There was so much great content from the Atlanta conference; it is great to see extended information being shared in this issue of Images. Your President has managed to unpack, but has yet to complete all the follow-up work. The Board responses to your annual reports are in progress, so expect to see these letters later in June and let me know if you need any information sooner. This does not mean your Board has been dawdling, but we are directing our energy in unexpected ways.

Minneapolis conference, already? It’s hard to believe, but we are hard at work on the 2011 conference, as you surely noticed with the recent call for proposals. The convergence of members from both the Visual Resources Association and Art Libraries Society in a joint conference means we have a larger pool of talent to draw upon and can mix it up in extraordinary ways. We hope you are excited by the prospect of coming up with ideas for individual papers, fully-formed sessions, or workshops. This combination of ways to propose and obtain conference content is being used in order to draw upon both organizations’ past practices and to try something new (see http://vraweb.org/conferences/2011Minneapolis-proposal/proposal.php). You don’t have to have a full slate of panelists (unless you want to) and can simply send in an idea for an individual presentation to be matched up with similar content. There will be plenty of opportunities for members to participate as organizers, speakers, or moderators. Please note that a call for moderators will come in the fall. In addition, a call for special interest/user groups, committee, and chapter meetings will come later. It is a July 1st deadline, so if you have any questions or want feedback, please don’t hesitate to contact Heidi Raatz or Jessica McIntyre, Co-Chairs for the 2011 Conference Program. I know that the Education Committee is also hard at work on conference content and appreciates suggestions from the VRA membership too.

The conference theme is Collaboration: Building Bridges in the 21st Centuryand we have some major construction in progress. The Twin Cities Local Planning Committee, with representation from both ARLIS and VRA, is doing an extraordinary job of brainstorming and planning. It looks like opportunities to visit the best of Minneapolis’ cultural heritage institutions will be part of the program. There is power in numbers--ARLIS is twice the size of VRA and with additional resources come broadened opportunities. There will be the usual substantive programming, but also extended presentation formats, plenary speakers, exhibitors, tours, etc. This is only the second time that VRA and ARLIS have combined forces for a joint conference and we are finding that our mutual interests are creating a vibrant partnership. The timing couldn’t be better with the current, flat economy. A joint conference provides members of the two organizations with an opportunity to get much more bang for their travel buck. So, mark your calendar for March 24-28 and stay tuned as the planning unfolds.

Trying to connect two different professional organizations with their own cultures and conference traditions is not without its challenges. The Boards and local planners are finding such a partnership requires flexibility, creative thinking, and a special nimbleness on the part of both organizations. Like any collaboration, there is a give and take to reach consensus that may involve some changes and compromises, but we are trying to insure that the attendees from both organizations will reap the benefits in the end. For example, there was debate about whether to go with a raffle or a silent auction. It was determined that the latter format works better for a variety of reasons, one of the most important being, that raffles are seen as a form of gaming in Minnesota adding many complicated ramifications. But, our own Empress, Patricia McRae Baley, has stepped up to do the honors as master of ceremonies, working in partnership with Janice Lurie from ARLIS. They plan to morph this format into something new, and of course, your usual creative donations will be most welcome.

A joint conference is a different animal requiring us all to adjust our mindsets. It is much more complex than the simple addition of two separate events compacted into a handful of days. This new beast is more like an algebraic equation to study a special relationship. There is a synergy to strive for—the two organizations’ combined conference should be greater than the sum of the separate parts. It provides us with a wonderful opportunity for meaningful collaboration with a like-minded group. This requires a mutual exchange of knowledge, experience, and ideas to maximize the benefits of such an interaction. So let’s make the most of it! Please feel free to contact me, or any of the VRA Executive Board members, if you have any suggestions or questions, and expect to hear more about how you can participate as the planning progresses.

• Caitlin Pereira, Visualresourcefullness
  http://www.slideshare.net/VisResAssoc/caitlin

• Elaine Paul, Good for Them, Good for Us: Blogs for Outreach in Visual Resources
  http://www.slideshare.net/ESPaul/good-for-them-good-for-us-blogs-for-outreach-in-visual-resources

• Elizabeth Schaub, Navigating the Blogosphere: Using Blogs to Market Resources and Services
  http://www.slideshare.net/VisResAssoc/schaub-blogging-presentation-vra-2010-for-slide-share-3621953

• Amanda Rybin, Marketing from Within: Integrating All Things Visual with Other Resources
  http://www.slideshare.net/AmandaRybin/marketing-from-within-integrating-all-things-visual-with-other-resources-3588967

• Lauree Sails, The Collaboratory as a Learning Space
  http://www.slideshare.net/VisResAssoc/learning-spaces-mac

• Kathe Albrecht, The VRC as a 21st Century Learning Place
  http://www.slideshare.net/VisResAssoc/vra-atlanta-2010-albrecht-learning-space

