The Madison DID

Software for Teaching and Learning with Digital Images

James Madison University's (JMU) Madison DID is a client/server application. The Madison DID is a content delivery system, and as such does not include any images or image catalog data (other than a handful of images for demonstration purposes). Client and server hardware and software requirements are described in this document. This document also addresses infrastructure, support, training and customization issues and content preparation.

Documentation on preparing images for placement in the Madison DID is included within the Madison DID documentation (see "Preparing Digital Images for Inclusion in the DID"). The Madison DID includes a number of utilities that greatly assist in the integration of digitized images into the system. These utilities along with documentation can be found in the "utilities" directory of your institution's Madison DID (e.g. http://mdid.yourinstitution.edu/utilities/). Some of these utilities work in conjunction with Adobe Photoshop, version 5.5 or higher. You may contact http://www.adobe.com for more information about Photoshop, including educational pricing. Optimizing images before placing them in the system is also a good idea. JMU has used Xat's Image Optimizer http://www.xat.com). This product can reduce image size from one to 15% without degrading image quality.

There are many methods for digitizing images for inclusion in the Madison DID. Three options are reviewed here:

• Digitizing Images On-Campus: There may be excellent reasons to digitize images on campus, however, total cost of undertaking such an endeavor quickly mount. The institution will need to purchase a fairly high-end scanner. In addition, editing of content must take place using a monitor that will ensure image accuracy and consistency across images. Consistent student labor is difficult to keep, with costs ranging from $6-8/hour. Training of students to ensure image quality can be intensive. Depending on how slides are currently stored in a visual resources facility, glass mounted slides may need to be unlabeled and placed in plastic mounts for scanning (the glass will distort the scan). If those slides must be returned to a collection, the slides must be remounted in glass and relabeled. Often, existing slides may already be degrading in quality, which will require image editing expertise of an imaging expert or visual resources expert. Hourly costs plus fringe may be $17-28/hour.
• Outsourcing Image Digitizing: Early into project development, JMU decided to outsource slide digitizing of JMU or faculty-owned content to a photographic corporation. These companies can digitize images at a rapid rate, using slide scanning facilities that the institution is unlikely to be able to afford. 300-500 appropriately packaged 35mm slides can be scanned in ten days, and returned on PhotoCD. If for any reason image quality is not good, the content can be returned at no cost, for rescans. Costs range from $1.50 to $8.00 per slide. JMU selected prices and services at $3.00 per slide. There are still costs of demounting and remounting and labeling slides, if applicable. However, overall costs are less. The added benefit of quick turnaround allows quick integration of larger bodies of content into the system.
• Licensing Commercially Available Image Libraries: As noted in the third bullet-point of the "Customization" section (see above), the Madison DID can be customized to allow integration between the Madison DID and third-party image libraries (e.g. AMICO and Davis Art Slides). While this option involves upfront customization costs, it may be the easiest and in the long run least expensive method of populating the Madison DID with a large number of high quality images. For additional information regarding custom integration tools for the Madison DID, contact the Center for Instructional Technology (mdid@jmu.edu) at JMU. Please consult the software license agreement to understand disclaimers related to the modification of the source code of this application.