Hi all,

I cannot testify to the usefulness of image database software in a
museum setting, as I am a PhD student in art history.  However, I have
experimented with the various database programs on the market to
manage the thousands of images that I have for my personal use.  The
best two that I know of are Canto's Cumulus and Photools' IMatch.

Cumulus is no doubt more customizable than IMatch for networked,
multi-user, use. As such, it is probably what you would want at a
large organization like the Tacoma Art Museum. Canto is also probably
a more stable company than Photools because they have been in business
for years, while IMatch is the product of a single programmer.  That
said, I do not use Cumulus for my personal work because it is more
difficult to set up and maintain.  It was very clear to me that
Cumulus is meant for large organizations with many staff members,
including tech support staff to maintain the servers.  Every image
must be on a hard drive or server, and if you want to move your
database from one server to another it can be a big pain.  You must
replicate the directory structure on the new server exactly as it was
on the old server, otherwise the links will all break.  If you want to
reorganize your data it is a major pain because it cannot reassign all
images in a folder with one click.  You may end up slowly and
painfully telling Cumulus where each image has been moved to a new
location.  http://www.canto.com/

For those of you at smaller institutions with only a few staff
members, I would recommend looking at IMatch instead.  IMatch meets my
needs well, as well as the needs of some of my friends.  It is
powerful and customizable.   It sorts in numerous ways and is easily
searchable.  There is a place to add comments—like a virtual notecard.
 It is well suited to people without a lot of time because it is
comparatively easy to install, configure, and use.  I found it useful
even before I did a lot of my own cataloging.  It is also pretty
cheap--$60 / license.  It is aimed at professional photographers
without a centralized image server.  However, it is very easy to set
up your own set of fields to index art (such as artist, patron,
current owner, etc.)  It can index images on a centralized server or
hard drive, as well as removable media like CDs, DVDs, and flash
drives (which Cumulus cannot).  It can do simultaneous cataloging
(such as selecting all of the paintings by Michelangelo and then
typing "Michelangelo" once).  Moving the database from one computer to
another is also pretty easy compared to Cumulus because you do not
need to replicate the directory structure on a new server.  Instead
you can reassign entire directory structures to new locations.
Although it is from a small company, I am not too worried about losing
my data in the long-term because it can export data in XML format.
This is a pretty universal format for transferring data between
competing products.  The major limitations of IMatch in my mind are:
1) although multiple users on a network can use it, only one person
can edit the database, and 2) it is only available for PC.  A trial
version of IMatch can be downloaded from http://www.photools.com/

Travis


On 2/1/07, Alyssa Rosso <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> We are undergoing the process of managing our images and photos throughout
> the organization. In addition to digitally cataloguing our museum's collection,
> we are also looking to organize all of the museum's photography. This includes
> publicity images of the museum, visitors, and exhibitions for the
> communications, development, and education departments as well.
>
> Right now we run into the problem of images being separated from their photo
> captions. Images of traveling exhibitions are being duplicated throughout
> departments, which takes up space on the server. Sometimes the images are
> altered in ways that are inconsistent with our lending contracts so we need a
> way to preserve them. We have no consistent or centralized filing system or
> naming convention throughout the entire organization.
>
> I hoping to know what has worked for other organizations. Do you have
> standard photo storage requirements that you use throughout the
> organization? What are they? What about photo management software such
> as Cumulus? What are the pros and cons of that?
>
> Thanks! I look forward to receiving your feedback.
>
> Alyssa
>
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-- 
---

Travis Nygard
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