The Library of Congress 2019-2020 Recommended Formats Statement

The Library of Congress releases the 2019-2020 Recommended Formats Statement. Library of Congress. July 25, 2019. 

     The Library of Congress has released the 2019-2020 Recommended Formats Statement. This version provides some valuable updates to the sections on Moving Image Works and Audio Works in particular. The goal of the Recommended Formats has always been to provide useful information furthering the shared goal of ensuring the preservation of and long-term access to creative works.  By providing up-to-date information about the file types, physical and technical characteristics and associated metadata which support these worthy goals, the Statement hopes to provide the building blocks upon which libraries can build their collections, now and for the future.

The Library remains committed to acquiring and preserving digital works and to providing whatever support it can to other similarly committed stakeholders.  "We shall continue to build our collections with their preservation and long-term access firmly in mind; and we shall continue to engage with others in the community in efforts such as the Recommended Formats Statement".  "And we shall continue to engage in an annual review process to ensure that it meets the needs of all stakeholders in the preservation and long-term access of creative works."

Digital Preservation Matters.

How Archivists Saved Damaged WWII Film

How Archivists Saved Damaged WWII Film for 'The Cold Blue'. Chuck Thompson. Popular Mechanics. May 23, 2019.
    Shrinkage is the biggest problem with old film according to the article. To use original footage for a new movie, the archivist transferred 15 hours of 16mm film to 4K for the World War II documentary The Cold Blue. The film stock that was shot in 1943 has shrunk since it was created. Kodachrome maintains its vibrancy, but tends to lose pliability and moisture over time. All of the outtakes had shrunk to an average of 1.4 percent, which is "considered an immediate preservation risk. Once the film reaches that stage, it’s difficult to preserve the film photochemically because the pitch of the sprocket holes won’t seat accurately on the sprocket teeth of the printers, causing registration and stability issues on the new copy".  “Photochemical preservation” means preservation of a film by printing a new copy on new film stock and then developing and fixing the image  using traditional photographic processes.

The largest outtake reel had 36,880 frames, at 922 feet long, generating 2.6 TBs of data for 25 minutes of run time. The entire project generated just over 80 TBs of material. The preservation DPX files were wrapped with Bagger and written off  LTO-6 tape. The  three copies of the tapes: one in near-line storage, another is offline, and the last that is sent offsite to maintain geographical separation. The original film was returned to its 25-degree Fahrenheit vault, which slows down any deterioration that may continue.

Digital Preservation Matters.

International Federation of Film Archives: Survey on Long-term Digital Storage and Preservation

Digital Statement PartV Survey on Long-term Digital Storage and Preservation. Céline Ruivo and Anne Gant. FIAF Technical Commission, International Federation of Film Archives. April 2019.

    The sustainability of digital files and formats for long-term preservation has been a major concern in this field for almost two decades now. The FIAF Digital Preservation Principles, published in 2016, use the OAIS (Open Archival Information System) Model. Increasingly, film archives are publishing their own technical specifications online. Digitizing a film includes not only archiving a final result (the master), but also archiving the “raw files” which are uncompressed. Some of the results of the survey of 16 institutions who responded:

• DPX is the main format used for preservation: 14 archives
• TIFF is used as a second preservation format: 4 archives
• Most use 4K resolution when they scan 35mm negatives for preservation 
• Few have written technical specifications for the deposit of new digital acquisitions, which are mostly born-digital films.
• Some archives use lossless compression for long-term preservation of a master to reduce storage space 
• Some archives are considering implementing the FFV1 format this year for storing files. 
• A checksum called framemd5 is integrated with the files MKV/FFV1.
• The recording back to film of restorations is applied by 8 archives

Sound
    In terms of sound, digital formats are more variable than image formats, depending upon their final distribution (cinema or TV broadcast). RAW formats are usually the same as the restored files.

• Most of the archives use a tape system for long-term conservation. 
• They generally wait for 2 generations to migrate their data to reduce the cost 
• Access storage is by a server that allows direct access to the files.
• Most of the archives store and manage their files in their own facility. 

Conclusion
     This initial survey of the current digital landscape shows there is much more work to be done to get a global view of digital film archiving, and to hear from more archives at all stages in the development of digital workflows. Some conclusions that can be drawn from the current set of responses:

1. There is a stabilization in language and a conceptual clarity emerging about the stages of a digital workflow within archives. The terms are becoming clear and are recognized as necessary parts of daily archival practice. This will allow for better information exchange and better comparison of workflows.
2. There are some choices which seem to be predominant, such as 10 bit Log DPX, for example, or the use of ProRes, LTO, .wav files, etc. It is helpful to detail the reasons why certain archives chose uncommon formats or processes.
3. There are reasons behind each archive’s choices, which make sense at the given moment. But it would be useful to revisit this survey in 5-10 years (or sooner), and see how digital film practices and archiving are progressing.

