Message-Id: <mailto:199407292138.QAA19994@library.wustl.edu> Date: Fri, 29 Jul 1994 16:02:27 -0400 From: "Linda McRae(ART)" <mailto:mcrae@SATIE.ARTS.USF.EDU> Subject: Data Elements for Image Collections To: Multiple recipients of list IMAGELIB <mailto:IMAGELIB@ARIZVM1.BITNET>
Greetings-- I have just joined this list and was not a part of a discussion I would, nevertheless, like to comment on. Several friends and colleagues have forwarded me a posting dated July 15 from Paul Gherman, Subject: Image Vision. Although it's a little late, this is in response to a section of that message. Mr. Gherman states that he understands that the museum and art community have some well thought out descriptors for slide images of art works. He may be referring to the AITF Framework of categories for the description of works of art (not yet completed) or to the data elements document being developed by the Visual Resources Association's Data Standards Committee. The VRA Data Standards Committee is compiling a list of data elements used in image collections (primarily collections of slides and photos of art and architecture). The document includes a list of fields or data elements, a brief description of each field, the AITF category number equivalent and the MARC tag equivalent (where possible). Each element includes an issues section covering field linkage, authority file linkage, controlled vocabularies, and descriptive conventions. If Mr. Gherman or other list members would like to know more about this project, you can contact me at the address listed at the bottom of this message. Mr. Gherman brings up another issue having to do with cross-disciplinary indexing of image collections. I cannot speak to the requirements of all types of image collections, but I can say that in cataloging images of art and architecture, LCSH is not very adequate. We are fortunate to have the Art and Architecture Thesaurus and I think that most art and architecture image collections doing subject analysis use it. Translating image information into words is difficult and I would think that specialized thesauri would be needed in most disciplines. As long as one list of generalized subject headings for a collection that contains information on many different disciplines is used, then everyone understands what the words mean. But in image collections where any number of thesauri might be used depending upon the discipline, problems could quickly arrise. For example, if one searched an image database indexed with the AAT using the word "orange", one would be led to a color, not a piece of fruit. But if one used the word "orange" in an agricultural image database, I imagine a very different result would occur. So, how in a cross-disciplinary image database does one build in an indexing structure that will make it possible to quickly focus on the desired subject? I'm sure this is possible, but it would need to be thought out. The bigger issues involving the differences between image and text databases has to do with the capacity of current technology to read images and extrapolate a whole from a part. While a computer can do this to some extent with text, i.e. a truncated word can lead to the whole word, it cannot do this with an image. It cannot scan a finger and extrapolate the concept of hand. For the near future, this means indexing images will continue to depend upon human translation of image information into words that the machine can index. The act of translation is difficult, time-consuming and very depended upon the knowledge of the indexer. I think a lot of theoretical and practical work needs to be done on this issue and I don't believe library schools have given it a thought. Thanks for letting me comment. How can I find out what kinds of image collections are represented on this list?
Linda McRae (813) 974-9234 VOICE College of Fine Arts/FAH 110 (813) 974-2091 FAX University of South Florida mailto:mcrae@arts.usf.edu Tampa, FL 33620-7350