Introduction

• Dalhousie Libraries works with external service providers to digitize analog and digital audiovisual items (e.g., U-matic, Betacam, VHS, DAT). Procurement of digitization services is guided by the University's Procurement Policy.
  
  
• The Libraries typically outsources audiovisual digitization on a project basis, using project management principles and best practices. Procurement of external audiovisual digitization services requires a budget, a designated Project Manager, a project charter with defined goals and objectives, and a project team with defined roles and responsibilities.
  
  
• Vendors digitize AV items in small and medium-sized batches, but the overall workflow is more like a high-volume "factory" operation described in the International Association of Sound and Audiovisual Archives Guidelines for the Preservation of Video Recordings (IASA-TC 06, Part D, Section D.1.1.2).
  
  
• External digitization jobs often include a variety of formats. For example, a shipment containing videocassettes may also include audio reels and 16 mm film reels.
  
  
• Audiovisual items are often found within multimedia archival fonds that include textual records, photographs, and other material that is normally digitized in-house. See other sections of the Digital Collections Handbook as necessary. 
  
  
• Audiovisual items cannot be digitized through the Libraries' Archives Document Delivery Service. 
  

Documentation