See also:

• Digital Preservation Principles v2 [PDF] 
• FIAF: Resources of the Technical Commission

Digital Preservation Matters.

In-House Digitization with the Lossless FFV1 Codec At the University of Notre Dame Archives. AMIA Poster

In-House Digitization with the Lossless FFV1 Codec At the University of Notre Dame Archives. Erik Dix and Angela Fritz, University of Notre Dame Archives. AMIA 2018. Poster. [pptx].
     An interesting poster at AMIA which shows their digitization workflow and processing steps from accessioning to preservation system.
WHY FFV1 as a codec for Digital Preservation Masters?
1. Lossless compression (no quality loss)
2. A Standard Definition FFV1 file is ca. 46 % of the size of the uncompressed file.
    A High Definition FFV1 file is ca. 57 % of the size of the uncompressed file.
3. FFV1 is part of the FFmpeg project and open source
4. It is safe for long term preservation.
5. Encoding into FFV1 can be done with low cost Windows PCs.
6. The video is captured in FFV1 in real time.
7. Standard definition FFV1 files can be played with the VLC media player

Digitization Workflow

Accessioning as Processing:

• Archives conducts a preliminary inventory, assigns collection code,  creates CMS record 
• AV materials transferred to AV Archivist for a preservation and digitization assessment
• Descriptive and technical metadata gathered
• Analog materials reorganized and stabilized for long-term storage.

Basic Metadata Creation:

• AV Archivist creates item–level metadata
• Descriptive and technical metadata promotes access and discoverability
• Descriptive metadata added to finding aid and uploaded to the Archives, the IR, and ILS

Inspection & Prep of A-V materials:

• Only requested AV items or at-risk items will be digitized 
• Videotapes often require baking or splicing

VCRS without SDI output:

• The digitization capture card uses SDI [Serial Digital Interface] connections. 
• VHS, Betamax, and older professional formats, e.g. 1” type C, U-matic don’t have SDI outputs. 
• A DPS-575 frame synchronizer is used to create a SDI signal from the S-video or output of these items
• Basic color correction is done at this step if necessary. 
• The SDI signal from the frame synchronizer is then split in two to feed a Windows PC for the creation of the FFV1 preservation file and to feed a Mac computer to create an Apple ProRes 422 mezzanine file.

VCRs with SDI output:

• They have VCRs for the DV tape family from Mini DV up to DVCPro HD, DVCam, and HDV, as well as the Betacam tape family from Betcam to HDcam that can output an SDI or HD-SDI signal. 
• The signal is also split in two to simultaneously create a FFV1 file on a Windows Pc and an Apple ProRes 422 file on a MAC.

Digital Preservation System:

• Use an LTO tape library for the storage of our digitized files. 
• Currently, the Archives is evaluating digital preservation systems for implementation. 
• Archives capabilities will be expanded to provide digital preservation micro-services to ensure continued access to its digital collections.

Digital Preservation Matters.

Preservation of AV Materials in Manuscript Collections. Training for AV format identification and risk assessment. Actions to take

Preservation of AV Materials in Manuscript Collections; Internal Training.  Ben Harry. Brigham Young University. November 2018.
     The presentation is not yet available on the internet. Some notes from the training:
“There is now consensus among audiovisual archives internationally that we will not be able to support large-scale digitisation of magnetic media in the very near future. Tape that is not digitised by 2025 will in most cases be lost.”  -NFSA.gov.au, Oct. 2018

The problem with AV is Fragility:

• Playback equipment is disappearing
• Knowledgeable experts are disappearing
• Materials breaking down
• Untrained handling easily destroys materials

The solution to the fragility is to address materials in a timely manner:

• Priority and Speed and Efficiency
• Train transfer operators
• Untrained handling easily destroys materials

A Challenge of AV is Neglect:

• Unable to describe AV Content adequately in finding aids or catalogs. 
• Requires certain level of specific knowledge of formats and physical carriers.
• Requires machine to read information that may not be available
• Time-consuming process for little reward
• Expensive, unstructured, uncoordinated

To overcome the challenge:

• Digitize material for description in basic processing
• Time-consuming process for little reward
• MUST be a lean process to minimize the effect upon processing

Audio-video preservation requires a certain level of specific knowledge. Staff must be trained to recognize and report AV Formats. Also, it is important to have risk assessment guidelines to help make informed decisions. Coordinate efforts and resources to reduce confusion, prioritize and set goals, unify our proposals for equipment and man power.


