DRA Digital Radio Archive

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• DRA Digital Radio Archive
• NRK Radio Archives experiences on the road
  towards the digital world
• Bjarne Grevsgard
• Head of Broadcasting Archives
• Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation, NRK

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Workday picturesThe Radio ArchiveScene
1Journalist wants the works on the
Norwegians relationship with the Swedes
(Norway celebrates 100 years of independence
next year.)
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(No Transcript)
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Lots of good stuff here
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(No Transcript)
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Listen, select, listen, select
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(No Transcript)
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- and here comes some more
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(No Transcript)
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Five hours later
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(No Transcript)
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Workday picturesThe Radio ArchiveScene
2Journalist wants the works on the
Norwegians relationship with the Swedes
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(No Transcript)
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Now we can search and listen and select, and
enjoy a cup of coffee at the same time.
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(No Transcript)
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Why digitise?

• Easier access when and where it suits us
• Time-saving no tapes to wind and rewind
• The archive material gets used more
• Improves programme quality

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• Programme production is digital so archive
  material must be digital to be usable
• Radio archive material is in demand through NRKs
  Internet services
• Recording tapes decompose in time and the sound
  will be lost unless it is transferred to new
  storage media.

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How did we achieve this? No other radio
stations had developed anything we could depend
on. Was there anybody we could co-operate with?
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The Radio Archive is a unique source of
information for research and documentation.We
talked to
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and we agreed

• The National Library of Norway and NRK have a
  common interest in getting the material
  digitised.
• We share the costs 50/50
• Afterwards the tapes are stored in the National
  Librarys mountain vaults, under optimal
  conditions. This gives the maximum lifetime.

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First a short pilot project among other things,
to establish a technical standard Three copies
or versions are created 1. Searching and
listening quality (MP3 40 kbit/s)2. Production
quality (MP2 384 kbit/s)3. Exact copy of the
contents of the tape
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Then we set to work
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250-300 original tapes are sent for digitising
every week
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Did I forget to mention that its about 1000 km
from NRK in Osloto the National Library in Mo i
Rana?
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Local archive 1000 km away The material remains
on hard disk and magnetic tape in Mo i Rana and
is sent through data lines to NRK in Oslo,
Trondheim and other places.
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Digital Radio Archive had to work from day one

• Continuous contact with the real world is vital
  to the project
• Many problems have been revealed and solved along
  the way because the system was not constructed
  beforehand.

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Its the content that matters

• Cataloguing the material well enough for
  digitisation is a big job a missing tape is
  easier to track than a missing computer file
• Nearly 40,000 hours of tapes have now been
  digitised.

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but the colleagues in the Radio Archive must
handle all formats for a long time to come
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The user may choose to start here.
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-or with a simple free text search.Here we
search for Sveriges Radio (Swedish Radio)
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(No Transcript)
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Red arrow Title (Midsummer Night at the Border,
1934)Green arrow Click on MER (more) see next
picture
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(No Transcript)
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Click on LYD (sound) and get the Player. Mark
what you want to download in production quality.
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We then order the file. The Order Form looks like
this. In a couple of minuteswe get a mail
telling that the file is delivered to, in this
case, the editing area Dalet Oslo.
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When the sound has been retrieved, it is
transferred to one of the editing and production
systems which the archivists must also be
proficient in.
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Dalet
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DigAs
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The Digital Radio Archive opens the way for
new possibilities in radio journalismFor the
archivists it leads to new professional roles
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Voices from the Archives
A Web Service with 400 clips from Interviews with
Artists and Politicians
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http//www.nrk.no/stemmerComing upSports
voicesRadio and TV voices Editorial,
development andoperational responsibilityTHE
RADIO ARCHIVE
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Reports and interviews from Nordland
Countyavailable for searching and listening in
the local public libraries
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Complete teaching programme for high school
Media and Communications Studies
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Many programme projects based on the Digital
Radio Archive (DRA) Example Norge i
100 one programme for each year that
has gone by since Norways independence
from Sweden in 1905 After the
arrival of DRA there has been more, not
less, to do for the consultants in the
Radio Archive
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The Radio Archive makes non-commercial
records possible, mostly folk music, but
also religious, classical and jazz.
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Although we have not yet launched DRA for the
whole of NRK, the statistics for 2003 indicate
nearly 100,000 searches. Perhaps more important
more than 6,100 items and programmes were ordered
and downloaded for use.
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Our experience It is vital that digital
solutions be developed in co-operation with daily
operational personnel. The next project for
facilitating and improving the efficiency of
creative work Create a common digital sound
effect database for the whole of NRK.
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Radio Programmes come from two sources, either
our own Programme Bank (Archives)or new material
(NYE OPPTAK). It is vital to take the Programmes
full circle to the Programme Bank, in best
possible quality, and catalogued for easy
retrieval, and use in Radio Production and/or on
new media platforms
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But it all depends on structured
informationfrom the producer
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INVEST YOURPROGRAMME!The Programme Bank .
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Rescue operations
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So, to create a digital radio archive we need
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a lot of problem solving
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hard physical work
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many miles of winter driving on the road to the
northern lights
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a large mountain with holes in it
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a lot of willing co-operation
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and the courage to do things differently!
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• Thank you for your attention
• Bjarne Grevsgard
• Head of Broadcasting Archives
• Norwgian Broadcasting Corporation, NRK