Viewing entries tagged "moving images"

Films from Forest History Society are now on DigitalNC

Fourteen films about various aspects of the forestry industry and forest conservation are now online from the Forest History Society.  The films date from the 1920s up to one about the Yellowstone National Park fires in 1988. Thanks to our colleagues in the Southern Folklife Collection, these audiovisual materials were digitized utilizing funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.


 

To view more materials from the Forest History Society, visit their partner page.  To learn more about our partnership with the Southern Folklife Collection, read this post.  And to view and hear more audiovisual materials on DigitalNC, visit our North Carolina Sights and Sounds collection.


87 films from Mars Hill University’s collection now on DigitalNC

87 films have been digitized out of Mars Hill University‘s Southern Appalachian Archives and are now widely accessible on DigitalNC.  The films primarily are of the Byard Ray Folk Festival and Bascom Lamar Lunsford Festival, which is still held annually today in Mars Hill.  Thanks to our colleagues in the Southern Folklife Collection, these audiovisual materials were digitized utilizing funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

To view more materials from the Mars Hill University, visit their partner page.  To learn more about our partnership with the Southern Folklife Collection, read this post.  And to view and hear more audiovisual materials on DigitalNC, visit our North Carolina Sights and Sounds collection.


DigitalNC Works from Home: Closed Captions

While at home, the NCDHC staff has been working on increasing accessibility to users through the addition of closed captions. Closed captions provide audiences with the text version of what is being spoken as well as relevant sound information–such as music, applause, and laughter–written out and synchronized with the audio of the video. Unlike open captions that are always present on a video, closed captions can be turned on and off by the viewer. The use of captions is not limited to those who have difficulty hearing, but encompass a large percent of the population who use them for diverse reasons which include helping people to focus, retain information, being in a sound-sensitive environment (e.g. a library), and more.

Creating captions from scratch for videos, even short ones, can take several hours. In an effort to generate captions for a larger amount of moving images in our collection more quickly we use Happy Scribe, an automatic subtitling tool. These autogenerated subtitles do not include sound description and are never 100% perfect for reasons such as heavy accents, no knowledge of North Carolina history, mumbling, and bad sentence formatting, which requires staff to double check words and spelling, text spacing, punctuation, accurate synchronization between text and audio, to add sound description, and to sometimes engage in research about North Carolina. To remain transparent to our users and those involved in the material, the content of the videos are not censored. We write exactly what we hear in the videos. Captioning is an ongoing process and we are doing our best to make sure that our closed captions are as accurate and easy to read for all viewers as possible.

Screenshot showing the different work areas of Happy Scribe, an automatic subtitling tool.

Different work areas of Happy Scribe

The image above shows what it is like to edit captions using Happy Scribe. The area to the left is used for changing the text and spacing. If we have too many characters per line a box near the timestamps will turn red to alert us that we need to change the spacing or create a new caption that will make it easier for the viewer to read.
 
The area along the bottom of the screen (grey strip with white boxes) is used to synchronize captions with the audio. The sound waves at the very bottom of the screen help us to accurately line up the text to audio. To move an entire box we can click and hold the middle of the white box and drag it where it needs to go. To change the length of time that the captions are on the screen we click on the beginning or end of the boxes to change their length. 

The right side of the screen shows us how the captions appear on the moving images. Below it there are several options to go forward or backwards in the video, edit subtitle limits (e.g. how many characters per line we will allow), and formatting of the captions such as color, size, font, alignment, and more. 

Shows captioning in Happy Scribe, an automatic subtitle tool, at work.

Captioning in action

 

Once the autogenerated subtitles have been fixed and sound description added, the closed captions are uploaded to the video. In addition, a copy of the transcription is uploaded to the video’s record for those who do not wish to watch the whole video or want to quickly search for specific information. 

To turn captions on or off for a video, mouse over the video area and click on the icon box with “CC” (outlined by a yellow box in the picture below). A menu will pop up where you can click on “Captions” (outlined by the blue box) to turn closed captions on.

To view moving images on our website with closed captions, please click here

To view all of the moving images on our website, please click here.


