Introduction to AV Preservation

Course Description

This course introduces audiovisual media formats and outlines best practices for their long-term care, preservation, and digitization. Students will gain a practical overview of handling and physical assessment, documentation, digitization workflows, and storage recommendations for audiovisual recorded sound and moving image collections. We will explore the lifecycle of media like VHS tapes, audio cassettes, optical DVD discs, and home movie film reels as they graduate from dusty shelves to digital repositories. Real-world scenarios from students and the course instructor will guide shared learning and media archaeology, and course graduates will grasp the core principles to care for analog and digital audiovisual collections, alike.

Course Objectives and Goals:

• To inspire capability and empower professionals working with film, video, and sound collections;
• To convey understanding of the history and technical lineages of audiovisual media formats and their distinctive approaches to recording sound and image;
• To familiarize students with the range of specific audiovisual media formats and their technical characteristics, specifically: recorded sound discs, magnetic tape, motion picture film, and digital video;
• To introduce core conservation principles and their relevant application in signal migrations from physical analog carriers to digital file-based mediums;
• To overview physical handling and inspection best practices for analog formats;
• To practically demonstrate contemporary audiovisual digitization and open source digital preservation workflows, tools, and software;
• To impart knowledge of relevant professional networks and learning resources for further education and participation in the audiovisual preservation field.

Week 1: Signals

We introduce core concepts about audiovisual recordings, forming a foundation by which we can understand all subsequent audiovisual recording formats regardless of medium. Using examples from popular culture, we consider: encoding and decoding, format specificity, calibration, analog representations, digital conversions, noise and interference, fragility and degralescence, human perception, time and death, being and existence. To orient ourselves with the range of audiovisual formats, we look at a handful of specific historical case studies to tease out the core concepts we’ve learned.

Week 2: Recorded Sound

We trace sound recordings from experiments by a French bookseller in the 1850s, through Edison’s multifarious grooved discs, to top-secret machinery stolen from the Nazis by Bing Crosby, all the way to Billie Eilish on your smartphone. Topics include: a primer on acoustics, fidelity, amplitude and waveforms, auditory perception, sampling, and compression. We consider how core qualities of sound signals are affected across varying format recordings thereof, and learn about contemporary workflows for preserving digital audio files and embedding metadata. Our grasp on magnetic media formats will segue into Week 3’s discussion of analog and digital videotape.

Week 3: Moving Images

We traverse the simultaneously parallel yet entwined “paths” of moving image recordings as films and as videos. Horse-racing, television soap-operas, moon landings, and Beyoncé are illustrative sights on a journey that considers how media recordings capture time. We overview basic equipment and set-ups for working with moving image formats. We demonstrate basic characteristics and handling of 16 mm on a film bench, and physically assess both analog and digital videotapes for typical signs of damage and deterioration (on physical carriers and upon playback). Topics include: visual acuity, resolution and “high-definition,” aspect ratio, frame rate, interlacing, display, deterioration metrics, storage climates, colorspace, codecs, compression, bit-rates, cables, hardware, and machine maintenance. We conclude with demonstrations of digitization workflows for motion picture film (telecine vs. frame-discrete DPX scans), and for analog videotape (using AMIA’s open-source vrecord software).

Week 4: Audiovisual Digitality and Long-Term Preservation

Broadly navigating digital technology since the late-twentieth century, we consider how digitality has homogenized recorded audiovisual signals (and, how it hasn’t always done so), with a focus on digital video. Core audiovisual digital preservation topics include: fixity and characterization, embedded metadata, transcoding and derivative-making, and command-line media micro-services. We consider pros and cons of digitization reformatting audiovisual media in-house versus with a third-party vendor service, and look at several RFP resources. We look at web-based video streaming and access workflows.