EPISODE 3: Michelle Gollehon, Utah Historical Society

AI Meets the Archive: How Utah Historical Society Is Using Google Gemini to Unlock 118,000 Card Catalog Records

What happens when a digitization project is too big for any human team to tackle and AI becomes the only practical path forward?

In this episode of Wider Lens, we sit down with Michelle Gollehon, Digital Asset Specialist at the Utah Historical Society, for a fascinating conversation about one of the most ambitious and innovative AI-assisted digitization projects in the field right now.

With the Utah Historical Society preparing to move its collections into the new Museum of Utah, Michelle and her team faced a pressing challenge: an entire legacy card catalog — 118,000 physical index cards — that needed to be digitized and made searchable before the move. Captured on DT's Versa imaging system and transcribed using Google Gemini Pro, the project offers a real-world blueprint for how AI can unlock research resources that would otherwise remain inaccessible indefinitely. By Gemini's own estimate, the approach saved approximately 4.5 years of manual labor and $176,000 in staffing costs.

In this episode, we unpack:

• How a collection move to the Museum of Utah sparked an unexpected AI pilot project
• Why AI transcription is fundamentally different from traditional OCR
• The prompt engineering journey: from early hallucinations to asking Gemini to write its own prompt
• The practical limits of working in batches and other hidden bottlenecks in AI-assisted digitization workflows
• The tribal flags project: digitizing the flags of Utah's eight Indigenous tribes for museum display using a Mylar sandwich technique on a wide-format scanner
• And much more…

Whether you're managing a card catalog of your own or just beginning to explore AI's role in your digitization program, this episode offers concrete lessons from someone who figured it out by doing it.

🎧 Listen now for one of the most practical, on-the-ground accounts of AI-assisted digitization you'll find anywhere in the cultural heritage field.

And as always, we welcome feedback, comments, and questions. Let us know what you'd like to hear on this podcast, or if you'd like to be a guest. Email us at: widerlens@digitaltransitions.com

Additional Notes from this episode:

• Utah Historical Society: https://history.utah.gov/
• Museum of Utah (opening soon): https://www.museumsofutah.org/
• Google Gemini Pro: https://gemini.google.com/
• Gaussian Splatting (mentioned as an emerging 3D capture method): https://repo-sam.inria.fr/fungraph/3d-gaussian-splatting/
• ilovepdf.com (free PDF compression tool mentioned in the episode): https://www.ilovepdf.com/
• DT Versa Imaging System: https://heritage-digitaltransitions.com/product-catalog/
• DT's Online Digitization Certification Courses: https://heritage-digitaltransitions.com/dt-digitization-certification-program/
• DT's "Digitization Program Planning Guide" Bundle: https://heritage-digitaltransitions.com/product/cultural-heritage-digitization-planning-bundle-solutions-guide-digitization-program-planning-guide-pdf/

EPISODE 2: "INSIDE DT" EDITION, Ben Cort Talks Technical Problem Solving in Cultural Heritage Digitization

What does it actually take to solve the toughest digitization challenges — in the field, under pressure, and with no room for error?

In this special Inside DT edition of Wider Lens, we sit down with Ben Cort, Digital Transitions’ Cultural Heritage Technical Support Specialist, for a focused, behind-the-scenes look at the technical expertise that powers preservation-grade digitization.

In this episode, we unpack:

• The real-world challenges institutions face when digitizing complex and fragile collections
• What it takes to troubleshoot and optimize high-performance digitization systems
• How technical decisions impact image quality, workflow efficiency, and long-term preservation outcomes
• Lessons learned from working directly with institutions in the field
• The intersection of engineering, photography, and conservation in modern digitization
• Why experience and problem-solving matter as much as hardware and software
• We also explore the human side of technical support — from unexpected edge cases to the mindset required to solve problems quickly and effectively in high-stakes environments.

This shorter Inside DT format highlights the people behind the work — the specialists who help institutions implement, maintain, and evolve their digitization programs.

Whether you’re running a digitization lab, evaluating new systems, or simply want a deeper understanding of what goes on behind the scenes, this episode offers a practical look at the expertise required to do this work at the highest level.

🎧 Listen now to go inside DT — and see how technical problem solving drives successful digitization programs.

And as always, we welcome feedback, comments, and questions. Let us know what you'd like to hear on this podcast, or if you'd like to be a guest. Email us at: widerlens@digitaltransitions.com

Additional Notes from this episode:

• Constantin Brâncuși Art: https://www.wikiart.org/en/constantin-brancusi
• DT's Online Digitization Certification Courses: https://heritage-digitaltransitions.com/dt-digitization-certification-program/
• DT's "Digitization Program Planning Guide" Bundle: https://heritage-digitaltransitions.com/product/cultural-heritage-digitization-planning-bundle-solutions-guide-digitization-program-planning-guide-pdf/

Episode 1: Cliff Harrison, Purdue University Library

What does it really take to digitize the world’s cultural heritage — at scale, at speed, and at preservation grade?

For the inaugural episode of Wider Lens, we’re honored to welcome Cliff Harrison, Senior Manager of Digital Programs at the Purdue University Libraries and School of Information Studies, for a wide-ranging conversation about advancing cultural heritage digitization within an academic research library.

In this episode, we unpack:

• Why “instant capture” fundamentally changed the economics of digitization
• The hidden costs of legacy scanning workflows
• What FADGI 4-Star and ISO compliance actually mean in practice
• The concept of the Preservation Digital Object (PDO) — and why it matters
• How digitization protects collections from catastrophe, conflict, and time
• Why image quality today determines research value decades from now
• The balance between conservation handling and high-throughput production
• How modern RAW workflows future-proof cultural heritage collections

We also discuss real-world case studies — including institutions managing millions of items — and how advances in sensors, lighting, optics, and workflow automation are redefining what’s possible.

Whether you’re a digitization manager, curator, conservator, imaging specialist, or institutional leader, this episode provides a framework for thinking strategically about preservation-grade digitization in a world where demand for access has never been higher.

🎧 Listen now to explore how modern digitization is moving from “good enough” imaging to true digital surrogacy — and what that shift means for the future of cultural heritage.

And as always, we welcome feedback, comments and questions. Let us know what you'd like to hear on this podcast, or if you'd like to be a guest. Email us at: widerlens@digitaltransitions.com

Additional Notes from this episode:

• Cliff Harrison's Contact Information: https://lib.purdue.edu/people/cliff/
• The Neil Armstrong joke from his speech Cliff mentions: https://earchives.lib.purdue.edu/digital/collection/msa5/id/3128/rec/2
• DT's Online Digitization Certification Courses: https://heritage-digitaltransitions.com/dt-digitization-certification-program/
• DT Instant Capture Digitization Systems: https://heritage-digitaltransitions.com/product-catalog/
• DT's "Digitization Program Planning Guide" Bundle: https://heritage-digitaltransitions.com/product/cultural-heritage-digitization-planning-bundle-solutions-guide-digitization-program-planning-guide-pdf/