Cigarette and Matchbox Art

These posts may not count any more, but since I found that this is in fact the last week of school (I thought this was finals week and things were determined in all classes) I thought I would write some more.  I may or may not get more points at this point in the semester, but I hate that is seems like I didn’t really seem to care too much about digital collections this semester.  I had a great deal to do this semester and my collection was not as great as it should have been, but it has been harder to find interesting things to blog about.  I am looking forward to the organization of information class next semester because I think that it would be so much easier to understand collections. 

Today, I visited the New York Public library website, which I haven’t really gotten to visit this semester, but one of their images collection really struck me.  The pictures are of old cigarette cards.  I can see why cigarettes were such a rage back in the day.  Collecting cards like baseball cards and getting cigarettes instead of bubble gum.  The reason why it struck me, however, is that the art work is really interesting.  And, I have started my own collection of matchbook cover and cigar box postcards.  These pop art collections are so similar.  I wish I was able to upload one of my matchbox postcards, so it could be compared to the pictures online.  Each cover speaks so much of its time and culture.

The collection I wish I had done

I wish I had taken the pictures I took while in Italy and made a collection out of them. Somehow, I thought that would be too easy. But, I had taken the photos and even have most of them categorized. My friends even sent me a DVD of more photos which I would have been able to add.  Many of my pictures are blurry, so I am glad to have the other photos.  If I had used the photos that were already digital, I would have had more time to worry about the metadata and the organization.  Hindsight being what it is, I would have chosen the easier route.  That is not to say that I won’t finish the project I started because my family is not expecting it to be done, but finding the inspiration is sometimes lacking.  Perhaps once the holidays are over, there will be more concentration for scanning in pictures.

Funny Comic

Astronomy picture of the day

I don’t know why I didn’t think of this collection before when I was making my list of favorite digital collections.  http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ is a website that has interesting picutres of a different astrological phenomenon every day.  For Chirstmas last year, I got a book about it.  And it is so neat to see what the picture is going to be for the next day.  The positioning of venus and jupiter last week made me remember.  Yahoo news had a posting of a picutre from Asia that made the rising moon look like a smiley face.   The cosmos are so interesting. 

Papers

I finsihed editing the final paper for the ODYN class I took last month.  Working in a group is so difficult sometimes.  I am glad that I did not have to write the whole 15 pages (twice that will all of the figures and appendicies), but putting it all together was really tiring.  I tried to make the paper cohesive and sound like one person, without really changing much.  I had to add transitions and conclusions, find citations that weren’t really there.  And, switching back to APA after being enbedded in Chicago for several semesters threw me.  I thought that the chicago manual was vague…APA is worse.  I don’t remember it being that bad, but trying to find information on how to cite a brouchure was practically like finding a needle in a haystack.  I finally found it.  Anyway, I hope that the rest of the group likes what I did.  I am ready to put this project to bed.  It was interesting to view a paper from the point of view of actually presenting it to the company to use.  It made it more real.  And, I think it will be a very nice addition to my portfolio at the end of the program. 

I am glad that the semester is starting to wrap up.  This semester has felt longer than last Spring.  However, I feel like I have learned alot this semester.

• Making a digital collection is difficult, especially when it is a family project on top of being a class project.  Had I known that my family would be pressuring me more to get it done, I would have chosen a different project
• There never seems to be enough time in a week to get done what you think you should have gotten done.  In my collections proposal I said that scanning in the pictures would probably only take 10 hours, max.  What I ever wrong.  I didn’t acount for editing out the white space, flipping pictures that got put into the scanner incorrectly, etc.  I think I spent more time editing than I did scanning.  For the rest of the pictures I have to scan in, I will make sure they are at least facing the correct way and they are organized long before I even get close to the scanner.
• I learned that there are more reference materials out there than I care to know about.  And evealuating them is an art and a hassle.  We were supposed to also find a “book” review of the sources we were evaluating.  I had no idea where to go for that.  There are definitely advantages to being in an MLIS program and working in a library.  I hope those who are actually in a library already realize that.
• Organizations, all kinds, have change programs that people will be annoyed with…and as much as technology is a reality, it is amazing how many people fight new technologies.  All organizations, being products of human behavior, are basically the same.  They have the same problems, they have the same triumphs.  It is just a matter of getting down to the real meat of the matter which is usually just lack of communication.
• No matter how well a team works together, email still makes things infinitely harder (lack of communication again-see it all comes back to that).
• After three semesters of trying, I really can’t get into this blogging thing.  I don’t mind it when I just need to write what I want to write, when I want to write it, but I have a really hard time being a part of the blogsphere.  I have other things I would rather do with my time than spend all of it online.  When I am bored, the internet is not the first place I go.  And my blog this semester has been a lowsy form of communication.

I have found myself at least looking at the news and interesting facts on Yahoo when I go online to read my comics, so I am becoming a bit more internet inclined…but, seriously, when I had my internet down for two weeks this semester, I didn’t miss it much, except for the fact that I had assignments due.  If I hadn’t been in class, I probably wouldn’t have bothered much with it.  Oh well, live and learn, right?

Italy

My plan this semester was to, little by little, give a bit of information about my trip at the beginning of the semester.  I haven’t seemed to have time, or the clearness of thought to so that.  Last night, I got a DVD of pictures that a friend from the trip put together for me, which brought up the thought.  Since I have a bit of time, I thought I would post about the Uffizi Gallery.

Uffizi Gallery Walkway

  I did not go into the Uffizi as I was on a budget, but we walked by it and got a little information about it.  Our tour guide pointed out the statue of Americo Vesspucci and actually asked if I knew who he was (I did).  The corridor of the Uffizi is full of statues of Famous Florentines.  It is amazing how many famous people were born or called Florence home.  It is true that the Florence was the birthplace of so many great men.  I absolutely loved Florence.  It was like the time stopped there.  And, while I was working on my digial collection, I found a picture of Florence that my grandfather took and it looks almost like a picture that I took in August.  Over 50 years later and the city hasn’t changed.  It bustles and bulges at the seams, but there are still brillant moments of peace and tranquility.  And, it is so hard to explain to people who have not been there.  You can walk through a street where you have to practially fight through the crowd and burst into a square where no one is there but the pigeons. 

Florence

Florence 1942

The phots are taken from opposite sides of the city, but you can see how similar the city still is.  History lives here and it speaks to anyone willing to listen.

LibriVox

This online collection of audio books is really cool.  One of my weird “dreams” is to read an audio book.  This website allows everyone to do that on books within the public domain.  I think this is an ambitious project, but a good example of open source at its best.   The whole site works on the will of volunteers.