My undergraduate degree is in Graphic Design and I am just a big enough art nerd to LOVE this collection.  The University of Wisconsin has included a collection of Artists’ Books in their digital collections.  This collection has a wide variety of books from Andy Warhol’s index to The Circus of Dr. Lao.

This database is an illustrated, descriptive index to the Artists’ Book Collection, located in the Kohler Art Library, University of Wisconsin-Madison. Presently, the Artists’ Book Collection contains over 800 titles. The database indexes approximately 760 of those titles, over 500 of which have one to four images to visually represent the structure and/or content of the book. With the goal to create a “visual finding aid” to the entire Artists’ Book Collection, the database will be expanded and updated on a periodic basis.

Andy Warhol's index

The Circus of Dr. Lao

I have always loved photograph collections.  In my spare time I enjoy taking pictures to collect for my own collections or to share with family and friends.  My favorite photography both to view and take is scenic photography.  I found a beautiful collection of photographs from the University of Virginia that is available for public view.  The photographs were taken by Frances Benjamin Johnston, below is what the University of Virginia has to say about this amazing photographer.

Belmont: Exterior, Garden Walk

Frances Benjamin Johnston (1864-1952) was one of the first American women to achieve distinction as a photographer. Although renowned for her work as a photojournalist and as a portraitist, Johnston’s greatest achievement as a photographer was her work to document the colonial architecture of the American South. From 1933 through 1940, with financial backing from the Carnegie Corporation, Johnston set about to record the vernacular architecture of Virginia, North and South Carolina, Maryland, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana, Florida and Mississippi. During her work in Virginia from 1933 to 1935, Johnston established close professional ties with Edmund S. Campbell, then the head of the Architecture Department at the University of Virginia. An outcome of Campbell working as an advisor to Johnston on the Virginia Survey was the deposit of 948 of Johnston’s original photographs for the purpose of study and research at the University. Johnston’s intention was not to make images of the grand architecture of the region, but rather to preserve a record of the barns, log cabins, inns, mills and outbuildings of humble origins. Her photographs are breathtaking examples of the American built environment that has been largely erased from today’s architectural landscape.

The university that I work has a subscription to Grove Art Online, and it is a lovely database that combines several databases into one.  The database includes Grove Art Online, The Oxford Companion to Western Art, Encyclopedia of Aesthetics, and the Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms.  You can select to search any combination of databases or all of them at once.  You can search by subject, title or you can browse the collection.  I could spend days browsing through all the images in the collection. If anyone else is an art fan like I am, I highly recommend this database.

Fashion Plate Collection from University of Washington Libraries Digital Collections

The original fashion plates collected by Blanche Payne and others have been cataloged and carefully stored for preservation purposes in archival housing. Many of these plates are from some of the leading French, British, American, and other continental fashion journals of the 19th century and early 20th century: Belle assemblée; Le bon ton; Le Follet, courrier des salons; Journal des dames and des modes; Godey’s lady’s book and magazine, and others. They are primarily hand-colored engravings although some of the plates after 1885 are colored lithographs. A project was undertaken by the Digital Initiatives Program to digitize and provide online access to selections from this collection. The 417 digital images cover many stylistic periods in French and English history. These include the Empire (1806-1813), Georgian (1806-1836), Regency (1811-1820), Romantic (1825-1850), Victorian (1837-1859), Late Victorian (1860-1900) and Edwardian (1901-1915). Although the original items are available for viewing by appointment through the Special Collections Division, providing web access increases the visibility and use of such unique resources.

This is an amazing collection of fashion plates that show off the fashion styles worn in the 19th and early 20th century women.  I love the artistic style of these fashion plates.  I’m so glad that libraries are taking pieces of history and sharing them with the world as well as saving them for future generations by creating digital collections.  As librarians we are the gatekeepers of knowledge, and we should do our best to preserve as much knowledge as possible.

www.kidsreads.com

I have used this website many times and I absolutely love it.  This website has several features and is a wonderful collection of information.  Included are listing of several children’s series and the reading order, author information, trivia, polls, reviews and more.  This site would be an excellent resource for children’s librarians, school librarians, even parents and kids.  I have used the series lists many times in helping both patrons and other librarians find a book in a series or by giving them a description of the series.  The section of books into movies is always a great source for those reluctant readers who might read a book after they know a movie was made from it.  Another great feature is the Cool & New section. Every month they compile a list and description of new books out that month.  This is helpful in collection development.  I use this site for many things even though I am not a children’s or school librarian.

