Filmstrip Viewer and Video Cassette Player

Filmstrip Viewer is an equipment used to view larger images using filmstrips and negatives. It compose of a compact micro-film reader employing the film carried by a Philips-type cassette as the recording medium on which micro-images are placed and from which these micro-images are projected through a plurality of lenses onto a viewing screen. 

Advantages

1.    It has the capacity of storing vast amount of information.

2.    It enables us to view larger images.

3.    It can be used no matter how lighted or dim the room is.

Video Cassette player

- is a type of electro-mechanical device that uses removable videocassettes that contain magnetic tape for recording analog audio and analog video from broadcast television so that the images and sound can be played back at a more convenient time.

Advantages

1.     Large numbers of images can be recorded easily, with no need to move objects to a photographic studio. The pieces can be moved during recording, so that the total amount of information recorded is much greater than with any number of still photographs.

2.     The ease of operation and speed of recording allows a great deal of information to be recorded without interruption of the survey process. For use with infrared, the speed of recording makes it possible to record as a routine every painting that is scanned, including those which appear to have nothing of interest. A voice recording can be recorded simultaneously with the recording of the image to identify the object and to explain what is being shown.

3.     A library of visible light and infrared images, similar to the libraries of x-radiographs that many museums have, can be easily built up. A great deal of information can be stored on one cassette, particularly compared to the space required to store corresponding numbers of photographic negatives and prints.

4.     A whole tape can be duplicated commercially, or with two tape machines.

5.     It is easy to compare a “freeze-frame” image on the monitor with a photographic print.

6.     It is a simple matter to include on the same tape an image of the artifact under normal illumination, or under raking light. For some legal purposes, it may be important to include a photograph of the painting being turned around to read the inscription. A single still photographic print may provide a reading of an inscription, but does not in itself indicate what painting it came from.

Disadvantages

1.     The main disadvantage is that no hard copy is produced. However, at worst, the conservator has almost exactly what he would have had before, that is, an image on a monitor screen. Images can be chosen and photographed at any time, with only slight loss of quality. When necessary, as for inscriptions, photographs can be taken for a client. For purposes of research, we feel that it is more important in most cases that the private conservator or the museum laboratory retain a permanent record than that the client or curator have infrared photographs. Because of the rapid developments in technology, the direct production of highquality still prints from a video tape will undoubtedly soon become possible.

2.     Viewing requires a video tape player and a monitor. This is getting to be less of a problem, since many museums already use video tape in their education departments and therefore have monitors, and many people own tape players. (Extensive use of video tape in the conservation laboratory may make the purchase of a monitor, i.e. television, advisable. This may lure curators into the laboratory during important events, like the final game of the World Series. It is not clear at this time whether this should be seen as an advantage or disadvantage.)

3.     During the infrared scanning process, the VCR records the slight vibration and temporarily out-of-focus image produced while the camera is moving. This can be eliminated by turning the VCR on and off, or by stopping the camera periodically to record a still image.

4.     The resolution of the video tape image is never more than and usually less than that produced by the camera.

5.     Questions have arisen about the permanence of video tape. For our purposes, this is not a problem. For museums or laboratories interested in using electronic recording media for long-term records, hard disks appear to be preferable.

6.     Comparison between infrared images on video tape would require duplicate tapes and two monitors.