Actions to take:

• Prioritize Formats for Migration / Reformatting
• Maintain Transparent Records on Preservation and Access
• Link Preservation and Access (one does not happen without the other)
• Provide Curators with AV Assessment tools
• Organize a Queue System to keep things equitable (what about 12 items per month, per curator? Adjust as Necessary)
• Create Digital File Naming guidelines
• Establish Access and Preservation format standards for AV materials:

 For Access and Preservation, the following standards will be used:

Audio Preservation

• Preservation Format:  PCM / wav 96 kHZ sampling   24-bit depth. 1 GB/Hour
• Access Copy: mp3.  Music: 256 kbps. Voice: 192 Kbps.

Video Preservation: Standard Def

• Preservation Format: ffv1 / mkv 720 x 486. 33 GB/Hour  
• Access Copy: H.264 / mp4

Video Preservation: Hi Def

• Preservation Format: ffv1 / mkv Native: 1080i / 1080p. 100 GB/Hour?  
• Access Copy: H.264 / mp4

Film Preservation

• Preservation Format: RGB ffv1 / mkv 1080i scan (MPS capability ceiling). 100 GB/Hour?  
• Access Copy: H.264 / mp4

Archive and delivery methods:

• Preservation: Rosetta
• Access: various options are available. 

Digital Preservation Matters.

Preservation of AV Materials in Manuscript Collections. Training for AV format identification and risk assessment

Preservation of AV Materials in Manuscript Collections; Internal Training.  Ben Harry. Brigham Young University. November 2018.
     Ben Harry, Curator of Audiovisual Materials and Media Arts History at Brigham Young University, provided some internal training concerning AV format identification and risk assessment. Here are some assessment tools for AV materials.

Digital Preservation Matters.

Audiovisual Metadata Platform Planning Project: Progress Report and Next Steps

Audiovisual Metadata Platform (AMP) Planning Project: Progress Report and Next Steps. Jon W. Dunn, et al. Indiana University. March 28, 2018.
     This is a report of a workshop which was part of a planning project for design and development of an audiovisual metadata platform. "The platform will perform mass description of audiovisual content utilizing automated mechanisms linked together with human labor in a recursive and reflexive workflow to generate and manage metadata at scale for libraries and archives." 

Libraries and archives hold massive collections of audiovisual recordings from a diverse range of timeframes, cultures, and contexts that are of great interest across many disciplines and communities. Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums (GLAM) face difficulty in creating access to their audiovisual collections, due to high costs, difficulty in managing the objects, and the lack of sufficiently granular metadata for audio/video content to support discovery, identification, and use. Text materials can use full-text indexing to provide some degree of discovery, but "without metadata detailing the content of the dynamic files, audiovisual materials cannot be located, used, and ultimately, understood".  Metadata generation for audiovisual recordings rely almost entirely on manual description performed by experts in a variety of ways. The AMP will need to process audio and video files to extract metadata, and also accept / incorporate metadata from supplementary documents.  One major challenge is processing and moving large files around, both in terms of time and bandwidth costs.

The report goes into depth on the AMP business requirements, some of which are:

• Automate analysis of audiovisual content and human-generated metadata in a variety of formats to efficiently generate a rich set of searchable, textual attributes
• Offer streamlined metadata creation by leveraging multiple, integrated, best-of-breed software tools in a single workflow
• Produce and format metadata with minimal errors 
• Build a community of developers in the cultural heritage community who can develop and support AMP on an ongoing basis 
• Scale to efficiently process multi-terabyte batches of content 
• Support collaborative efforts with similar initiatives

The following formats are possible sources for AMP processing:

• Audio (.mp3, .wav) 
• Image (.eps, .jpg, .pdf, .png, .tif) 
• Data (.xlsx, .csv, .ttl, .json) 
• Presentation (.key, .pptx) 
• Video (.mov, .mp4, .mkv, .mts, .mxf) 
• Structured text (.xml, with or without defined schemas, such as TEI, MODS, EAD, MARCXML) 
• Unstructured text (.txt, .docx)

The report continues by looking at the Proposed System Architecture, functional requirements, and workflows.
Outcome: "The AMP workshop successfully gathered together a group of experts to talk about what would be needed to perform mass description of audiovisual content utilizing automated mechanisms linked together with human labor in a recursive and reflexive workflow to generate and manage metadata at scale for libraries and archives. The workshop generated technical details regarding the software and computational components needed and ideas for tools to use and workflows to implement to make this platform a reality."

Digital Preservation Matters.