After reading the chapter on Digital games in A Companion to Digital Literary Studies it realized I knew of two digital collections of games right off the top of my head.  I had never thought about a website full of games as a digital collection, but now it makes sense.  As a gamer, I would have to say these would have to be one of my personal favorite digital collections.  The two sites I use most frequently are http://www.realarcade.com and http://www.pogo.com.   Both sites offer a collection of games that the user can interact with, this includes games that are downloadable as well as games that are played strictly online.  The games are divided into catergories: Arcade; Puzzle; Word; Card; etc.  Real Arcade, as well as Pogo, offer the ability for the user to become a member of the gaming community which gives the user more benefits for a small fee.  Pogo and Real Arcade both have newsletters that are delivered to your email address which show you what new games they have as well as games that my be discounted.  I would recommed both of these sites as “FUN” digital collections.

I found a collection of photographs that I find just beautiful.  It is a digital collection from the University of Louisville.  The collection is photographs taken by Kate Matthews (1870-1956), a pioneering woman photographer of Pewee Valley, Kentucky.  I personally had never heard of her, but I love photograph collections and was pleasantly surprised when I stumbled across this one.  The collection consists of 431 items.

Kate Matthews is best known for her photographs depicting characters in the Little Colonel series of children’s books written by her friend and neighbor Annie Fellows Johnston.  She relied almost exclusively on her own community and acquaintances as subjects, and her photographs represent her interests in costume studies, literary allegory, and scenes of everyday life.

In an time when few women ventured into photography, Matthews won prizes at the Kentucky State Fair, in contests in Chicago, Columbus, and Pittsburgh, and in other regional and national competitions. She had photographs published in The American Annual of Photography seventeen times between 1896 and 1923. Her photos also ran in The Youth’s Companion, Cosmopolitan, Vogue, Ladies’ Home Journal, Good Housekeeping, Illustrated American, Forward, The Brown Book of Boston and Burr McIntosh Monthly.  Pretty impressive for a woman of this time, especially for one who rarely traveled very far from her home.

Not only is this a lovely collection of photographs, but also an interesting story of a woman who didn’t follow the typical standards and lived her life as she wanted.

As I’ve been researching more about digital collections I wonder what makes a true digital collection and what is just a collection of digital items.  While I did get a better understanding after reading Lee’s article, I still feel there are some collections out there that are more digital items than a true collection at least in my opinion.  I guess my question is more who makes the decsion that a collection is worth digitizing?  Just because the collection may be of interest to you does this make it of value?  I guess some of these questions are coming from me pondering what would I like to select for my collection for this class.  I have a few ideas on what I might like to do, but I worry about the overall value of the collection.  I’m sure I will continue to ponder on this subject.

Even though I haven’t really thought about digital collections per say I realized some of the sites I visit regularly are actually digital collections.

The first site is Hulu.  Hulu is a site of TV shows, movies and even video game trailers.  Not all TV shows or movies are available, but a wide variety is accessible.  Hulu even has a section called Collections which are collections of TV shows or movies on various subjects, for example: Classic War Movies, 2008 Emmy Nominees-Comedy, Great Sport Cameos, etc.  You can browse both the TV and movie sections to see what is available or you can look at what is popular.  I really like this site because I can re-watch some of my favorite shows, or catch up on episodes I’ve missed.

The second site is iTunes.  iTunes is a site that is a collection of music, videos, audiobooks, movies and games you can purchase to listen to or watch on your computer and iPod.  iTunes also has a wide variety of podcast that you can subscribe to or just browse to listen to at your leisure.  I love the ability to preview songs and albums before I purchase them.  With iTunes you can also listen to songs from around the world, instead of just what is at your local store.

The third site is NetLibrary.  NetLibrary is essentially a collection of e-books.  I discovered this site while preparing for giving tours to the English Comp classes.  I have found all kinds of useful books in this collection.  I was very excited to find a few books Dr. Van Fleet recommended for Reader’s Advisory.  This is an excellent resource to give people access to books they might not have immedate access to otherwise.  NetLibrary even has the abilty for you to create a username which allows you to save books in your favorites to access later.