Photographic documentation of mold-damaged postcards

Karen Potje <kpotje [at] cca__qc__ca> writes

>Does anyone have suggestions on how we can photograph, photocopy or
>microfilm a collection of about 2,300 mouldy postcards without risk
>of contaminating work areas, equipment, other collections materials,
>or the photographer?

Color xeroxing does an excellent job as an inexpensive quick method
of copying postcards; you can enlarge them easily as they are copied
and can do more than one at a time to save time and expense.  The
color isn't precise but detail is captured very well.   However, I
wouldn't recommend copying them through a plastic bag, as that would
degrade the image.  Moreover, if you were not going to treat the
postcards, keeping them in a plastic bag would just make the mold
worse unless they were frozen.  If you do have a freezer available,
use of a ziplock type plastic bag would be an option for storage
until treatment of selected items was needed (as they were called
for by researchers).

Gary D. Saretzky
Coordinator, Public History Internship Program, Rutgers University;
Archivist, Monmouth County, New Jersey; Chair, NJ Caucus,
Mid-Atlantic Regional Archives Conference

                                  ***
                  Conservation DistList Instance 12:43
                Distributed: Thursday, November 12, 1998
                       Message Id: cdl-12-43-008
                                  ***