On 15 Feb 2014, at 20:00, David Gerard <[email protected]> wrote: > Seriously, though: if you want archival quality, the way to go is a > CoolScan. Not only would we be able to scan negatives ourselves > (though it'd be tied to the office, rather than being a loanable > item), we'd be able to make very good friends indeed with GLAMs that > have random piles of unscanned negatives. > > It'd be nice if someone with a few hundred quid bought a CoolScan, > scanned their collection, then donated the kit to WMUK when done with > it. > > The way it usually goes is: someone buys a CoolScan on eBay, scans > their negative collection, sells it to the next person. WMUK would be > a suitable end point for such a chain. > > The main catch is for it to be *someone else's* problem to make sure a > decade-old piece of kit is in usable condition not to be a white > elephant - donating something that turns into a liability is helpy > rather than helpful. CoolScan IV/4000 use FireWire, V/5000 on use USB > ... software and supported OS is an interesting question as well ... > III/3000 and earlier do archival-quality scanning, but often have > weird hardware requirements. I think the I and II needed their own ISA > card. This is the sort of white elephant *not* to inflict on a small > charity. > > If I had ~£500 to spare I would happily be that person. I'm not though :-) > > I'll borrow the Ion (a rather less fragile piece of kit, so > borrowable), but if I had access to a CoolScan I'd happily do 'em > again.
Perhaps it would be worth WMUK thinking about purchasing such equipment, either to be made available in the office (which would then require travel costs, or postal costs and volunteer time in the office to scan posted material in), or to be sent around to interested volunteers? Of course, both purchase and maintenance costs should be thought about here, both for the machine itself and for the equipment that’s needed to interface with it, and also insurance costs... Depending on demand and durability, that may or may not make this cost-effective. Or maybe there are renting-on-demand options available for equivalent, more recent, equipment that can do the job? (It’s not a white elephant so long as the up-front costs turn out to be worthwhile, given that it shouldn't cost much to recycle it if it breaks…) Thanks, Mike _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list [email protected] http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
