To discuss depositing archive material, please contact the Acquisitions and Loans Manager at archives@hes.scot or for an archive that comprises digital material, please contact the Digital Archives team at digital.archives@hes.scot. For larger accessions, it may be necessary for HES staff to view the material in order to assess it and plan its transfer.
Deposit agreements
A deposit agreement should be signed before a deposit of an archive is made. Physical ownership is transferred to HES and allows us to invest resources in digitisation and conservation of the deposited archive.
A deposit agreement means that ownership and all Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), including copyright, are assigned to HES. This allows us to make material accessible to researchers and to licence and sub-licence the use of the material to users. If required, please contact us for further discussions regarding IPR. Please see the SAMPLE HES Collection Deposit Agreements linked below.
If you have any questions about deposit agreements, please get in touch with the Acquisitions and Loans Manager at: archives@hes.scot
Physical Archive material
Physical archive comprises material such as textual documents, notes, photographs and drawings, usually on paper or film. HES staff can provide advice on general conservation issues. If there are any items which have been damaged it is essential that no attempt is made to effect any repairs, unless by a trained paper conservator, so as to avoid any further damage.
Archive material should be appropriately housed and packaged in suitable clean and sturdy containers for transfer to HES so as to avoid any damage. Packaging material does not, however, have to be of archival quality as HES will repackage material for permanent storage after sorting and accessioning. It is essential that all deposits should be well organised and identified. Poorly organised or unidentified material can delay or prevent it being made available for research.
If an archive contains material that is not suitable for public dissemination (ie for commercial sensitivity or data protection reasons) this should be discussed with HES staff before the material is deposited.
If architectural material is being deposited, if associated job lists or hand lists exist for the material these should be included, as should a relevant Curriculum Vitae for the architects.
Please note that where you are depositing digital material, such as a photograph taken with a digital camera, we would not want to receive a paper copy as well. In terms of which material we take, the rule is that we take it in its original form, i.e. if an item is born digital, we take it in digital form - we do not need a physical/paper copy. If it was born paper, we will take the paper. However, if the item is born paper, and has also been digitised, we will accept this as well as the paper original, as this will allow us to display the material online.
If you have any questions about depositing physical archive material, please get in touch with the Acquisitions and Loans Manager at: archives@hes.scot
Digital Archive material
Digital material includes anything that has been created in a digital format i.e. is ‘born’ digital. This will include anything from digital photographs, reports, raw laser survey or geophysical data, GIS data, CAD drawings or illustrations, and much more.
There are a number of ways you can deposit digital material such as via a CD, hard drive or memory stick, or you can transfer material to us via our online file sharing software service ShareFile.
You can access the HES Archives ShareFile here
When depositing digital material with HES it should be separated from the physical archive. It is processed by us in a different way and by a separate team. However, when you separate material, please be careful to make it clear which project your digital files are associated with. It takes us a significant amount of time to unpick and process digital material which has not been archived efficiently. Please use a clear folder structure and name files and photographs appropriately ensuring not to submit multiple copies of the same file (duplicate files). If you are submitting photographs, please provide a photo index which includes a caption for each image you are archiving. If you find you have images which do not directly relate to the activity you undertook or site you recorded, please do not include them in your deposit. For instance, we do not normally retain images of vehicles, animals or people unless they are clearly relevant.
If you have any questions about what constitutes a digital deposit, are unsure what to include, or how to deposit data with us, please get in touch at: digital.archives@hes.scot
Depositors Forms, Sample Agreements and other documents
Please consult and use the following documents when considering or making a deposit to the archive:
