In the last couple of weeks I have been out to visit both the Reid Musical Instrument Museum and St. Cecilia’s Music Hall to document the buildings prior to a makeover.
The Reid is a particularly challenging location for a photographer: tight spaces with mixed lighting and tall glass cabinets lining the walls and centre of the room. Reflections everywhere. It turns out that this was not a good day to wear my new white top!
A large order from the Lothian Health Services Archive came our way recently, which included postcards from the hospital & group portraits of staff and patients. In amongst them I discovered an early example of photo bombing- look between the shoulders of the 2 chaps in the centre of the back row- I love combination of serious faces of the people posing and the incongruous jaunty feet in the air behind them. Was this intentional? Or did he simply happen to be doing a handstand at the time…?
On the 2nd June, I was lucky enough to begin employment as the Employ.ed Digital Collections intern for the CRC. Although I begin with a little trepidation – like most people when they start a new job, I spent the night before worrying that I’d be really bad at it or that no one would like me – I am now in my fifth week and enjoying it immensely: I don’t really want to leave!
As part of our role here, Malcolm and I have taken many photographs of the Main Library. Over the years this has built up an archive of born digital images that show the life of the Library. Before and after shots of the Main Library Redevelopment Project, seasonal shots of the building and campus environs, students using the facilities and CRC events- such as exhibition openings, have all been documented.
Occasionally, one of us has to play a cameo role in the photo’s on those days we just can’t seem to get a student in the right spot, Malcolm stars in this one…
Another visual essay from me this week. I thought it would be interesting to share a closer look at the amazing work of the invisible artists who populate the title pages of many books in our collections. I am constantly astonished at the graphic accomplishment present in these works from anonymous artists. I have spent some time highlighting details that are inspiring works in their own right. These works stand on their own feet and in their own space. All images this week are details from ” The Faerie Queene “. Shelfmark JY 1096. Points of note are the best snake tongue ever drawn (see below) and a fantastic phoenix rising from flames. More images from the book can be found within our image collections at http://images.is.ed.ac.uk/
Deputy Photographer, Malcolm Brown.
This week saw the start of a small project to digitise some papers that recently came to the CRC from the The Cockburn Museum, School of GeoSciences. The collection contains…
Two of my favourite photographs in the Centre for Research Collections come from The University of Edinburghs copy of William Henry Fox Talbot’s “The Pencil of Nature“. Shelfmark Df.3.85 .The…
Having a background in Fine Art through study at Glasgow School of Art I am very aware of the striking visual content that passes through the Digital Imaging Unit on…
As photographers for the Special Collections in the University of Edinburgh Main Library, we’ve seen a fair amount of beautiful books and manuscripts, but the diversity of the collections, both…
Fascinating book of the month requested for digitisation in the DIU goes to Thomas Greens “The Universal Herbal; or, botanical, medical, and agricultural dictionary. Containing an account of all the…
