PRESERVATION OF RECORDS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24838, 11 February 1942, Page 6

PRESERVATION OF RECORDS

PHOTOGRAPHIC TECHNIQUE

Destruction of valuable records by fire, normally a negligible business risk, became a serious menace in Britain during the ordeal by fire from the air. The result has been the stimulation of new methods of the duplication of records, drawings, accounts, and all manner of business data liable to destruction by enemy action.

Three photographic processes are employed, in all of which British photographic technique has taken the lead. By the first of these methods a document or drawing is photographed direct on to a sensitised paper; the second is a new application of the reflex method, the copies being the same size as the originals; while the third, and most important, utilises the cine size film on which the documents are micro-copied. The first two methods are rapid and simple, so simple, in fact, that any junior staff member can do the work after a couple of hours' instruction on apparatus which can be installed in any office. The microcopying method requires special apparatus and is usually undertaken by specialist firms. Apart from the enormous advantage of speed and accuracy, these systems are also economical. The wage bill for a typist copying a 1500-page document would run to about £2O, whereas two juniors recently did the same work by the reflex method in 14 days. A 72-page foolscap report can be copied in two hours and a-quarter, a 200page ledger double foolscap in four days.