Digitisation of Serbian cultural heritage

Announcement of the Audiovisual Archives and Digitalization Center of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts

The Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts (SASA) is a leading scientific and cultural institution in Serbia. The archive of the Academy, founded in 1841, is a major repository not only of the most important documents of Serbian culture but also of treasures of world heritage. Besides this, the archive of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Sremski Karlovci is also under SASA’s supervision, with its exceptional collection covering the period from the fifteenth to the nineteenth century.

The building of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Belgrade

Establishment of the Audiovisual Archives and Digitalization Center (AVA SASA)

In order to preserve and present to the public the most important and most valuable parts of the materials in its possession, SASA established its Audiovisual Archives and Digitalization Center in 2017. At the time the digitisation centre was set up, SASA set exceptional requirements. Because of the significance and value of the materials held in its library and archive, digitisation must be carried out at the highest level, in line with the strictest standards, using clearly defined digitisation procedures.

The inestimable significance of the material to be digitised becomes evident from the fact that it also includes the charters and laws of Serbian rulers of the 14th and 15th centuries. Inter alia, we keep here the original manuscripts of our most renowned writers, the correspondence of the most important Serbian scholars and writers, more than 3,000 paintings, drawings, sculptures, art collections, the original scores of works by Serbian composers, and photo archives with about 10,000 photographs and negatives.

Marginalia on the first edition of Vuk St. Karadžić’s Serbian Dictionary (1818) / SASA Library, Rv 46/

Appian’s History of Rome, Venice, 1477 /SASA Library, R8 1/

There is also a digital studio in the Academy building, but the seat of the Audiovisual Archives and Digitalization Center is in another building nearby. It occupies about 800 square metres on three levels and operates with six digital workstations. There is another digital studio in Sremski Karlovci, where the church archives mentioned are digitised.

Digitisation to the strictest industry standards

To achieve the best quality in cultural heritage digitisation, AVA SASA decided to acquire Phase One systems, following the example of the world’s most important archives and museums.

The Academy’s digital workstations are equipped with Phase One cameras (iXG 100MP, iXG 50MP and XF 80MP), Schneider lenses and Capture One’s tools specialised for cultural heritage. The equipment is housed in a room designed specifically for this purpose, where every factor affecting digital imaging (for example: the colours of the walls, room temperature, humidity) is checked and controlled.

AVA SASA digitisation studio

Twelve staff members work at the institution, including two expert consultants and six operators. The maintenance of the IT equipment has been entrusted to a specialist company, which monitors the servers and data storage devices on a daily basis, as well as the backup of the digitised materials.

Even the best digitisation equipment can produce results of modest quality if it is not taken care of by experts and well-trained operators. Over the past few months, AVA SASA has held intensive daily training sessions for its six operators, who have learned and mastered every stage of the digitisation process.

A digitisation expert giving advice

The training is given by digitisation experts who have exceptional experience in digital photography and in the processes of cultural heritage digitisation. In January, Phase One organised a two-day workshop where experts from Hungary (members of Tripont’s digitisation department) gave a short training session on Phase One cameras and demonstrated some of the features of the Capture One software. The next workshop, the highest-level Cultural Heritage Specialist training, was held in April 2019.

Cultural heritage digitisation procedures

In view of the significance and value of the material to be digitised and the sensitivity of the materials, the AVA SASA team is drawing up a detailed description of the ideal process for cleaning the materials and for restoring and handling them. This is an extremely important and delicate part of the digitisation process; without it, the archival materials would be exposed to possible damage.

An operator using Phase One and Capture One

Projects and plans for the future

In the coming years, the work of AVA SASA will be directed primarily at its own cultural heritage. In this sense, the priority projects are always linked to the especially valuable collections of the SASA Archive and the SASA Library, and to the exceptional material held in the Archive in Sremski Karlovci and the SASA Art Collection. In addition to these cultural assets, AVA SASA is digitising all publications (books, scientific journals) issued by SASA since its foundation in 1841, which amounts to nearly 16,000 documents.

In the meantime, AVA SASA intends to conclude strategic cooperation agreements with various cultural institutions in Serbia, as well as with other institutions that hold priceless cultural objects.

AVA SASA’s intention is to be regarded as an exemplary model in every area of cultural heritage digitisation. This intention also underlies the acquisition of the Phase One systems and the rigorous methodological training and operator training. The organisation of the AVA SASA Research Center is also under way, where we will examine the efficiency of digitisation procedures in terms of quality and digitisation time. We will publish the results on the AVA SASA website.

The above goals pose serious challenges for AVA SASA as a whole, but with more modest objectives we would not be able to meet SASA’s strict expectations, so we could only choose uncompromising top quality.

All the photos in this post were taken by Branislav Vojnović and Veselin Milunović.