[Metadatalibrarians] Image Metadata and Management Software

[Rowena Koh]

Hello,

I am an MLIS student and am working in the Vancouver Art Gallery's  
Photo-Imaging department over the summer.  I have been asked to do  
some research into image metadata standards and management software.   
The information I gather will help us in developing a plan to improve  
the way our images are currently stored and organized, so I am hoping  
that some of you can help me out.

The Vancouver Art Gallery is a mid-sized gallery with approximately  
9500 works in the collection.  The Photo-Imaging Department maintains  
about 4500 digital reproductions of the gallery's works and uses  
Portfolio to organize the images.  This is separate from the gallery's  
collections database, Cuadra/STAR.

I am hoping to find out about how libraries, archives, and museums are  
dealing with the following issues:

Technical Metadata - What types of metadata standards and formats do  
you use for describing digital images?  We are particularly interested  
in technical and administrative metadata, such as camera/scanning  
equipment, image processing, as well as photographer name, date of  
creation, rights information, etc.  Currently, the metadata are  
embedded into the files using the IPTC and EXIF formats together with  
Photoshop's File Info, and XMP.

Do you know if this type of embedded metadata is the way to go here?   
Can they be read by and/or exported/imported to most digital asset  
management and other database software?  Our main concern is that the  
metadata is preserved should we decide to migrate the information to  
another system and/or consolidate the two databases. In the meantime,  
we are also hoping to set it up so that STAR can read or import  
metadata from the image database.

Another issue is finding standards that allow us to relate multiple  
images to one object in the STAR database, particularly of objects  
consisting of multiple parts.

As for image management software, the gallery is planning on upgrading  
to the server edition of Portfolio but is also open to other options.   
Any feedback you can provide about the software your organization is  
currently using would be great.

Thanks for reading!  I look forward to hearing your responses.

Rowena Koh
Photo-Imaging Assistant, Vancouver Art Gallery
rkoh at vanartgallery.bc.ca  750 Hornby St., Vancouver, BC, V6Z 2H7
T (604) 662 4700 x 616  F (604) 682 1086  www.vanartgallery.bc.ca