----- Original Message -----
From: "Nick Roberts" <nickbroberts@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <rollei_list@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, July 19, 2006 8:29 AM
Subject: [rollei_list] Re: OT: Film vs Digital to preserve
archives
I've been dabbling with digital imaging for13-14 years now,
and I've not yet lost an image. I keep two copies of
everything, one off-site, and migrate everything every time
I change a storage medium (and keep the old ones! - I've
actually still got a PC with Windows 3.11 and a 5.25 inch
floppy drive mothballed just in case...).
So as far as I'm concerned, my digital files are actually
safer than my negs and slides. Indeed my original digital
dabbling was to give me electronic backup of my film records
just in case of a fire.
Nick
This is fine as long as someone is dedicated to updating
the storage periodically. In this sense, it is not really
archival because that implys storage which is very long term
without a lot of attention. Very often examples are given of
people being able to recover images from negatives which
have been in storage for on the order of 100 years, and
prints that old are fairly common.
One advantage digital storage has over analogue is that
the original data can usually be recovered without change or
loss where there is always some loss for analogue methods.
I suspect that there may be better ways of storing
digital data than the current magnetic media and the current
applications of optical media, but those are in the future.
Even of the media are very long lasting there remains
the problem of being able to recover it and decode it. The
concern here is being able to duplicate the mechanism, both
mechanical and electronic, needed for such recovery, at some
time in the distant future. Of course, the same thing
applies to photographic materials but is not so obvious.
Photographic materials have been enormously improved but not
changed in principal for nearly two centuries. The process
is very stable, the oldest photographic records can be read
by eye and can be duplicated with modern materials. However,
if we consider a future time, when photographic materials
will no longer be available commercially, a problem similar
to digital will exist. That is, it might be necessary to
make a photographic material in order to recover and
preserve existing information. The technology of the
photograhic chemistry needed to make modern materials is not
trivial and may be more difficult to duplicate in the
distant future than precision machinery (disc drive) and
electronic circuits capable of emulating the older coding
technology. The reason is that the old digital technology
may then be closer to the practice of the time than chemical
methods.
Those requiring genuine archival storage (100 plus years)
may have to resort to parallel storage methods and, at least
for digital, the frequent transfer of data to newer media
and methods.
I have been taken to task in the past for stating that I
think digital and computer technology is still in a very
early stage of development but I stand by this judgement. We
only think computers are very advanced because we can't see
the future.
---
Richard Knoppow
Los Angeles, CA, USA
dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