Metadata for audio and videos

Metadata for audio and videos. Karen Smith-Yoshimura. OCLC: Hanging Together blog.
October 29, 2018.
     This post discusses a topic that is under discussion by a number of groups.
Our libraries are repositories of large amounts of audiovisual materials, which often represent unique, local collections. These issues need to be addressed. Chela Scott Weber: “For decades, A/V materials in our collections were largely either separated from related manuscript material (often shunted away to be dealt with at a later date) or treated at the item level. Both have served to create sizeable backlogs of un-quantified and un-described A/V materials.”
The result is that today, much of this audiovisual material is in dire need of preservation, digitization, clarification of conditions of use, and description.

AV materials, skill-sets and stakeholders are part of a complex environment. Managing AV resources requires knowledge of the use context and the technical metadata issues, in order to think through programs of description and access. It may help for libraries to identify the issues by the category of the AV materials:

•     Commercial AV: Licensing issues, old formats, and the quality of vendor records
•     Unique archival collections: Often deteriorating formats, large backlogs, lack of resources, and rare and expensive equipment that may be required to access (and assess) the files
•     Locally generated content: Desire for content-creators to describe own resources

How does a library decide the amount of effort to invest in describing these AV materials. Finding aids can provide useful contextual information for individual items within a specific collection, but they often lack important details needed for discovery of the items, specifically for legacy data.  Some hope that better discovery information will reduce the need to repeat the same information in different databases, but this would require using consistent access points across systems.

Institutions commonly prioritize which of their AV materials are to be described and preserved, assessing their importance through surveys and assigning priorities from inventories. These are often multi-divisional efforts.  Rights management issues can be very complex, but they are easier for new AV files acquired since rights management has become part of normal workflows. However, older materials may lack rights information.

Metadata for AV materials often include important technical information. Some have systems that have implemented PREMIS to support the preservation of digital objects, which helps with their AV materials.

This is an opportunity for institutions who have developed their own assessments and templates to share them with others and identify common practices and criteria.

Digital Preservation Matters.

Deadline 2025: collections at risk. -- "Tape that is not digitised by 2025 will in most cases be lost forever."

Deadline 2025: collections at risk. The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia. August 2017. [PDF]
     This document is relevant for our own library as we increase our focus on video preservation in our collections. In this document, I consider digitization to mean digitization for preservation.

Some notes from the document:

• "There is now consensus among audiovisual archives internationally that we will not be able to support large‑scale digitisation of magnetic media in the very near future." 
• "Tape that is not digitised by 2025 will in most cases be lost forever."
•  Much of what is now this nation’s heritage originated in the analogue era of the 20th century and has been handed down on various magnetic tape formats.
• "All tape-based formats created in the 20th century are now obsolete. Tape that is not digitised by 2025, we risk losing forever. This creates a deadline, and a dilemma, for those entrusted with the care of these precious memories."
• At current rates, not all magnetic tape can be saved in time, meaning that much will of the cultural heritage will be lost to future generations. 
• "Considerable resources are required to ensure all surviving tape-based media is digitised and managed for
  long-term digital storage and access." 
• Quite a lot of our history on tape finishes up in landfill just because it is seldom valued at the time that decisions about its preservation are being made. 
• "Our audiovisual heritage is too precious to lose"

Many recordings, radio broadcasts and TV programs have already been lost. Recordings have been discarded or destroyed once their immediate broadcast life was deemed over, or erased to be reused, and some live radio and television programs were not recorded at all. In the next decade we stand to lose much of our vital cultural memory unless we act swiftly to invest in digitisation infrastructure and capability.

Some benefits of preserving these recordings are:

• The historical record connects us to who we were, and who we are. 
• The original content in many collections becomes accessible and it creates knowledge.  
• Making these resources discoverable and accessible provides a tangible return on the considerable investment in creating them.
• "Unlocking a treasure trove of images and sounds of the past will inspire creators of new works, and encourage" the creation of new content.
• These preservation projects will promote "specialised skills development and help retain expertise within the cultural sector and the audiovisual industries."

We are now in a better position to measure the positive impacts of digitising our collections with The Balanced Value Impact Model developed by Simon Tanner at King’s College, which "balances tangible gains from economic, social and innovation perspectives with harder to measure cultural values".  It is important to develop a framework for preserving audiovisual collections along with sufficient investment to ensure future access to and celebration of the at-risk collections. The digitisation costs are not disproportionate to the investment already made in the production, collection, storage and preservation of our audiovisual heritage. There is still time to avoid the "preventable loss of an irreplaceable part of our heritage."

Digital Preservation Matters.

