Insight, created by Luna Imaging, is software that enables the Library to build and manage a permanent collection of digital images for use in teaching and scholarship. It provides the user with an environment for viewing and manipulating high-resolution digital images and accessing extensive catalog data about them. It will transform the way faculty and students at Brown use images in the classroom and in individual study. In addition to facilitating the local collection building, the software makes it possible to access other Insight collections on remote servers. Thus the community of user institutions‹which includes Yale, Duke, Cornell, Stanford, and Berkeley, among others‹can build a networked system of digital image repositories.

While Insight collections can be viewed in a browser, the most exciting and powerful tools are available only in a Java client that users may freely install on their PC or Mac workstation. A researcher must use the client to access more than one collection simultaneously. To connect to Insight or download the Java client, point to: http://dl.lib.brown.edu/luna/index.html. Use of the client requires a password (provided on the above site). Use the University¹s proxy server first, if you are accessing this site from off-campus.

Our one, supported, local collection is called simply the Brown University Digital Image Collection. At present, the majority of the contents of this collection are images purchased individually under license from vendors to support teaching of courses in the History of Art. Other images included are reproductions of prints (Napoleon caricatures) from the Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection. They constitute a public collection that can be shared outside of Brown. Insight allows flexibility in setting access, so that it is possible to allow full access to the latter, with no rights issues, while restricting access to the vendor- supplied images to Brown affiliates only.

. Three other collections of images are presently accessible through the Java client. Two are free: the Rumsey Map Collection and Japanese Historical Maps. The other, AMICO (Art Museum Image Consortium), consists of 100,000 images‹and growing-- contributed by 36 museums. The majority is 20th century photographs. For more information see: http://www.amico.org/AMICOlibrary/contents.html and http://www.lunaimaging.com/community/collectionsharing

Besides meeting the Library¹s need for a system to collect images from various sources, Luna Insight presents the user with sophisticated tools for manipulating images, saving them in groups for later use or for sharing with others (such as a class), and composing a presentation. Among the functions are zooming in to see detail, panning an image at high resolution, displaying two or more objects to scale, linking two images, linking to an external web site, and annotating details within an image. If the user wishes to use images outside of the Insight environment, downloading of files is permitted (depending on the privileges associated with the login).

Josiah records for Luna Insight and AMICO provide the links needed to connect via browser or to download the Insight Java client. Before the connection is made to AMICO, a brief description of the uses allowed is displayed: http://www.brown.edu/Facilities/University_Library/eresources/edatabases/amico-license.html. If downloaded images are displayed on a website, it must be restricted to Brown users.

The Library plans to support courses on a project basis initially, and particularly welcomes requests for support that will exploit our own public domain collections or image resources to which a faculty member owns the rights. The current Luna Insight implementation is based on a cultural artifact data model and can be used for any variety of "man-made" objects, not natural and scientific ones at this time.

An Insight "feature tour" is available at: http://www.lunaimaging.com/insight/featuretour.html. Contact Norine Duncan to schedule an introductory demonstration for groups or an individual. For answers to questions about Insight¹s relevance to your teaching or research, contact her (x3-3082) or Patrick Yott (x3-2817)

‹NorineDuncan

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