Explore unique highlights from UBC’s Open Collections, as well as insights into the work of the Digitization Centre. From announcements of new projects and collections to behind-the-scenes looks at our digitization process, we share the stories and hidden gems that inspire us in our efforts to preserve and make accessible diverse materials.
Moving Spaces
Posted on Jun 17, 2014 by Matthew Murray
As you might have heard we’ve been planning on expanding into a new space for several months. It finally happened on Friday, and we’re mostly moved in now! Here’s the room we’re moving into. I wish we’d taken some photos when it was just a vast empty white room before the carpet was installed. Here […]
Remembering the Empress
Posted on Jun 11, 2014 by Matthew Murray
We marked the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Empress of Ireland, one of the worst naval disasters in Canadian history.
We’ve joined The Flickr Commons
Posted on by Matthew Murray
We’re very pleased to announce that we’ve successfully joined The Commons on Flickr! You can check out the announcement on our blog.
Japanese Card Games
Posted on Jun 05, 2014 by Matthew Murray
Later this year we’re starting a project in partnership with the UBC Asian Library and the UBC Department of Asian Studies to digitize some cool old Japanese game cards! (Ise monogatari utakaruta, from UBC Rare Books & Special Collections) Karuta カルタ, is a borrowed Japanese term (from the Portugese carta) that refers to playing cards. Karuta became popular in […]
Remembering the Empress
Posted on May 29, 2014 by Laura Ferris
Today marks the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Empress of Ireland, one of the worst naval disasters in Canadian history. The Empress of Ireland, along with the Empress of Britain, was one of the first steamships that the Canadian Pacific Railway Company launched for its trans-Atlantic route in the early 1900s. Unfortunately, the […]
New Release! Greater Vancouver Regional District Planning Department Land Use Maps
Posted on May 22, 2014 by Rob
We have now completed the digitization, metadata creation and uploading of the Greater Vancouver Regional District Planning Department Land Use Maps collection. Go have a look!
The Discoverer and other book destruction/digitization techniques
Posted on May 21, 2014 by Matthew Murray
While we frequently post on this blog about the collections we’re digitizing (or about to digitize) we rarely talk about the various processes of digitizing that we use. To bring more light to our techniques I thought I’d show you a couple of the methods we use for getting books ready to digitize. Last month […]
We’ve joined The Flickr Commons
Posted on May 14, 2014 by Matthew Murray
We’re very pleased to announce that we’ve successfully joined The Commons on Flickr! You can check out the announcement on their blog. The Commons is a group of libraries, museums, and other institutions from around the world who have placed all or parts of their digital image collections on Flickr. While joining this group is exciting […]
Uno Langmann Collection
Posted on May 07, 2014 by Matthew Murray
You may have recently heard that Uno Langmann, a well known local art dealer, donated more than 18,000 photographs, apparently worth $1.2 million, to UBC! The photos stretch back to the 1850s and go all the way up to the 1970s. While we probably won’t be able to digitize all of the photos (due to copyright […]
Epigraphic Squeezes
Posted on Apr 30, 2014 by Matthew Murray
If you’ve never heard of epigraphic squeezes I wouldn’t be surprised as they’re not commonly known, they don’t even have a Wikipedia entry! Epigraphic squeezes are created when a soft, wet material, such as paper or plaster, is pressed into inscriptions made in stone. When the material dries it is removed and becomes a mirrored 3D version […]
