I would definitely scan at a minimum of 600 dpi for printed matter. That's what the National Yiddish Book Center uses for the Yiddish books they scan. It is slightly coarse, but works well for the technology (and storage space) that were available at the time. Today, I would look at 1200 or 2400 dpi if plausible and settle for 600 dpi if not. There is probably nothing for which 300dpi is a reasonable resolution except for a throw-away that is being used for an immediate purpose (the scanner equivalent of storing materials on optical media--great for many purposes at hand, not relevant or appropriate to archives).
TIFF is a fine archival format. Many institutions have started using it (and our institution is among the zillion who are looking at it) but there is no rush to change. ari On Jan 8, 2008 11:24 AM, Perian Sully <psully at magnes.org> wrote: > Hi all: > > We're currently having a debate about the appropriate scanned image > sizes for archival documents. Our scanner doesn't scan into RAW, so > we're batting back and forth whether to save the master TIFFs as 600 or > 300 dpi. > > On the 300 side: > 1) many of our archival materials were already scanned at 300 dpi (that > being the original size I designated, but we've a long way to go yet) > 2) the majority of our reproduction requests are for 300 dpi JPG > 3) storage space concerns > 4) archive materials are mostly documents and don't necessarily need 600 > dpi treatment > 5) since the documents aren't "precious" like the 3D materials and > photographs, we can go back and rescan if we really need a 600 dpi JPG > (ie. handling concerns aren't as great) > > On the 600 side: > 1) scan once and be done with it > 2) we do sometimes receive 600 dpi JPG requests > 3) storage is cheap > 4) make sure the master TIFF is as high as quality as possible, since we > don't have RAW to fall back upon > > We're also thinking about scanning the documents at 300 dpi, and > photographs and 3D materials in 600. > > What do other institutions do? Any best practices we should fall back > upon here? > > Thanks in advance! > > Perian Sully > Collection Information and New Media Coordinator > Judah L. Magnes Museum > 2911 Russell St. > Berkeley, CA 94705 > 510-549-6950 x 335 > http://www.magnes.org > Contributor, http://www.musematic.org > > _______________________________________________ > You are currently subscribed to mcn-l, the listserv of the Museum Computer > Network (http://www.mcn.edu) > > To post to this list, send messages to: mcn-l at mcn.edu > > To unsubscribe or change mcn-l delivery options visit: > http://toronto.mediatrope.com/mailman/listinfo/mcn-l >