Deep into that darkness peering: Our Dark Repository

Deep into that darkness peering: Our Dark Repository.  Lance Thomas Stuchell. Bits and Pieces. October 22, 2018.
     This is an interesting post about their dark archive and how it is being used. Their definition of a Dark Archive is: An archive that is inaccessible to the public. It is typically used for the preservation of content that is accessible elsewhere. For them, the “preservation of content that is accessible elsewhere” line is an important one. "Before we created a dark archive, all of our preservation systems were built for access, with many of them creating access copies (or DIPs, for all you OAIS groupies out there) on the fly from the preservation copy (AIPs) in the repository."

These systems worked for most of their digital material, but not for time-based digital media, such as video files, since they were too big to serve as access copies or be the source of on-the-fly access copy creation. The dark archive allows them to separate access from storage, and provides a place to preserve A/V preservation masters long-term.  Their  "Dark Blue" repository "provides long-term storage for A/V preservation masters and medium-term storage for forensic images/file transfers of born-digital archival accessions" and may be expanded in the future for data backups, perpetual access copies of licensed content, backups of video games, and web archives.

The dark archive workflow relies on other systems for metadata management and searchability, such as the catalog and ArchivesSpace. "We will continue to evaluate our storage strategy as the diversity and size of our digital collections grow, but right now Dark Blue fills an important void in our preservation strategy."

Digital Preservation Matters.

The Safeguarding of the Audiovisual Heritage: Ethics, Principles and Preservation Strategy

The Safeguarding of the Audiovisual Heritage: Ethics, Principles and Preservation Strategy: IASA-TC 03, Edition 4, 2017. The International Association of Sound and Audiovisual Archives. January 31, 2018.
     These are some notes from the latest revision of a core document for the audiovisual preservation community and provides principles and strategies for audio visual preservation. "The future of preserving digital material for the long term will be one of managing a pathway between the choices we make now and those choices we must make in the future. We must act decisively now even though we know that technological developments will not necessarily align with those choices. Though no choice is a final one, a well informed decision will consider the process for navigating to the new. Major changes in the current revision include a widening of scope to include moving image content, and a greater acknowledgement of the prevalence of file-based digital material alongside its carrier-based equivalent."

Preserving audiovisual material requires completing three related tasks:

1. Preserving the stability and optimal readability of the physical carrier through best practices.
2. Maintaining or renewing the technological system required to access the information.
3. Transferring the information to other sustainably accessible, file-based formats while there is still access to the original information.

• Audiovisual carriers are generally more vulnerable to loss of information than conventional materials due to damage caused by poor handling, poorly maintained equipment or by poor storage.
•  market-driven obsolescence of formats means there is a finite window of opportunity for digitally preserving carrier-based content
• efforts must be made to preserve carriers in useable condition for as long as is feasible.
• " the preservation of the document in the long term can only be achieved by copying the contents to new carriers/systems while this remains possible."
• "Separating the primary information from the original carrier raises the question of future authentication of the sound and images."
• Responsible preservation of digital data requires systems and a technical infrastructure, the monitoring of the condition of files, and the existence of plans for media migration and format migration." These topics are discussed in the Open Archival Information System (OAIS) Reference Model (ISO 14721) and the Trusted Digital Repositories (ISO 16363).
• "It is strongly recommended that metadata be written according to established standards, in as consistent a fashion as possible"
• Generally, priority should be given to those documents that are at greatest risk, through either degradation or technical obsolescence
• "The archive must, therefore, keep itself and its employees updated with the latest scientific and technical information from the field of audiovisual archiving. This will include information concerning the extraction of both primary and secondary information from carriers, and improvements in preservation and restoration practices."

Digital Preservation Matters.

AFI, Library of Congress Celebrate 50 Years of Film Preservation

AFI, Library of Congress Celebrate 50 Years of Film Preservation. Penelope Poulou. Voice of America. November 14, 2017.
     The American Film Institute and the Library of Congress are partners in film preservation. The Library of Congress facility has an ongoing preservation process where technicians transfer films onto a sturdier polyester-type film material, which if stored properly can last for centuries. The digital conversion reaches wider audiences on a multi-platform basis, including streaming. "Not only are they archiving these movies, they are also circulating to television channels, television stations.
But the  Nitrate Film Vault manager says digital preservation may be an oxymoron.  “How do you save digital material? 'Cause digital as a rule is very iffy. You have only a couple of different ways you can store it, you can store it magnetically or optically or on a card, but none of those are permanent. Something can disrupt them and the stuff is gone.”

Whether stored in their original format or restored on newer film or digitally, the important thing is that these films are kept for posterity. “Film is a huge part of our history. And, if we don’t cherish it and preserve it, it will not be with us. So, we have to do that.”

