Microform

It enables libraries to access collections without putting rare, fragile, or valuable items at risk of theft or damage.

Microfilm has a one to one ratio to users. Only one user can access one microform at a time. To increase this you must duplicate, distribute and store increasing the manpower needed to maintain the collection.

It is relatively compact, with far smaller storage costs than paper documents. Normally 75 document size pages at 24x fit on one 4x6 microfiche jacket, 240 report pages at 48X fit onto a 4x6 COM fiche. When compared to filing paper, microforms can reduce space storage requirements by up to 95%.

[15]

It is cheaper to distribute than paper copy if users have related equipment to access those images. Most microfiche services get a bulk discount on reproduction rights, and have lower reproduction and carriage costs than a comparable amount of printed paper. This is dependent on the current price of film and postage as well as end user equipment availability for the needs required. This is why courts specify the printed image from film and not the film itself. The US Supreme Court, since Nov 2017, has shown a preference to a digital submittal over analog images.

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It is a relatively stable archival form when properly processed and stored. Preservation standard microfilms use the process, creating silver images in hard gelatin emulsion on a polyester base. With appropriate, albeit difficult to maintain, storage conditions, this film has a life expectancy of ~500 years.^[16] However, when temperature and humidity levels are greater than required a number of things often happen. Fungus can eat the gelatin used to bind the silver halide. The acetate base of the film degrades into acetic acid under non-ideal conditions, causing what is known as vinegar syndrome. Redox is the oxidation of the surface of the film and is often found in higher humidity areas. Regardless of temperature, blemishes (REDOX) appear on film and are caused by oxidation of materials stored with or near film. Diazo-based systems with lower archival lives (<20 years) which have polyester or epoxy surfaces are commonly used as a means to duplicate and distribute film to a broader number of users. Diazo is not used as a film master but as a duplicate of a silver based image.

silver halide

The principal disadvantage of microforms is that the image is (usually) too small to read with the naked eye and requires analog or digital magnification to be read.

Reader machines used to view microform are often difficult to use; microfiche is very time-consuming, and microfilm requires users to carefully wind and rewind until they have arrived at the point where the data they are looking for is stored.

Photographic illustrations reproduce poorly in microform format, with loss of clarity and halftones. The latest electronic digital viewer/scanners can scan in gray shade, which greatly increases the quality of photographs, but the inherent bi-tonal nature of microfilm limits its ability to convey much subtlety of tone.

Reader-printers are not always available, limiting the user's ability to make copies for their own purposes. Conventional photocopy machines cannot be used.

[17]

Color microform is extremely expensive, thus discouraging most libraries supplying color films. Color photographic dyes also tend to degrade over the long term. This results in the loss of information, as color materials are usually photographed using black and white film. The lack of quality and color images in microfilm, when libraries were discarding paper originals, was a major impetus to Bill Blackbeard and other comic historians' work to rescue and maintain original paper archives of color pages from the history of newspaper comics. Many non-comics color images were not targeted by these efforts and were lost.

[17]

When stored in the highest-density drawers, it is easy to misfile a fiche, which is thereafter unavailable. As a result, some libraries store microfiche in a restricted area and retrieve it on demand. Some fiche services use lower-density drawers with labeled pockets for each card.

Like all analog media formats, microfiche is lacking in features enjoyed by users of digital media. Analog copies degrade with each generation, while some digital copies have much higher copying fidelity. Digital data can also be indexed and searched easily.

Reading microfilms on a machine for some time may cause headache and/or eyestrain.

It is common to accidentally mutilate, damage or lose microfilm. Users can easily cut, fold, scratch, roll over and deface microforms very easily. Most damage to film is caused through general use where readers' glass guides and dirt will often scratch emulsion, jam film in carriers and otherwise damage film through user mishandling.

Microfilm does not allow for simple reproduction. Film is not forever, so in order to keep the images they will require duplication to a new image. This process from analog to analog image reduces the quality of the image by 12% or more. Over time the image will be lost if maintained in analog form only.

Since it is analog image (an image of the original data), it is viewable with mild magnification. Unlike media, the format requires no software to decode the data stored thereon. It is comprehensible to persons literate in the written language; the only equipment that is needed is a device to magnify the image appropriately. Many feel, because an image can be seen with a loupe or other small device, microfilm is simple to use. In large repositories of microfilms, it is impractical to find unindexed images amongst millions of others across hundreds of rolls of film. Microfilm image quality is often described as either legible, decipherable and illegible. Photo information on film is often obliterated by the process as the image is reduced to black and white, not halftone or grays.

digital

Prints from microfilm are accepted in legal proceedings as surrogates for original documents but require reader/printers to convert images back to paper. Nearly all of the analog reader printer manufactures have discontinued production and support of these units in favor of digital reproduction.

Microfilm can be digitally converted and spread to a very large number of users at the same time with little or no added cost to the users. Digital microfilm or Computer Output Microfilm is often created from digital surrogates so there are both digital and analog images providing for a very secure backup and the ability to use the images without risk of damaging the film.

 – Steganograph method of hiding messages

Microdot

 – Machine used to produce microfilm

Microfilmer

 – Printing at a small scale

Microprinting

 – Microfilm digitization business based in Cedar Rapids, IowaPages displaying short descriptions of redirect targets

NewspaperARCHIVE

 – Catalog published by manufacturers

Parts book

 – Set of activities aimed at prolonging the life of a record or objectPages displaying short descriptions of redirect targets

Preservation (library and archival science)

 – French photographer and inventor

René Dagron

 – Optical instrument

Stanhope (optical bijou)

The Library of Congress Photoduplication Service

at the Wayback Machine (archived August 19, 2000)

"Microfilm and Microfiche" — Northeast Document Conservation Center

U.S. Government Scientific and Technical Information by Subject Category on Microfiche available from the National Technical Information Service

(PDF)

Investigations on Color Microfilm as a Medium for Long-Term Storage of Digital Data

at the Internet Archive

Microfilm Collection

"Can You Tell Me What Kind of Microfilm I Have?" – BMI Imaging Systems