Women in Leadership Panel discussion from Mitchell Community College now online

DigitalNC has a hit a new milestone – a virtual panel held during the COVID era is now part of the NCDHC collection, thanks to our partner Mitchell Community College.  

screenshot of a google form

From the Google form used to sign up to attend the virtual panel

Recorded using the software Blackboard Collaborate, the panel hosted by the community college library featured four Iredell County women Dr. Porter Brannon, Dr. Camille Reese, Sara Haire Tice, and Dorothy Woodard, who answered questions about what inspires them, how they overcame obstacles along their career paths, and more.  You can watch the panel yourself here

To view more materials from Mitchell Community College, view their partner page here.  To view more audiovisual materials on DigitalNC, visit our collection North Carolina Sights and Sounds


“Chinese Girl Wants Vote” film now on DigitalNC thanks to Levine Museum of the New South

Black and white photograph of a woman

Still from the film “Chinese Girl Wants Vote”

A film created as part of the exhibit “Counting UP: What’s on Your Ballot” at the Levine Museum of the New South to highlight the importance of voting is now on DigitalNC.  “Chinese Girl Wants Vote” was created by Jinna Kim to tell the story of suffragist Dr. Mabel Ping-Hua Lee and touches both on the themes of voter rights and immigrant rights in light of the political environment of 2020 and in honor of the 100th anniversary of the passage of the 19th amendment.  

To view more materials from the Levine Museum of the New South, visit their partner page here and their website here.  To see more audio-visual content on DigitalNC, visit North Carolina Sights and Sounds.  


Oral histories and other audio-visual materials now online from Methodist University

42 audio recordings, including 35 oral histories, and 1 silent video showing Methodist University (then College) in the late 1970s or early 1980s are now online.  Thanks to our colleagues in the Southern Folklife Collection, these audiovisual materials were digitized utilizing funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

three adults sitting at a table

Video still from a silent video taken on Methodist University’s campus in the late 1970s or early 1980s

The oral histories including the batch are with various faculty and other staff who worked in the early days of Methodist University’s history.  There are also 9 other audio recordings that include building dedications as well as fun items such as promotions that ran on the radio for theater productions at the school and a feature called Methodist College Report.  

To learn more about our partner Methodist University, visit their site here.  To learn more about our partnership with the Southern Folklife Collection, read this post.  And to view and hear more audiovisual materials on DigitalNC, visit our North Carolina Sights and Sounds collection.


Over 200 films from Appalachian State University now on DigitalNC

Three adults playing instruments on a stage

Appalachian Mountain Girls and the Kruger Brothers at Mountain Music Jamboree

Thanks to our partner Appalachian State University and our friends at the Southern Folklife Collection, 243 films documenting music and religious traditions in the Appalachian mountains and surrounding region are now on DigitalNC.  The digitization of the materials for preservation and online access was funded through a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

The films come from two collections at Appalachian: William R. and John W. Turner Concert and Dance Videos and the C. Howard Dorgan Papers. The Turner collection consists of films and audio recordings taken at bluegrass and old time music festivals, fish park gigs, and concerts in primarily the North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia mountains.  The Dorgan collection contains films and audio taken at churches, mostly of Baptist affiliation, in Appalachia.  Sermons, singing, and revivals are all documented in the films.

Thanks to the hard work of the staff of the Southern Folklife Collection these films are now much more accessible for both our partner’s use and a wider internet audience.  

To learn more about our partner Appalachian State University, visit their Special Collections’ page here


DigitalNC on the web: NC Hunt and Fish and the Outer Banks Fisherman

We love being sent or just stumbling upon, projects on the web that utilize materials digitized through the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center.  We thought since they have done such a great job highlighting us, it’d only be fair to turn around and highlight a few we’ve found recently.

Man standing in the ocean holding a fishing pole

We are still right in the middle of summer time here in North Carolina so it seems like a good time for another post on DigitalNC on the web featuring fishing.  This particular use of DigitalNC was figured out by the staff at the NCDHC due to web traffic analytics.  Last winter when we ran the numbers on our highest viewed items for 2018, we were surprised that a video of fishing was the second highest viewed item on our site in 2018. Specifically this film of Roland Martin, a well known fisherman fishing on the Outer Banks.  It is aptly titled, “Outer Banks Fisherman” and was digitized thanks to our partner the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.  

