Integrating MPEG-7 into the Moving Image Collections portal

This article discusses the implementation of MPEG-7 within the Moving Image Collections (MIC) portal. MIC is a union catalog of the worldʹs moving images, as well as a portal to information on the care, management, and use of moving images. The MIC Union Catalog utilizes a core registry schema that is designed to map readily to any metadata schema used to describe moving images. The MIC development team was particularly interested in supporting MPEG-7 for future non textual digital video indexing applications. An MPEG-7 application profile and Microsoft Access cataloging utility were developed in order to test MPEG-7 within the MIC Union Catalog; 400 science digital videos in the Research Channel collection were cataloged in MPEG-7. The MPEG-7 records were mapped to MIC and ingested. Draft MPEG-7 to MIC and MIC to MPEG-7 maps were developed and are available at the MIC Web site. MPEG-7 records are available for viewing for any record in the MIC database via a collections explore search within the Archivistsʹ portal. The MPEG-7 cataloging utility may be downloaded from the MIC project Web site (Moving Image Collections. MIC Cataloging Utility. http://gondolin.rutgers.edu/MIC/text/how/cataloging utility.htm). This article also discusses issues with MPEG-7 as a descriptive metadata schema, as well as mapping and implementation issues identified in the project.