Human tales of work, rest and play emerge from a cache of approximately 6,000 glass slide negatives and slides dating from the 1890s to the 1940s.
This slice of life is part of the Hocken Library’s archival collection and is gradually being digitized by reprographic operator Richard Munro.
The collection included glass slides measuring about 8cm by 8cm and had a positive image on the glass, he said.
“It’s pretty much the forerunner of a slide projector.”
People would gather for “magic lantern” shows to see images projected onto a screen.
The collection also contained glass plates that had a negative image and varied in sizes up to about 20 cm by 30 cm.
They predated photographic film and were able to capture scenes in extraordinary detail.
“They’re very delicate, but they’re just so beautiful.”
Digitizing the collection was a time-consuming process.
After being removed from a climate- and temperature-controlled archive room, the plates took 24 hours to acclimate before being captured with a light box and high-quality digital camera.
Handling the slides was fraught with potential problems as the image was just a thin layer of chemicals bonded to the glass.
“You can really see the emulsion peeling off the glass, you can see the image just falling apart,” said Mr Munro.
After the digital capture, it was up to archivists Tom Riley and David Murray to add as much detail as possible to each image.
Murray said the images came from a variety of sources, including the Otago Harbor Board, the New Zealand Alpine Club, Hallensteins, the former DIC department store and Coulls Somerville Wilkie, which later merged into Whitcombe and Tombs to form the Whitcoulls bookstore.
Others included the Dunedin Photographic Society and the North East Valley Normal School.
The images sometimes carried little information, so the archivists did what they could to supplement the information, including posting some on social media to ask members of the public if they could shed any light.
“They say every picture tells a story, but every picture tells more than one story,” Murray said.
Researcher services manager Lynn Benson said it was a fantastic collection.
“We want to make sure that we have digitized all our negatives in the coming years.”
The library hoped to do a full relaunch of their online searchable system.
This would replace the Hocken Snapshop site that launched in 2010 and contained about 30,000 images, but it was a one-time project.
Instead, the revamped site would allow for items to be added regularly as they were being digitized.
“We hope to launch that next year,” said Ms. Benson.