Identifying Acetate within your collection

Different methods to use

• Date on box (is original film box accompanies the reels still)
• Dates on originals, e.g. Start Targets, letterheads, plans etc
• Edge markings, not always clear as polyester can use the same markings

 NB: Be wary of duplicate 2nd or 3rd generation film as it could well be polyester, dates and edge marking may be mistaken for Acetate film

Degradation of Cellulose Acetate

The Australian Network of Information on Cellulose Acetate (ANICA) has an excellent article on the Deterioration Pathway of Cellulose Acetate. We thoroughly recommend you read this article to gain further understanding of what can happen to acetate film.

Evaluating your collection

Using the ANICA levels, categorise your collection into groups of importance e.g.

Material availability - is the content unavailable elsewhere?

Client demand - is this in constant use for access purposes?

Method of reformatting – Polyester Microfilm vs. Digitisation

We recommend that the microfilm remains as the long-term storage option for your collections, Digital is the way forward for access but in our opinion has still not reached the cost effectiveness of microfilm storage. Microfilm is a physical, tangible, eye readable medium, its proven to be easily transferred digitally over the decades regardless of the technology advancement. Being able to return to the polyester duplicate as technology improves means you are not stuck with the best result of the time when you can probably improve on that as technology changes.

Our AUT case study (available on request) highlights the need to ensure your collections have not passed the point of no return; these were filmed in the era of the originals being discarded once they had been microfilmed. Now not only is information lost in paper form but also the microfilm has been lost due to Acetate degradation, end result is we all lose, those records are gone forever.