This entry continues from a previous entry that introduced the Zoomifyer application with a focused look at a few specific applications that Zoomifyer is currently used for and future digital library possibilities. The standard edition of Zoomifyer is being implemented by leading edge libraries, cultural and scientific institutions while the technologically more complex and robust enterprise edition with accompanying interesting possibilities has yet to see widespread application.
In microscopy, the Zoomifyer is used to study details of very small objects (i.e. cells, parts of cells). With regards to art historical application, The National Gallery of Art uses the Zoomifyer with an application that combines art historical investigation with an elegant Flash interface. A thumbnail is used to link images and from here images may be examined more closely. The applications seems to be becoming derigeur in high end art history/museum exhibitions. Thumbnails can be viewed in a small space and then zoomed to their details. Many applications further customize the 'navigational' interface. Others look at large text manuscripts such as those presented on the Nathaniel Hawthorne Archive for manuscript originals. On medieval manuscripts and rare books, the Zoomifier is excellent for scholarly research. Similarly, on panoramic photographs and large images zoomifier is put to very good use - refresh rates a bit slow. In National Geographic's Lewis and Clark Exhibition, the Zoomifyer is used extensively to enlarge artifacts. In presenting scale detailed photographs such as the tribute to the World Trade Center Disaster, the Zoomifyer is a very useful tool.
To generalize, the Zoomifier is becoming a standard in leading edge cultural, scientific and educational institions: the Getty, Harvard, National Geographic, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Smithsonion, British Library, National Library of Medicine, National Gallery of Art, etc. What is evident is that it is now the time for the Zoomifyer to be creatively exploited to bring out its creative possibilities not intended by orthodox prescription. As famed Xerox Parc research scientist Alan Kay has put this in a different but apropos context, the trick is not to give the application to a room full of thirty-something Ph.D.'s in a high end research lab but rather open the door for a classroom of fifteen year old hackers, let them play and be open to new possibility through creative misuse and unexpected remixes.
Posted by at September 15, 2004 10:23 AM | TrackBack