The Image Cluster: how many words does a picture tell?
| Published date | 01 March 2005 |
| Pages | 19-21 |
| Date | 01 March 2005 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/03055720510588416 |
| Author | Paul Child,Lorna Hards |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management |
The Image Cluster: how many
words does a picture tell?
Paul Child
Institute of Education, London, UK, and
Lorna Hards
The ArtWorld Project, Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts,
University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK
Abstract
Purpose – To examine how the Image Cluster projects, funded by the Joint Information Systems
Committee (JISC), have made very varied collections of images available to higher education and the
wider public.
Design/methodology/approach – Looks at the lessons learned and shared within the group of nine
projects: Artworld, Bristol BioMed Learning and Teaching, Crafts study Centre, Designing Britain,
Digital Image Resource for the Practical Study of Woven and Printed Textiles, FILTER, Fineart.ac.uk,
LTSN Bioscience ImageBank, PICTIVA.
Findings – Reveals that many of the lessons learned in the Cluster arose out of difficulties experienced
in common throughoutthe group, as they worked on ambitious projects to strict standards. Possibly the
most serious lessonlearned from these projects is that good time and cost estimationfrom the very start
can avoid problems later. Another lesson was in managing the work of external contractors.
Originality/value – Presents an analysis of lessons from Image Cluster projects that can be built on
by strategists.
Keywords Information management, Informationsystems, Teaching, Learning
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
It has long been felt that images are effective in providing concepts, information and
understanding to the viewer. After all, “a picture tells a thousand words”. The nine
projects in the Image Cluster[1] all came about through recognition of this, and the
feeling that images were greatly underused in education. Equally, many collections
were relatively inaccessible apart from in their local setting, this being particularly true
of the museum collections involved in the programme, such as the Sainsbury Collection
at University of East Anglia (www.uea.ac.uk/scva/), digitised by ArtWorld.
The Image Cluster projects, a subset of projects financed under the 5/99 funding
programme (www.jisc.ac.uk/landt), had five main aims. These were to:
(1) Digitise a collection of images.
(2) Develop teaching and learning materials based on these images.
(3) Implement good practice in digitisation.
(4) Broaden access to these collections of images to educators.
(5) Broaden access to the general public.
The Emerald Research Register for this journal is available at The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/researchregister www.emeraldinsight.com/0305-5728.htm
The Image
Cluster
19
VINE: The journal of information and
knowledge management systems
Vol. 35 No. 1/2, 2005
pp. 19-21
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited
0305-5728
DOI 10.1108/03055720510588416
To continue reading
Request your trial