Correspondence: Donna Slawsky, Tel: 516 983 9073; E-mail: donnaslawsky@yahoo.com

¹is a librarian specializing in metadata and taxonomies for digital images. She consults on DAM projects for corporate and private clients, and is on the adjunct faculty at Baruch College. She was Manager of Indexing and Taxonomy for the digital archive at Scholastic Inc., served as Director of the HarperCollins Information Center for 11 years and received a Masters in Library Science from Pratt Institute.

Abstract

DAM systems typically contain primarily visually rich files such as photographic images, video, logos, line art and illustrations. Since there is no text associated with visual assets, the keywords associated with them often determine whether users will be successful when searching for assets in the DAM system. A controlled vocabulary in the form of a thesaurus of keywords can be incorporated into a DAM to enable accurate retrieval of images. Concepts of photo description including "ofness" and "aboutness" are introduced as well as the basic vocabulary and principles around thesaurus construction and maintenance are introduced. Applications for a DAM system in an organizational setting are presented.