AES British Section lectures - May 2006

Non-Contact Surface Scanning Systems for the retrieval and protection of Archived Sound Recordings

John McBride, University of Southampton

The aim of the research is to develop methods for the rapid non-contact scanning of archived sound recordings such that the sound contained can be stored in a digital format. The project is focused on the development of sensing methods and the implementation of the sensing methods into two measurement systems, one for cylindrical scanning and one for planar (disc) scanning.

The technical issues will focus optical scanning methods, and on the issues of collecting large data sets, both in terms of data collection time, and data processing. The methods used to process the data for sound and the issues of damaged surfaces will be addressed.

The aim of the sound archive project is to recover important and damaged recordings of interest to the general public, historians, linguists and musicologists. The proposal is timely and critical, since at present many sound carriers are archivally unstable and at risk of deterioration.

Initial studies are presented on a cylindrical scanning system, and the associated data processing method.

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