Dear colleagues and Robert R. Maigatter,
I am late into this thread and it maybe that I should hold my fingers to
keyboard on the subject, but microfilming is an area of great interest to me
and in my defence I only arrived back in Perth on the 17th October since my
departure on 29th August and after attending the ARMA Show in Chicago,
flying into Houston on the Thursday after the show and immediately joining
the gridlock of cars in the mass exodus with my daughter and an almost 4
week old granddaughter for 24 hours. NOT FUN!
Can the powers organising the San Antonio have a word with the weather maker
and ask for clearance and a no show of hurricanes in 2006.
But I digress.
Prior to attending the ARMA Convention I spent several weeks in Europe
visiting microfilm and scanning manufacturers plus the UK Archives microfilm
section in Kew, London. I have to admit to being a MICROFILM supporter being
involved in the industry since 1974 but after seeing what is happening in
Europe has made me question the microfilm before digitizing theory.
For general business documents with limited retention periods of up to 100
years and not forever as in an Archival environment where the time frame
maybe as long as FOREVER most high quality scanners with appropriate QA
utilised as a part of the scanning process e.g. ANSI-AIIM Standard MS
44-1988 [REVISED 1993] titled "Recommended Practice for Quality Control of
Image Scanners it is my belief that scan first and dump to microfilm is an
appropriate methodology to implement.
For Robert there have been some excellent input regarding rotary cameras &
planetary cameras and other suggestions and I vote for a planetary camera
solution to his requirement at 24X (letter) or 32X (legal) with the Minolta
DAR 2800 auto feed unit. Why? Because of resolution or the clarity of the
film produced on a planetary camera is around 135 up to a claimed 200 lines
per millimetre whereas a rotary camera starts out at 85 lines per millimetre
with some increase on this for particular models. Why? Because with a
planetary camera the document being filmed the document and film are both
stationary at the point of exposure = high quality. With a rotary camera
both the document and the film are in constant movement during the exposure
process = lower quality. Enough of the technical stuff!
My preference is for low magnification ratio's 24 or 32 X maximum. The
saying in the microfilm industry was and I believe still is - Quality
filming e.g. documents you need to be able to reproduce as a quality
reproduction = Planetary Camera work whereas junk filming e.g. bank cheques
or cheap $ job go for Rotary Camera work. Some in the industry may find my
position untenable and will disagree with my views on Planetary V Rotary,
but so be it.
I am arguing with myself with the issues of the scanning of Archival =
forever documents as against the current held view of microfilm first for
longevity and posterity and scan from the microfilm for access purposes.
What I have observed with some specialised scanners for scanning documents &
books from letter A size = 8 1/2 x 11 inch = DIN A4 to D size = 22 x 34 inch
or even E size= 34 x 44 inch size = DIN A0. I have yet to make my final
decision but I think on the merits of the argument I will be changing ships
and going digital first.

I am moving away form my long held belief of film first to scan first and
film second and I am sure that will cause some healthy discussion in RIM and
Archive circles.

I trust that Robert and others find this post of value and the area of
Digital V Microfilming first worthy of further discussion.

Happy microfilming or is that SCANNING!

Regards, Laurie

Mr Daniel Lawrance [Laurie] Varendorff, ARMA
Member of the Western Australian Governments - Digital Records Working Group
(DRWG).
Specialist Technical Writer on Records and Information Management (RIM) and
related subjects, available for hire.
Published Articles available @
http://www.records-management.com.au/publications.shtml?laurie-
A Records Management Professional, and proud of the fact!
Consultant/Trainer/Tutor/Presenter: Records and Information Management
Imaging and Micrographic Specialist: 31 years experience
You may care to visit our web site @  www.records-management.com.au
<http://www.records-management.com.au/>

Also representing: Digital Microfilm Equipment - DME

You may care to visit our web site @   <http://www.microfilm.net.au/>
Digital Microfilm Equipment (DME) - For all things Micrographic

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