• Welcome Ancestry Library Edition
  • Help
You are here: Learn > The Library > Daily News Desk > Ancestry Quick Tip

Ancestry Quick Tip
5/28/2002 - Archive


More Photo Labeling Tips
When faced with labeling a large group photo, where individuals may not be lined up in neat rows, here is one solution I've hit upon.
  • Put the photo in an archival sheet protector.
  • Using an archival pen (fade proof, water proof, acid free -I find mine at art supply stores), draw an oval or circle around each face.
  • Number each person, placing the number where it can be seen against clothing or background, but not on the face.
  • On a separate sheet of acid free paper, make a list of the numbers and, next to them, where available, the names of known people.
  • If you don't know everyone, but want to share the photo with others who may be able to help, make quality scanned or color laser copies of the photo and hand copy another sheet protector.

    When labeling any photo, I use hints I learned from a rare book librarian. In addition to using an archival pen, she told me never to write in the area behind the faces and to try to choose a dark area of the photo. Then, should the ink somehow manage to migrate through the paper, even though it shouldn't if it is archival, it will not bleed through to such a distracting or important part of the picture.

    Another possibility is to put the information on acid free paper and then to tape it to the photo using archival tape.



    Thanks to Susan Hopkins for today's Quick Tip! If you have a tip you would like to share with researchers, you can send it to: mailto:editor@ancestry-inc.com.

    Quick Tips may be reprinted, with credit to the submitter, in other Ancestry publications, so if you do NOT want your tip included in a publication other than the Ancestry Daily News and Weekly Digest, please state so clearly in your message.

  •   Printer Friendly
     
    E-mail to a friend

    Search The Library