Organization

Cataloging: Almost as Fun as Playing

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Now that I've finalized on the mechanism I'm going to use to catalog my miniature collection (Collective Access), I've been having a blast getting the system set up to address the differences between a miniature wargaming collection and a traditional museum or gallery. In most cases this is changes to meta data. I need to add a whack of stuff. Things like role (elite, troops, core, heavy support), modelled weapons, and organization elements to match an order of battle where appropriate.

This is a blast. Now I'm not a trained museum curator so with Collective Access comes a learning curve associated with the vocabulary of cataloging objects. Thankfully I've stumbled across the Collections Trust website. It's a UK resource for standardized handling of collections and their resource section is extremely helpful in defining what the best definition of terms like "assention date" actually means. The page I linked to above is their Spectrum resource page. Spectrum is a framework and standard for managing collections. It covers every facet of maintaining a collection of objects - in my case, toy soldiers - and it has a ton of guidance for how to go about doing it. Now, I'll say right now, I have no intention of trying to be Spectrum compliant. That's just silly. But if you're looking for a thorough way to catalog all of your models, Spectrum - coupled with Collective Access isn't a bad way to go.

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