get organizations to
understand how to keep their information alive for the long term, we need to
talk about it in ways that make sense to them. Talk about the value of their information
over the long term. Why they would want, in five, ten years, have access
to information that they’re creating today and then how they would insure that
their information or the data is available for five, 10 years.
[6:17] Using stories to get our points across, but doing it in a way that doesn’t
rely on our terminology as DAM professionals. But the terminology of our organizations,
our users, our colleagues, now whoever it is that we’re trying to persuade
that they need to do something now to insure the life of their information
in the future.
Henrik: [6:45] Well, thank you, Jill. [6:46] For more about Digital Asset
Management, log onto AnotherDAMblog.com. Thanks again.

Related Articles

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