Re: Archival colour spaces

From: Eileen Mathias (mathias@ACNATSCI.ORG)
Date: Fri Dec 14 2001 - 13:22:53 CST

  • Next message: David Adams: "Re: Archival colour spaces" 

    Message-Id: <200112141927.fBEJRWo09812@sitelicense.arizona.edu>
Date:         Fri, 14 Dec 2001 14:22:53 -0500
From: Eileen Mathias <mailto:mathias@ACNATSCI.ORG>
Subject:      Re: Archival colour spaces
To: mailto:IMAGELIB@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU

    <pre> Dear Scott:

    At the Academy of Natural Scinces in Philadelphia, so far we have not embedded the color profiles Instead, as we burn o r archival copies of images to CD, we burn a copy of the color profile used for those images to the same CD. This way, the profile can be applied at any point in the future. We use the color profiles corresponding to the equipment that is used to capture the original data. In other words, if images are captured using our PowerPhase FX camera, we burn a cop
     of the FX color profile to disk. We do this because we want to archive, to the greatest extent possible, the raw data s it was captured without any further processing.

    I am starting to think about embedding the color profile in the image. We chose not to do this initially because new te hnologies are always uncertain, and color management was relatively new. There was no guarantee that future software ap lications would know what to do with a profile embedded using today's technology. However, color management is now bec ming more excepted and standardized. In addition, if future software doesn't know how to interpret today's profiles, th y would most likely ignore the embedded profile. With our next project, we may embed the color profile AND burn the pro ile to disk. Once the profile is embedded, it follows the image around until it is modified or changed. This would pre ent the profile from getting separated from the image, which would result in images that are not true to the original.

    When I asked the same question of this listserve a couple of years ago, one library replied that they were capturing two versions of each image - one with the color profile embedded, and one without. They covered all of their bases. This m y be a good way to go if you have misgivings. We felt here that we couldn't afford the time or storage space to capture each image twice. In essence, we made the best decisions we could with the available resources in mind. Crystal balls would be helpful.

    Eileen Mathias

    Eileen C. Mathias Information Services Librarian & Coordinator, Albert M Greenfield Digital
      Imaging Center for Collections Ewell Sale Stewart Library The Academy of Natural Sciences 1900 Benjamin Franklin Parkway Philadelphia, PA 19103 215-299-1140 215-299-1144 FAX mailto:mathias@acnatsci.org

    </pre>

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