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Chapter 6, Identifying and Dating Archival Audiovisual Formats
The following resources are helpful for identifying analog audiovisual formats, and also for determining a ballpark date for undated media.
All formats
- The University of Illinois Preservation Self-Assessment Program (PSAP) Collection ID Guide is the most comprehensive illustrated guide: https://psap.library.illinois.edu/collection-id-guide/#audiovisual
- The Museum of Obsolete Media is a good place to find information about rare formats: http://www.obsoletemedia.org/
Video
- Texas Commission on the Arts Video Identification and Assessment Guide includes videotape formats introduced between 1956 and 1999: http://www.arts.texas.gov/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/video.pdf
- Video Preservation Website, Video Format Identification Guide to videotape formats introduced between 1956 and 1995, so is slightly less complete but is in a more handy, web-based document: http://videopreservation.conservation-us.org/vid_id/index.html
- The National Archives’ online Archival Formats manual has a page on identifying video: http://www.archives.gov/preservation/formats/video-identify-formats.html
- The Indiana University “Format Characteristics” manual for audio recordings is a lengthy but comprehensive document on archival sound recordings with more details than the PSAP guide. Use the table of contents to find dates for each of the general formats: http://www.dlib.indiana.edu/projects/sounddirections/facet/facet_formats.pdf
- The National Archives’ online Archival Formats manual has a page on identifying audio: http://www.archives.gov/preservation/formats/audio-identify-formats.html
- The National Archives’ Archival Formats manual has a page on identifying motion picture film: http://www.archives.gov/preservation/formats/motion-picture-film-identify-formats.html
- Little Film.org has visual aids and dates for small-gauge film (8-16mm): http://www.littlefilm.org/
- Film can be dated by looking for edge code (usually plus signs, circles, squares, and triangles at the edge of the film) that correspond to the date of manufacture. If you find an edge code on a reel of film, you can look the dates up on the edge code chart and know a proximate date of the film’s content: http://www.filmforever.org/Edgecodes.pdf
Terra Foundation Center for Digital Collections
A virtual repository of a substantial cross-section of the Archives' most significant collections.