Digital Preservation Matters.

Preserving the public record on television is becoming an ever-more-urgent task

The Devolution Will Be Televised. Peter B. Kaufman and Jeff Ubois. The Nation. October 18, 2017.
     Preserving the public record on television is an increasingly critical challenge for the country and the world because it is a primary source that historians and others will rely on to document this administration. Audio and video will be a major part of the public record for this time period. "There is no question that, as we look to the end of this century and how our time will be remembered, we will look back at our news and our culture through moving image and recorded sounds."

Preserving the public audiovisual record on television, and all audiovisual media is urgent task, especially for memory institutions. Moving images are the most popular form of media today: over 80 percent of web traffic is video. Many professionals and organizations are working on this, but strong funding mechanisms are weak or missing. In October 1997, the Library of Congress issued its first report, “Television and Video Preservation 1997” the need for preserving these materials. The American broadcasting records are historical and cultural materials which are "a key to understanding our civilization”.  Many film and audiovisual assets were already being lost due to media degradation and equipment obsolescence.

National strategies are needed for publishing and distributing our digitized and born-digital archival material.  "As the recent scrubbing of government websites has shown, we must rely on non-governmental institutions to help ensure that our archives are never permanently altered to reflect political expediencies. Indeed, we should ensure that the video records of presidential press conferences, banking debates, foreign-policy debates, and all such public activity is preserved and remains accessible to future citizens, journalists, and political figures. We need to recommit to preserving all of our televised triumphs and tragedies."

Digital Preservation Matters.

Videotapes Are Becoming Unwatchable As Archivists Work To Save Them

Videotapes Are Becoming Unwatchable As Archivists Work To Save Them. NPR: All Things Considered. Scott Greenstone. June 3, 2017.
     Research suggests that magnetic tapes, like video tapes, aren't going to live beyond 15 to 20 years, sometimes called the "magnetic media crisis." Magnetic information on tapes will slowly fade, and when it diminishes too much, the information on the tape will be lost. There are groups trying to migrate the tapes before the content is unrecoverable. Part of this process is to identify what is on the tapes and which tapes need to be preserved long term.

Digital Preservation Matters.

Encoding and Wrapper Decisions and Implementation for Video Preservation Master Files

Encoding and Wrapper Decisions and Implementation for Video Preservation  Master Files. Mike Casey. Indiana University. March 27, 2017.
     "There is no consensus in the media preservation community on best practice for encoding and wrapping video preservation master files." Institutions preserving video files long term generally choose from three options:

• 10-bit, uncompressed, v210 codec, usually with a QuickTime wrapper
• JPEG 2000, mathematically lossless profile, usually with an MXF wrapper
• FFV1, a mathematically lossless format, with an AVI or Matroska wrapper

The few institutions digitizing and preserving video for the  long-term are roughly evenly divided between the three options above. This report examines in detail a set of choices and an implementation that has worked well for their institution. Originally they chose the first option, but with recent advances of FFV1, they reopened this decision and initiated a research and review process:

• Exit strategy research and testing
• Capture research (use FFmpeg within their system to generate FFV1 files).
• Comparison of issues
• Consultation with an outside expert

Results:  Research into exit strategies, they were able to move FFV1 files to a lossless codec with no loss of data. They decided to capture using FFmpeg, which requires developing a simple capture tool, and developed specifications for a minimal capture interface with FFmpeg for encoding and wrapping the video data.

Technical:  identified a number of key advantages to FFV1, including:

• roughly 65% less data than a comparable file using the v210 codec
• open source, non-proprietary, and hardware independent
• largely designed for the requirements of digital preservation
• employs CRCs for each frame allowing any corruption to be associated with a
• much smaller digital area than the entire file

FFV1 appears to be "trending upwards among developers and cultural heritage organizations engaged in preservation work". They also chose the Matroska wrapper, which is an audiovisual container or wrapper format in use since 2002, and which is a more flexible wrapper option.

As more and more archives undertake video digitization" they will not accept older and limited formats" (AVI or MOV), but they will be looking for standards-based, open source options developed specifically for archival preservation. "Both FFV1 and Matroska are open source and are more aligned with preservation needs than some of the other choices and we believe they will see rapidly increasing adoption and further development."

Implementation: They developed a quality control program to validate that the output meets their specification for long-term preservation and checks the FFV1/Matroska preservation master files. These files are viewed using the VLC media player, a free open source cross-platform multimedia player that supports FFV1 and Matroska

Currently, they have created over 38,000 video files using FFV1 and Matroska. "We have chosen two file formats that are open source, developed in part with reservation in mind, and on the road to standardization with tools in active development. We have aligned ourselves with the large and active FFmpeg community rather than a private company. While the future is ultimately unknowable, we believe that this positions us well for long-term preservation of video-based content."