We decided to do some digging into why that might be and stumbled upon a really great forum – NC Hunt and Fish. Someone on there had found the video and posted it – which promoted lots of excitement on the forum and drove lots of avid fishermen to our site to view it for themselves apparently!  The video itself is a fun look at sport fishing on the NC coast in the 1980s and the forum has lots of great memories of those who themselves used to go down to the Outer Banks to fish.

If you have a particular project or know of one that has utilized materials from DigitalNC, we’d love to hear about it!  Contact us via email or in the comments below and we’ll check out.  To see past highlighted projects, visit past posts here


Discover Charlotte – A City in Motion

film title printed over charlotte sunrise

In partnership with the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library we’re pleased to share this 1968 film entitled Discover Charlotte – A City in Motion. Created by the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce and narrated by famous journalist and North Carolinian Charles Kurault, this promotional film boasts about Charlotte’s industrial and economic growth.

air traffic controller in tower with view of tarmac and planeIn color with an upbeat soundtrack, Discover Charlotte lauds the motion of Charlotteans, beginning with a look at the city’s role in trucking, rail, and air transport. Turning to the banking industry, the film shows people processing large amounts of checks and cash and using adding machines at lightning speed. Shots of the Charlotte Record newspaper offices include coverage of Record employees learning via Teletype that Gene Payne, the Record’s cartoonist, had won a Pulitzer. You’ll see pilots and passengers at the Charlotte Douglas airport, Arthur “Guitar Boogie” and the Crackerjacks playing at the WBT station, computers whirring in a new data processing center, workers constructing a Duke power complex, and researchers examining newly woven textiles.

Most of the film features scenes of middle and upper class white Charlotteans in work, social, or religious settings.  In Charlotte, there is “a church for every man” and there are brief views of a number of religious institutions including Covenant Presbyterian Church, Dilworth Methodist Church, Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Cathedral. Other events and activities shown in the film include

  • Festival in the Park at Freedom Park,pit stop with race car being gassed up and tires changed
  • the Mint Museum Drama Guild rehearsing a play,
  • a wedding reception for an unnamed white couple, 
  • a Carolina v. NC State basketball game,
  • a Charlotte Checkers hockey game, and 
  • a NASCAR stock car race.

There are also views of two university campuses, Johnson C. Smith and the relatively new UNC-Charlotte.

Filmed during the Civil Rights movement, there are only brief allusions to racial tensions. There is a snippet of white police officers talking about “riding with Negro officers,” which cuts to a group of black men and officers talking about a local march. The end of the film describes Charlotte’s participation in the Model Cities initiative and its “total attack on poverty,” efforts that were meant to eradicate urban blight that, as in many cities in America, ended up displacing and/or destroying minority-owned homes and businesses. The film ends with drawings of a planned expressway, widened streets, parks, new hotels and high rises.

This is one of a number of items Charlotte Mecklenburg Library has shared on DigitalNC. You can see more on their contributor page or learn more about their North Carolina collections on their website.


New Materials from Rockingham County Public Library, Including Yearbooks, Films, and More

The James J. Dallas home in Rockingham County.

The newest batch of materials from our partner, Rockingham County Public Library, includes two yearbooks, three books, a vertical file, several newspaper issues, and two short films. The yearbooks, from 1967 and 1968, were created by Madison-Mayodan Junior High School. The books cover the stories of Rockingham county notables John D. Robertson and James J. Dallas, as well as the Greensboro Telephone Exchange. The vertical file contains materials related to Smyrna Presbyterian Church’s centennial celebration, and the newspapers include more issues from the Fieldcrest Mill Whistle.

Lastly, video footage in this batch includes two films converted from 8mm format. The first shows the 1969 Madison Christmas Parade filmed in downtown Madison, NC. The second is a film created by Macfield Inc. that details their continuing education program for employees.

Serious student government officials seen in the 1968 Madison-Mayodan Junior High School yearbook.

To browse through the items in this batch, click the links below.

To see more materials from Rockingham County Public Library, check out their DigitalNC partner page, or take a look at their website.


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This blog is maintained by the staff of the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center and features the latest news and highlights from the collections at DigitalNC, an online library of primary sources from organizations across North Carolina.

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