• Heidi Eyestone, Learning Spaces: A Unique Approach at Carleton College
  http://www.slideshare.net/VisResAssoc/vra-learning-spaces-eyestone

• Elisa Lanzi, Learning about Learning Spaces
  http://www.slideshare.net/VisResAssoc/learning-spaces-lanzi-share-3591030

• Jenni Rodda, Space Planning and Collections Retention in the Digital Age
  http://www.slideshare.net/VisResAssoc/v-r-a-atlanta-2010-j-rodda

• Steven Kowalik, Transition to Learning Spaces: Redefining Our Space for the Digital World
  http://www.slideshare.net/VisResAssoc/transition-to-learning-spaces-3542855

• Claire Dienes, After the Transition, Preserving Analog Legacy Material at the Met
  http://www.slideshare.net/VisResAssoc/after-the-transition-preserving-analog-legacy-materialat-the-met

• Sarah Goldstein, The Monolith Problem, or How Not to Phase Out Your Analog Slide Collection
  http://www.slideshare.net/VisResAssoc/s-g-transition-goldstein

• Robert Carter, Shepherding Information (confessions of a library programmer)
  http://www.slideshare.net/rcarter0/shepherding-information

• Susan Jane Williams, Making your data work harder than you do
  http://www.slideshare.net/SusanJWilliams/making-your-data-work-harder-than-you-do

• Jenn Riley, Shareable Metadata for Visual Resources
  http://www.slideshare.net/jenlrile/riley-vra2010    

• Fun Stuff: Engaging New Technology Updates since Toronto
  http://www.slideshare.net/SusanJWilliams/et2010-pt1undatesfun

• John Trendler and Heather Cleary, Cloud Computing
  http://www.slideshare.net/johntrendler/et-session1cloud-computing

• Susan Jane Williams and Heather Cleary, 3-D
  http://www.slideshare.net/SusanJWilliams/et2010-pt13d

• Betha Whitlow, How to Keep Up [Repeated in Part 2]
  http://www.slideshare.net/Betha28/whitlow-keeping-upsession1

The Delicious page link for Engaging New Technologies (all the links mentioned in both parts, supplementary material as well): http://delicious.com/ETvra2010/

• Eric Decker, Interacting with images-adding functionality to images databases
  http://www.slideshare.net/Bostik6/life-on-the-other-side-of-the-pond-vr-activity-in-europe-interacting-with-images-adding-functionality-to-image

• Catherine Worrall, VR Activity in Europe, the UK Perspective
  http://www.slideshare.net/Bostik6/life-on-the-other-side-of-the-pond-vr-activity-in-europe-a-uk-perspective-pt1

• Vicky Brown, VR Activity in Europe, The UK Perspective, Part II
  http://www.slideshare.net/Bostik6/life-on-the-other-side-of-the-pond-vr-activity-in-europe-uk-perspective-part-2

• Lavinia Ciuff, The American Academy in Rome Photographic Archive
  http://www.slideshare.net/Bostik6/life-on-the-other-side-of-the-pond-vra-activity-in-europe-the-american-academy-in-rome-photographic-archive

• Carolyn Caizzi, Video
  http://www.slideshare.net/ccaizzi/vraengaging-technology-video
  

• Greg Reser and Meghan Musolff, Semantic Web
  http://www.slideshare.net/gregreser/semantic-web-3649298
  

• Fun Stuff: Wrapping up New Tech 2010 with some whimsy
  http://www.slideshare.net/SusanJWilliams/et2010-pt2funstuff
  

• Betha Whitlow, How to Keep Up [Presented in Part 1]
  http://www.slideshare.net/Betha28/whitlow-keeping-upsession1
  

• Betha Whitlow, From VR Professional to Teacher: Crafting Instruction Sessions
  http://www.slideshare.net/rbrubacher/whitlow-instruction-101

• Emy Nelson Decker, A Focused Look: Working with Freshman in a Digital Imaging Class
  http://www.slideshare.net/rbrubacher/whitlow-instruction-101

• Meredith Kahn, Instructional Techniques for Diverse Audiences
  http://www.slideshare.net/rbrubacher/mkahn-instruction101

• Sarah Cheverton,Talkin' 'Bout My Generation: Teaching Technology Across the Ages
  http://www.slideshare.net/rbrubacher/cheverton-talkin-bout-generation-vra-2010

Vendors who posted PPTs on SlideShare:

• Robb Detlefs, EmbARK (Gallery Systems)
  http://www.slideshare.net/VisResAssoc/let-your-data-flow-with-embark

• Pandora Mather Lees, Bridgeman Art Library International and Wendy Zieger, Bridgeman Education
  http://www.slideshare.net/wzieger/bridgeman-education

• Anna Miller, LUNA (Luna Imaging, Inc.)
  http://www.slideshare.net/ncharm/luna-imaging-vra2010

• Susan Jane Williams, Archivision, Inc.
  http://www.slideshare.net/SusanJWilliams/archivision-vendor-slam-2010

• Lydia Keene-Kendrick, Davis Art Images
  http://www.slideshare.net/davisartimages/davis-art-images-vra-vendor-slam-2010

• Jeff Kahn, SoftChalk LLC
  http://www.slideshare.net/softchalk/softchalk-vra

Maureen Burns, Board; Great Lakes Chapter - Marlene Gordon, University of Michigan- Dearborn; Greater New York - Jenni Rodda, Institute of Fine Arts; Mid-Atlantic, Virginia Hall, John Hopkins; New England, Carey Weber, Fairfield University; Northern California, Karen Kessel, Sonoma State University; Pacific Rim, Karen Whalen, Reed College; Southeast, Barbara Brenney, North Carolina State University; Southern California, John Trendler, Scripps College; Texas, Katerine Moloney, Amon Carter Museum; Upstate New York, Jeanne Keefe, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Chapter Chairs, or their representatives, of ten of the thirteen chapters met in Atlanta to talk about their needs and plans.  They expressed great satisfaction with the new Bursary accounts and MemberClicks impact on chapter memberships.  We discussed ways to continue to grow the chapters and recruit those interested in becoming Chapter officers.  It would seem the successful chapter mix social with educational. The New England Chapter has tried a webcast of a meeting, with minimal success although one member did sign on.  As we all get more familiar and the technology improves, this may provide an educational experience, but it is doubtful that it will provide the social experience.  Jeanne described a business meeting in a very social atmosphere, which probably helps the Upstaters bond very well.

I asked for guidance in the membership committee's task to update the online Leadership Guide. Their first request was to rename it something more obvious, such as Chapter Chair guide and four current chairs volunteered to preview it.  Also, they would like to be able to download a copy to keep on hand and to have access to VRA marketing material, such as brochures and logos in this area of the site.  An addition to the current information would be an explanation of how a chapter might seek funding, such as from the VRA Foundation.

When asked for input about institutional membership, they reminded the membership committee to include local chapter membership also.

They also asked that the role of Liaison continue as it benefited them to have a central contact and discussion leader. 

ATLANTA, Georgia (VRA) March 31, 2010 -- The Visual Resources Association (VRA), the international organization for image media professionals, proudly presented the 2010 Nancy DeLaurier Award to Murtha Baca and Patricia Harpring for their work on the Getty Vocabularies on March 18th at the 28th Annual VRA Conference. The Nancy DeLaurier Award, named for one of the pioneers of the Visual Resources profession, honors distinguished achievement in the field of image management. "Achievement" is measured by immediate impact and may take
the form of published work, oral presentation, project management, software development, technology application, Web site creation, or other outstanding effort. Baca and Harpring's efforts encompass all of the above categories. Current VRA President, Maureen Burns, stated
"Letters of support for this nomination poured in from around the world showing the global reach of Murtha and Patricia's Herculean efforts and further demonstrating how the Getty Vocabularies are truly an unparalleled body of work."

The impact of the Getty Vocabularies is enormous in the field of visual resources and beyond -- visionary in inception and instrumental to the quest of standardizing image cataloging across the cultural heritage community. Information professionals in visual resources collections, libraries, museums, and archives regularly use the Art and Architecture Thesaurus, the Union List of Artist Names, and the Thesaurus of Geographic Names, developed, sustained, and nurtured, primarily by these two individuals, under the auspices of the Getty Research Institute. The
Getty Vocabularies not only provide uniform terminology to describe works of art, architecture, material culture, and other associated materials for metadata creation, but their use enhances access to online resources and the knowledge bases researchers rely upon.

In addition to project development and management, Baca and Harpring have worked tirelessly to promote free global online access to these vocabulary tools, to translate them into many languages, and to assist colleagues in better understanding how to use them most effectively.
Attesting to their ongoing vision of the future in terms of shared standards and best practices is their promotion of a new Cultural Object Name Authority (CONA) intended to provide authoritative work records about cultural objects overcoming linguistic, chronological, and other
variations in naming. At the awards ceremony, Baca and Harpring announced their latest publication, Introduction to Controlled Vocabularies: Terminology for Art, Architecture, and Other Cultural Works.

Additional Info and Images:
http://www.vraweb.org/about/awards/award-2010ndla.html

Omeka:  Web publishing (made even easier!) for Image Collections
By Liz Gushee (University of Virginia)

Omeka – What is it?:
Omeka is a free and open-source web-based publishing tool for online exhibits created by the Center for History and New Media at the George Mason University.  Omeka’s suite of tools allows for the delivery of collections, exhibits, research materials and teaching resources by curators, librarians, archivists, and scholars without requiring the intervention of a programmer.  The setup of Omeka is as simple as creating an image set on Flickr or launching a blog; this ensures that the curator’s efforts can be focused on the activities of creating, describing, narrating and interpreting collections of culture heritage materials rather than programming and technology infrastructure. 

That sounds great!  Tell me more:
Omeka provides a set of templates to choose from so that the curator has a choice regarding the presentation style of featured collections and/or exhibits.  The templates are easily modified to suit, or if your heart is set on a particular look and feel, custom themes can be built using Omeka’s flexible API and documentation.  The people at Omeka care about standards too, as they follow best practices for web design and are section 508 compliant. 

Omeka is an ideal vehicle for online exhibits and can showcase a large number of image files and metadata; it can also accept and store video, audio, PDFs and Power Point presentations as well.  The folks at Omeka have thoughtfully provided every file and item with Unqualified Dublin Core elements; Dublin Core data, combined with the Omeka-generated feeds and OAI-PMH harvestable data, give Omeka sites the ability to share data among systems and, perhaps most importantly for image curators, allow for the possibility of sharing of content among other Omeka sites.  Last, but certainly not least, Omeka provides ways for the public to actively engage with online content as exemplified by contribution-based sites such as the “Hurricane Digital Memory Bank” (http://hurricanearchive.org/) and the “April 16th Archive” (http://april16archive.org).

I’m tempted but not ready to take the plunge with Omeka:
That’s okay because the Omeka folks have provided a sandbox in which prospective users can try out their suite of tools.  Although, the sandbox doesn’t allow users to upload their own files to test, the sandbox is pre-populated with a variety of files types.  In this environment, users can try out the templates, create and edit metadata, build a mock exhibit and get more familiar with the administrative interface and the inner workings of Omeka.

Now I’m hooked!  But my institution has skimpy IT support.  Who can I turn to?
If you don’t have access to a server that meets the requirements for running Omeka, the Omeka folks have provided a list of inexpensive web hosts; at least one of the web hosts suggested gives users the option to either purchase hosting with Omeka already installed or, if preferred, the option to run a virtual machine locally on one’s Windows, Mac or Linux personal computer.  At the time of this writing, the Omeka had launched Omeka.net Alpha, a hosted service, with the intention of having a public beta launch in fall 2010.  Stay tuned!

If I get stuck, or don’t understand something about the Omeka tools, what can I do?
The Omeka developers have provided their users with a number of ways to learn more about how to make the most of Omeka.  On the website there’s a movie to watch, tutorials to follow, and dates provided of public presentations, webinars, and workshops.  In addition, there are multiple user forums regarding specific aspects of Omeka as well as discussion lists for developers.  The Omeka folks understand the need for documentation for users who are just getting started right on up to the developers who are contributing code for the Omeka community.

I’m on board with Omeka, but who else is using it?
Many institutions, large and small, are using Omeka sites to showcase their collections and to build online exhibits.  To demonstrate the variety of uses and the differences in the look and feel of sites built with Omeka, the Omeka folks have populated their site with many examples from museums, libraries, science centers and history centers.  The following institutions are just a small subset of who is using Omeka:  Chicago History Museum, Newberry Library, University of Minnesota Libraries, Columbia University Library, Smithsonian National Museum of American History, and the New York Public Library.

The University of Virginia Library will launch their initial Omeka-powered site in the fall of 2010 with the online exhibit “From Village to Grounds:  Architecture after Jefferson at the University of Virginia.”  This site will serve both as a companion piece to the physical exhibit as well as a documentary record of the curator’s efforts once the physical site has been disassembled.  The UVa  Library also plans to create customized Omeka page templates, which will be consistent with the layout and design of the overall Library website, to bring old exhibition pages up to the Library’s current online look and so that new exhibit pages can be created and maintained a more manageable technical environment.

So, give Omeka a try.  It’s easy to install, easy to use, and easy to love.

Digital Preservation for Digital Collaboratives Workshop
August 3-4, 2010
San Jose, CA
http://www.bcr.org/dps/training/neh-sanjoseworkshop.html

Third Workshop on 'Very Large Digital Libraries'
September 10, 2010
Glasgow, United Kingdom
http://www.delos.info/vldl2010/

Networked Humanities: Art History in the Web
October 9-14, 2010
Acquafredda di Maratea, Italy
http://www.esf.org/index.php?id=6726

International Conference on Dublin Core and Metadata Applications,
to be held in October 20-22, 2010
Pittsburgh, PA
http://www.asis.org/Conferences/DC2010/

EuroMed2010 – Cultural Heritage
November 8-13, 2010
Limassol, Cyprus
http://www.euromed2010.eu