A Better Photographer

I wore my photographer hat the other day as I worked with the Museum's collections. This isn't to say that I have much skill, however. My expertise with using the Museum's Panasonic digital camera is rudimentary at best despite my continued attempts to better familiarize myself with its functions. Yet the collection requires that I keep this hat ready on its hook. 

Since we started digitizing our collection in 2012, identifying photos have been taken of every new specimen for its catalog record. Photos supplement the specimen's written description and allow us to pick up on slight damage or other changes that may occur since the original photos were taken. Oftentimes I look back at photos and recognize the black table cloth backdrops that we normally use at events. Sometimes I can even tell where the photo was taken based on the lighting--the window-filled office on a sunny day or the dimly lit Tower room. Because we're a small organization with a tight budget, we've made due with what's available to us. 

I attempted a higher quality photo above.

Digitizing our collections means including photos of each specimen in the digital record. Here
is an original photo of a trio of red-winged black birds.

I like to think that good equipment is becoming more readily available to us since 2012. Recently, I purchased a light box to help improve our collections photos. A light box is quite literally a box, usually a dark fabric exterior that can be opened up with multiple windows to snap a photo of what's inside.  I played around with the box earlier this week and was quite impressed that even I could pull off professional-looking photos. 

After playing around with photographing a few items, it's safe to say that I'm happy with this purchase.