UPDATED Spectral Imaging – Understanding the Technique and Technical Aspects
Instructors: Fenella France and Meghan Wilson, Library of Congress
Level: Introductory
Duration: 2 hours, with a 15 minute break
Course Date: Monday 14 June
Course Time:
    New York: 12:45 - 15:00
    Paris: 18:45 PM - 21:00

Prerequisites: No prerequisites

Benefits:
This course enables the attendee to:

• Expand their digitization capabilities through the integration of spectral imaging to understand whether this might be a useful tool for their institution and collections.
• Gain skills to focus on best practice, standardized procedures, and effective digital spectral project planning.
• Hear an in-depth overview of the types of cultural heritage information and knowledge that can be accessed using a spectral imaging system.
• View an explanation and video demonstration of an integrated spectral imaging system.
• Understand and assess illumination modalities (reflected, side-lighting, transmitted) to best meet the needs of specific collection materials.
• Review benefits of spectral imaging in relation to specific research questions.
• Integrate the priorities of scholars, curators, and researchers in digital projects.
• Learn challenges and tools for managing large imaging datasets and metadata.

Intended Audience: A wide range of professionals who work on or are planning to work on collaborative, multidisciplinary projects that would benefit from spectral imaging. This includes preservation professionals and scholars; scientists and engineers; digital specialists, database administrators; program managers and directors; archivists, curators, librarians, and researchers.

Course Description: Digital studies of cultural heritage collection materials are moving beyond simple RGB image capture to include multispectral imaging and multi-modal imaging integration. These non-invasive imaging systems provide specialists and researchers with a tool that can reveal hidden information and additional useful data that enables a deeper understanding of collections. The incorporation of a multispectral imaging workflow allows recovery of erased or obscured writing, exposure of important provenance features such as watermarks, the identification of inks and colorants, and provides a means for in-depth analysis of creation techniques and material characteristics. These features are important for scholars, authentication, "fingerprinting", and the care of collections.

This course examines the connections between non-invasive spectral imaging techniques and the cultural, societal, and provenance information contained within original sources that is not captured in base digitization. Attendees are introduced to the range of types of spectral imaging that can be undertaken to explore unknown information hidden within the original source material.

Fenella France, chief of the Preservation Research and Testing Division, develops non-destructive imaging techniques for collections. Her focus is spectral imaging and processing techniques to increase links between scientific and scholarly data. She received her PhD from Otago University, New Zealand, and has worked internationally on many heritage projects. She serves on a range of professional committees, collaborating with colleagues from academic, cultural, forensic, and federal institutions. She is currently on the Advisory Board for CHANGE – Cultural Heritage Analysis for New Generations, UCL Cultural Heritage Data Management, and CLIR.

Meghan Wilson is a preservation science specialist in the Preservation Research and Testing Division at the Library of Congress with a degree from the Maryland Institute College of Art. She has worked extensively on multiple spectral imaging programs around the world and specializes in operation, training, quality control, and data management of this imaging technology.

Cost:
Member $ 85
Non Member $ 95
Student $ 45

For office use only: