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How to digitize museum objects

A variety of methods can be used to create digital images of the objects in the museum. At the Übersee-Museum Bremen, we digitize different collections according to different criteria. Digital images can help to make objects that are stored away from view in museum depots accessible worldwide.

Wooden cabinet with many drawers and white labels — The Übersee Museum's collections contain more than a million objects. Making them accessible is a huge task. On this cabinet, you can see the small white labels that can be used to manage each location in this cabinet in the database.

CC BY-SA 4.0 Übersee-Museum Bremen, photo: Volker Beinhorn

Camera with display with a mounted stuffed bird in the background — Birds and other small to large animals are photographed at a photo station. A small card with colour checker and measurements, as well as all labels found on the collection objects, is photographed at in the same shot.

CC BY-SA 4.0 Übersee-Museum Bremen, photo: Volker Beinhorn

A person stands in front of a camera system that is lit from the sides and forms an arc – in the background, you can see a computer screen — Plants, which are placed flat on sheets of paper, are placed under a fixed camera. In the background, you can see the computer that controls the camera capture. With help from the software on the computer, the image can be viewed and all settings can be controlled.

CC BY-SA 4.0 Übersee-Museum Bremen, photo: Volker Beinhorn

A person sitting at a computer can be seen from behind; next to them is a photo station with lighting, on which a box of butterflies is lying — Insects are photographed in the drawer in which they are stored. This way, several animals can be digitally photographed at the same time. The picture can be checked on the computer that controls the camera.

CC BY-SA 4.0 Übersee-Museum Bremen, photo: Volker Beinhorn

A person stands at the photo station with a hand scanner in their hand and holds the scanner over a label attached to a box — Each label is also provided with a code that a scanner can read and transmit the information to the computer. This QR code is a visual version of an internationally unique number that is written to the file after scanning.

CC BY-SA 4.0 Übersee-Museum Bremen, photo: Volker Beinhorn

A person sitting in front of a computer can be seen from behind; a large insect is visible on the screen — Very small animals can also be photographed using microscopy: digital microscope images can be created at this station. This means that even the smallest details can be examined using digital images.

CC BY-SA 4.0 Übersee-Museum Bremen, photo: Volker Beinhorn

A blue Kompaktus cupboard with drawers — If you imagine the quantity of objects, it quickly turns out that photographing alone is not enough. You would never be able to find anything in the amount of photos again ...

CC BY-SA 4.0 Übersee-Museum Bremen, photo: Volker Beinhorn

A view into a drawer with cardboard cards — ... that's why it is so important that each object is managed in a database alongside with all its metadata information and also its location. And there is a lot of additional information in many different sources that also needs to be digitized and recorded – here, for example, information on punched cards.

CC BY-SA 4.0 Übersee-Museum Bremen, photo: Volker Beinhorn

Long, narrow wooden object is placed on a white paper background by one person, with a photo light set up — Many objects are photographed inside the depots on a white surface with a white background. This way, the objects remain close to their depot location, and the photo station moves through the depots.

CC BY-SA 4.0 Übersee-Museum Bremen, photo: Volker Beinhorn

This story relates to the topics Collecting, Museum Work, Metadata, Digitization, . Discover more content on these topics by clicking one of the tags!