Digital Preservation Matters.

Saving At-Risk Audiovisual Materials

Saving At-Risk Audiovisual Materials. Jeanne Drewes. American Libraries. March 1, 2017.
     Many audiovisual collections are considered at risk. Large amounts of content could be lost through deterioration of the original media unless it can be transferred to more durable digital formats. As libraries and other institutions rediscover the value of these collections they are taking steps to preserve the sounds and images they contain. Here are some steps to consider when planning your audiovisual preservation project.

• Know what you have. This is an important first step.
• Determine your priorities and set goals.
• Develop an action plan based on your goals. 

"Preserving our own history as a profession by capturing the voices and stories of our colleagues is key toward ensuring our future."

Digital Preservation Matters.

The Nuclear Bunker Preserving Movie History

The Nuclear Bunker Preserving Movie History. George Willeman, film archivist.  Great Big Story. Oct 10, 2016.
     A short video about the Library of Congress movie and film archive which is located in an underground bunker in Culpepper, Virginia. The bunker was originally a gold storage unit and later a fallout shelter during the Cold War. Today the Library of Congress stores film there. It is used to ensure the survival of the nations films through restoration and preservation. Besides storing, the center also specializes in repairing and processing films of many different types and sizes. It also includes nitrate films in 124 nitrate film vaults. Some of the films are over 100 years old. They preserve old and new films for the historical value, not necessarily the monetary value. The purpose is to remember what the early times were like, what we had and what we did. "Film is one of the absolute best ways of doing that."

Digital Preservation Matters.

Audio Visual Archiving: Philosophy and Principles

Audio Visual Archiving: Philosophy and Principles. Ray Edmondson. UNESCO. 2016. PDF, 102pp.
     Audiovisual heritage comprises a large and increasingly important part of the world's cultural heritage. Currently, among the major issues for Audio Visual Archiving are digitization and format obsolescence. The field is complex and requires skills, technology and budgets.

There is a lack of professional recognition  of the community and a lack of formal training standards and courses.  Audiovisual archiving is still emerging as an academic discipline. The greatest challenge of digitization is not one of technology or economics, but of scholarship, education and ethics. A major challenge of preservation is not only to migrate analogue works that are at risk, but to keep up with the new born-digital productions  and at the same time preserving the technology and skills of an analogue era.

Preservation of AV archiving, ensuring the permanent accessibility of audiovisual content with the maximum integrity, is a never‑ending management task. "Nothing has ever been preserved – at best, it is being preserved!" AV media have always been in a state of continuous evolution.

To preserve their collections and make them accessible, audiovisual archives have to maintain obsolete technology as well as keeping abreast of new technology, and retain the relevant skill base for both. Content is migrated to newer formats to maintain its accessibility, while older carriers may still need to be maintained for their artefact and informational value.  Digital formats are not simply replacing analogue formats; they both have a future.  It is unlikely that there is any “ultimate” format.
Some notes and definitions:

• Audiovisual documents are no less important, and in some contexts more important, than other kinds of documents or artefacts.
• The responsibilities of Audiovisual archivists include maintaining the authenticity, and guaranteeing the integrity, of the works in their care. Selection, protection and accessibility of this content should be governed by publicly declared policies rather than political presssures.
• Preservation and access are two sides of the same coin, but they are so interdependent that access can be seen as an integral part of preservation.
• Preservation, without the objective of access, has no point. The relatively fragile and fugitive nature of the audiovisual media and its technology place these functions at the centre of the management and culture of audiovisual archives.
• Digital preservation combines policies, strategies and actions to ensure access to reformatted and born digital content regardless of the challenges of media failure and technological change. The goal of digital preservation is the accurate rendering of authenticated content over time.
• "An audiovisual archive is an organization or department of an organization which has a statutory or other mandate for providing managed access to a collection of audiovisual documents and the audiovisual heritage by collecting, preserving and promoting." 
• The function of building, documenting, managing and preserving a collection is central and presumes that the collection will be accessible.
• An audiovisual archivist is a person formally qualified or accredited as such, or who is occupied at the level of a skilled professional in an audiovisual archive, in developing, preserving or providing managed access to its collection, or the serving of its clientele.
• The preservation and accessibility of moving images and sound recordings eventually involves copying or migration. Documenting the processes involved and choices made in copying from generation to generation is essential to preserving the integrity of the work
• All key areas of an archive’s operation – including collection development, preservation, access and collection management – should have a deliberate policy basis.
• "Permanent access is the goal of preservation: without this, preservation has no purpose except
  as an end in itself."
• Putting long-term preservation at risk in order to satisfy sudden, short-term access demand is
   a risk that should be avoided 

Collection development embraces four distinct procedures:

1. selection: involves research and judgment, leading to acquisition
2. acquisition: involves technical and physical choices, contractual negotiation and transaction, shipment, examination and inventorying of carriers
3. deselection: a judgmental process based on later circumstances, including changes in selection policy
4. disposal: the ethical divesting of carriers from a collection

The philosophy and principles of audiovisual archiving will always be a work in progress.

