TAPE workshop on the curation and preservation of audiovisual collections
University of Glasgow, Scotland, UK
Monday 12th – Friday 16th May 2008
Workshop Outputs Now Available
Workshop Report Also Available in PDF
The 2008 TAPE Workshop brought together a range of international audio, film and video experts from national heritage institutions, broadcasters, research centres and commercial service providers. The delegates, like the speakers, also came from across Europe, representing all manner of audiovisual archives and providers in the UK and Ireland, Switzerland, Italy, Belgium, Spain, Denmark, Latvia and the Netherlands, making for a truly international workshop.
The week began with introductions: the initial three sessions provided an overview to audio, film and video preservation to familiarise everybody with the main challenges faced. A drinks reception and tour hosted by BBC Scotland followed, allowing the delegates and speakers to get to know others in the group. Tuesday continued with the focus on fundamental concepts with sessions ranging from building analogue collections, the principles of digitisation, managing digitised and born-digital material and how to cost curation and preservation work to develop robust business cases. A conference dinner on the Tuesday evening provided the opportunity to share information about collections and problems faced which helped to lead into discussion on the Wednesday in the outsourcing and film restoration workshops. The second half of the week had more of a digital preservation slant. Sessions covered preservation planning and approaches, storage and repositories, metadata, encouraging access and reuse and how to generate revenue from digital content. From the initial sessions that familiarised delegates with key concepts in audiovisual preservation, the speakers worked through the various processes involved in creating, curating and using content to provide a holistic view of the challenges encountered when managing audiovisual collections. |
BBC Scotland’s new building at Pacific Quay ©MS
Richard Wright and Matthew Addis admiring a 78 player in the pub ©MS |
L to R: Richard Wright, BBC, Charles Fairall, BFI, Giorgio Dimino, RAI ©U of G |
With the course taking place over five days there was ample opportunity for socialising during the breaks and in the evenings. Lots of new connections were made that will help to share expertise across institutional, sectoral and national boundaries. Feedback was very positive as the comments below demonstrate. The suggestions from speakers and delegates will help us to develop a programme of training over the coming years in collaboration with the Universities of Amsterdam and Applied Sciences in Berlin. Details of future events will be released as they become available. |
- “A very impressive and worthwhile workshop”
- “Excellent!”
- “An amazing breadth of information, fantastically structured. Very useful delegate pack as well”
- “Great hosts. Very good workshop. Thank you.”
- “The visit to BBC and the Scottish Film Archive was great”
- “Good networking opportunities”
- “It’s the best and most comprehensive training I’ve ever been on”
The view from a delegate
I was keen to attend the TAPE workshop as it provides a valuable mix of theory and practice related to audiovisual archiving, presented by experts from across Europe through case studies and practical activities. My work to date has concentrated on digital preservation and TAPE was a great opportunity to see how digital preservation of audiovisual media fits in with their analogue preservation and conservation – two inherently linked activities with nevertheless, very different expertise requirements.
The presentations and workshops improved on and updated my existing expertise in digital video/audio preservation (an increasingly important task as more and more research and digitisation activities embrace multimedia as a research tool and dissemination format), both at a direct practical and strategic level. The event also introduced me to activities across Europe of which I was not previously aware which will allow me, and anyone to whom I give technical advice, to explore potential collaborations with other people undertaking similar work.
The event also allowed me to fill a gap in my knowledge, in terms of training in conservation or preservation of analogue originals which is often asked about in the same breath as digital preservation. I certainly found it extremely useful to get a more holistic sense of the film, video, and audio archiving industry as a whole, and this allows me to participate in informed discussions with those who are handling both analogue and digital archives (conversion from an analogue archive to a digital archive is one of the most common models of work).
Particular highlights for me were the visit to Scottish Screen Archive and the fascinating research presented by Matthew Addis and Simon Factor on the subject of financial issues and digital business models.
Daisy Abbott, Digital Curation Centre
TAPE workshop announcement |
Workshop content
This five-day workshop will provide an intensive grounding in the theory and practice of audiovisual archiving, enabling curators to develop strategies to safeguard their collections. The training will be led by a range of expert film, video and audio curators from across Europe. They will address issues such as the handling and storage of analogue originals, digitisation and restoration, managing digital assets and enabling access and reuse.
The workshop will emphasise practice, using case studies and workshops to enable delegates to develop solutions for their specific context. By the end of the workshop delegates will be able to identify which of their collections are at most risk of loss so work can be prioritised, and will be able to recommend policy changes to improve the management and dissemination of collections.
Programme (PDF Format)
Workshop leaders include:
- Matthew Addis, IT Innovation Centre, Southampton, UK
- Giorgio Dimino, RAI, Italy
- Catherine Lacken, Südwestrundfunk, Stuttgart, Germany
- Alan Russell, Scottish Screen Archive, Glasgow, UK
- Richard Wright, BBC Information and Archives, Brentford, UK
- Charles Fairall, British Film Institute, London, UK
- Simon Factor, Moving Media, Dublin, Ireland
- Will Prentice, British Library Sound Archive, London, UK
- Elif Rongen-Kaynakci, Nederlands Filmmuseum, Amsterdam, Netherlands
- Peter Findlay, British Library, London, UK
Speaker Biographies (PDF Format)
Workshop details
As this is an introductory course it is suited to curators without specialist audiovisual training. No specific technical expertise is required.
The workshop will be conducted in English so delegates are expected to have a working knowledge of the English language to be able to participate.
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Registration for TAPE 2008 has now closed and all places on the course have been filled.
We hope to run events in future years in collaboration with the Universities of Amsterdam and Applied Sciences in Berlin.
For more information on future workshops please contact Sarah Jones at S.Jones@hatii.arts.gla.ac.uk |
| Further information contact Sarah Jones at: S.Jones@hatii.arts.gla.ac.uk ++44 (0)141 330 3549
or write to HATII, 11 University Gardens, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, G12 8QJ
This course continues the training programme established by the EU funded Training for Audiovisual Preservation in Europe (TAPE) project, which was co-ordinated by the European Commission on Preservation and Access (ECPA) and ran between 2004 and 2008.
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