Partner Perspectives: the digitisation of Early European Books at the Wellcome Library

Matthew Brack

Digitisation Project Manager

Wellcome Library

Monday, 13 October 2014

The Wellcome Library• One of the world's major resources for

the study of medical history.

• Part of Wellcome Collection within the Wellcome Trust.

• Digitisation Programme since 2010.

• 5.35 million images digitised; 39,500 items available online.

• Developed an open source digital ‘player’ for all types of digital content (https://github.com/wellcomelibrary).

• Non-format-specific search layer (Encore).

Early European Books in context

http://eeb.chadwyck.com/

http://wellcomelibrary.org/moh/ http://bit.ly/1vSt8Ic

http://bit.ly/1x0bRAj

ProQuest Early Euopean Books

UK Medical Heritage Library

Reading Room / Pathways

Western Manuscripts 1000-1650

Forensics and Sex temporary

exhibitions

Early European Books in context

Project timeline

October 2010

February 2011

June 2011

January 2015

Project scoping and negotiations.

Contract signed. Digitisation Support Officer employed by Wellcome Library and studio space allocated.

Numen (Diadeis) digitisation operators arrive. Testing and start of digitisation workflow.

End of standard workflow for digitisation. Only Incunabula and out of scope books remain.

The contract

• Up to 14,000 books digitised.

• Freely available in the UK via ProQuest.

• All images delivered to Wellcome Library.

• 10% (1,400) made available via Library player.

• Remaining books closed for 15 years.

• Cost for Wellcome Library: space and 1FTE.

Wellcome Digital Library Programme

The studio

The workflow

Working with Numen…

The challenges

• Electronic/database errors

• Condition of books and low opening.

• Changes in condition over time.

• Communication between Library and Numen.

• Record and image delivery.

• Mopping up and preparing for Incunabula.

The future

• Decisions on Incunabula.

• Decisions on previously out of scope material.

• New equipment with slower scan rate.

• But digitising stuff that wouldn’t have been otherwise.

• PQ shift from quantity and breadth to premium content?

• Numen studio move.

Thanks

m.brack@wellcome.ac.uk

@WellcomeDigital

@MatthewBrack