Digital Preservation Matters.

List of analog media inspection templates/forms

List of analog media inspection templates/forms. Katherine Nagels, et al. May 6, 2016.
     This  is a list of freely available analog media inspection templates, forms, or reports. Anyone is free to add contributions.  Appropriate additions may include:

• inspection reports/forms/templates
• condition reports/forms/templates
• instructional guides for inspecting or assessing the condition of analog film, audio, or video

TEMPLATES/FORMS

• Guggenheim Museum, Conservation Department (date unknown): Media Report: Tape; Media Report: Film
• Matters in Media Art (2015): Condition Reports: video, audio, slides, film, computer-based artwork, display hardware
• Tanisha Jones, Moving Image Archiving & Preservation, New York University (2005): Video Prioritization, Selection, and Inspection Overview and Form
• Independent Media Arts Preservation (IMAP) (c.2006): Videotape Inspection Form
• National Film and Sound Archive Australia (c.2008): Condition Report Form for Film
• Filmoteca Española (1996): Informe de inspección de materiales (película)
• National Film Preservation Foundation (NFPF) (2004): Print Condition Report for Film
• Columbia University Libraries (2008): Audio and Moving Image Survey Tool
• University of Washington Libraries: Film Condition Report; Videotape/Audiotape Condition Report

IDENTIFICATION RESOURCES

• University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Preservation Self-Assessment Program: Format ID Guide
• California Audiovisual Preservation Project (2013): Audiovisual Formats: A Guide to Identification
• Texas Commission on the Arts (2004): Videotape Identification and Assessment Guide
• Indiana University Field Audio Collection Evaluation Tool (FACET) (2007): Format Characteristics and Preservation Problems
• Video Preservation Web Site (2007): Video Format Identification Guide

Digital Preservation Matters.

Why Analog-To-Digital Video Preservation, Why Now

Why Analog-To-Digital Video Preservation, Why Now. Bay Area Video Coalition. April 4, 2016.
     The first part is from an article that revisits an earlier publication: How I Learned (Almost) Everything I Know About ½” Video from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. By Moriah Ulinskas, Former Director of Preservation. Originally published October 5th, 2011. It describes preserving a video recording of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the difficulties involved. Some quotes from the article and the website in general:

• "I tell all our clients and partners that they have 5, maybe 10 years left in which they can have these works preserved and transferred and then these recordings are gone for good."
• "These are the legacy recordings I refer to with such urgency when I talk about the immediacy and importance of video preservation. These moments of political and cultural significance that inspired someone, 40 years ago, to hook up a camera and record this tape which we’ve inherited from dusty basements and disregarded shelves."
• "If we do not do diligence in transferring these recordings to new formats, as the originals become impossibly obsolete, these are the moments and the messages we will lose forever."

Some items from the rest of the website:

• As audio and video technologies have changed, and as old formats age and disintegrate, we are at risk of losing significant media that documents the art, culture and history of our diverse communities. Link
• Analog media preservation is necessary because of two central factors: technical obsolescence and deterioration. Experts say that magnetic media has an estimated lifespan for playback of 10-15 years, and companies have already ceased manufacture of analog playback decks, the devices required to digitize and preserve analog media.

Audio / Video Preservation Tools

• QCTools (Quality Control Tools for Video Preservation) is a free, open ­source tool that helps  conservators and archivists ways to inspect, analyze and understand their digitized video files, in order to prioritize archival quality control, detect common errors in digitization, facilitate targeted response, and thus increase trust in video digitization efforts. 
• A/V Artifact Atlas.  An open­-source guide used to define and identify common technical issues and problems with audio and video signals. The intent of the guide is to assist and promote reformatting archival media content.
• AV Compass. A suite of free online resources to help with organizing and preserving media collections. It includes step-­by­-step educational videos, PDF guides, an overview of preservation concepts, and a simple tool for creating inventories. This guide helps users with creating a preservation plan and taking specific steps to make that plan happen.

Digital Preservation Matters.