Digital Studio Tools & Services

Digital Studio staff offer training, consultation, and assistance with the use of the tools and services described below.

File Management

Files 2.0

The new Files service (also called Files 2.0) fulfills most personal, work, research, teaching, and learning needs. It gives you web-based access to your files from different locations, and features secure file storage, large quotas, the ability to host public Web pages, and a user-friendly interface. Files is automatically available to all part- and full-time faculty, staff, and students. The program, which is accessible through the Files tab in NYUHome, also enables you to: selectively and securely share files with students or colleagues inside and outside the NYU community, create versions of your documents, track views of and changes to your documents, and more. Click for more detailed information about Files or send email to AskITS@nyu.edu.

Webspace

Webspace is a similar service to Files, but is intended for use by departments who need to store potentially sensitive data, and therefore does not provide functionality for public sharing. Use of the Webspace service is limited to those departments and faculty and staff members who request access (and to those who had access to Webspace before Files 2.0 was introduced in June 2008). Click for more detailed information about Webspace or send email to AskITS@nyu.edu.

Faculty Digital Archive

NYU's Faculty Digital Archive (http://archive.nyu.edu) is a repository into which full-time NYU faculty can deposit their work in digital form. The Faculty Digital Archive (FDA) is intended to be a highly visible repository of NYU faculty digital scholarship, though collections can also be set up to restrict access to only selected people. Collections are owned and managed by faculty, who will have responsibility for adding, making available, and removing content. FDA content is backed up regularly and objects are assigned persistent URLs, which makes linking to and citation of individual objects reliable and easy. For more information, see www.nyu.edu/its/faculty/fda.

Return to Top

Image Management

Luna Insight

Insight® is software for digital collections currently in use by the Institute of Fine Arts, the CAS Department of Art History, and the Tisch Department of Photography and Imaging. Images and data for each collection are maintained by the department that owns the collection. For more information, see www.nyu.edu/its/luna or send email to luna.help@nyu.edu.

ARTstor

ARTstor is a large digital image library that includes hundreds of thousands of high-quality images for teaching and research. The various collections include images of artworks (paintings, sculpture, etc.), photography (both "artistic" and documentary) as well as the built environment (architectural structures and monuments). ARTstor also offers a "personal collections" feature that provides 1000 MB of space for registered users to store their own images, which can then be used side-by-side with the other collections. For more information about ARTstor, see the NYU Libraries website, or send email to digital.studio@nyu.edu.

Return to Top

Learning Management

Blackboard One-on-One Training

In the training sessions hosted by Studio staff, faculty learn how to:

• Plan a Blackboard site that is an effective online complement to in-class material
• Explore the layout and key features of Blackboard from the student and faculty perspective
• Customize the look and feel of a Blackboard course site
• Review the content, communication, and assessment tools of Blackboard
• Save a Word document as a web page
• Upload a simple document or syllabus

To schedule a one-on-one training session click the "Email the Blackboard Support Team" link in the Blackboard channel of NYUHome or go directly to the help form at www.nyu.edu/blackboard/help. Be sure to select "Request Training" and to specify three dates and times that are convenient for you.

See also:

• ITS Blackboard FAQs for NYU Faculty
• NYU Blackboard Training Videos
• NYU Blackboard Information Page

Return to Top

Media Publication

Podcasting

The Digital Studio is available to assist faculty members interested in making podcasts for use in the classroom or for research. When you publish a podcast, others can "subscribe" to whatever original content you choose to deliver: audio, video, PDFs and more. When you update your podcast with new content on a regular basis, subscribers will automatically receive this content and can view or listen to it on their computers or mobile devices. For more information on creating podcasts, please see www.nyu.edu/podcast.

If you're new to podcasting, we suggest that you read "Five Things You Should Know About Podcasting" (by Vincent Doogan, in Connect: Information Technology at NYU, Spring/Summer 2006).

Streaming Services

If you plan to incorporate audio or video clips into your lesson plan, either in class or for assignments, you may want to consider streaming the clips. Streamed media is progressively delivered to people's computer as they watch or listen to it, rather than requiring them to download the entire file beforehand. Streamed audio and video can be added to your Blackboard course site or other website and accessed through a web browser. NYU supports the Real video and audio format. For more information, schedule a consultation with Digital Studio staff.

Video Conferencing Services

For collaborations with colleagues outside of the NYU community, the Digital Studio offers video conferencing services. Similar to a traditional conference call, a video conference allows you to transmit video as well as audio. To request a video conference, please send email to videoconferencing@nyu.edu.

Blogs

In the past few years, blogs have emerged as a major category of Internet web publishing. Blogs enable an individual to create an evolving web site and, optionally, for other members of a community or group to comment on postings. NYU's blog service is designed to create a sense of community among students and offer faculty an up-to-date, innovative way of engaging their students and colleagues in discussion. For more information about using NYU Blogs, visit http://blogs.nyu.edu or send email to blogs.help@nyu.edu.

Return to Top

Digital Authoring

Text Scanning

By using Adobe Acrobat Professional and the Digital Studio's document feeder, instructors can easily create electronic PDF documents from articles and handouts.

Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software can be used to scan printed material and save it as a digital document.

Image Scanning

Flat Art Images

Adobe Photoshop is used to scan images from books, photos, and flat art images. Our scanners are equipped with transparency adaptors for scanning transparencies from 35mm to 8x10".

Large Format

Our Epson 10,000 XL scanner has a scanning surface of 12.2" x 17.2" and an optical resolution of up to 2400dpi for scanning large images or transparencies.

Slide and Negative Scanner

Nikon Super Coolscan 5000 slide and negative scanners are available to digitize your slide collections. The slide feeder, which can accommodate up to 50 slides per session, has simplified what used to be a cumbersome task of scanning slides individually and offers up to 4000 dpi true optical resolution and digital ICE technology that automatically removes surface defects and dust marks. Once the scanning parameters are selected, an instructor can use Photoshop to edit images as they are processed (e.g., color balance, contrast, brightness, cropping).

Return to Top

Digital Video and Audio Capture, Creation, Conversion, and Editing

Video Workstations

Use Digital Studio equipment to capture selections of video from VHS, DVD, mini-dv and laser disc and encode to various formats. Edit your video using iMovie or, for more experienced editors, Final Cut Pro.

Audio Workstations

Capture audio from cassette, phonograph records or digital audio tape. Audio can be edited and encoded into MP3, AIFF, WAV, and more.
 

 

 

 

DVD Authoring

By using iDVD (or DVD Studio Pro for the advanced user), you can create your own DVDs with titles and chapter markers for easy navigation when shown in the classroom.

Standards and Best Practices for Digitization

Studio staff can offer expert advice in digitizing content to best suit your needs.

Metadata

Metadata is information about a digital object (e.g., image, text, audio, or video). This information is used to describe characteristics of the object (e.g., author, date created, file size, format, description, and keywords), and can be used to track, retrieve, and share the objects.

Primary Text Collections Available Online and at the Digital Studio

More and more of Bobst Library's primary source materials are available in digital format, both online and on CD. You can find digitized primary text materials in your subject via the Library's Arch website: http://library.nyu.edu/arch. Select your subject and in the Arch Format drop-down menu select "Primary Text Collections."

Return to Top

Page last reviewed: August 26, 2009