APII – Australian Plant Image Index

The Australian Plant Image Index is the National collection of photographs and illustrations of Australia's flora.1

Description

Xanthorrhoea macronema. Photo by G Butler2

The Australian National Botanic Gardens (ANBG) has for many years been building up a collection of photographs and illustrations of Australia's native plants.

Originally these were photos taken on field collecting trips to supplement the herbarium specimens and data associated with the living plants. In recent years many other photographers have contributed to the Index. We are now embarking on an active plan to encourage people to contribute reliably identified photographs to the Index.

Our aim is to have a good quality coloured slide of every Australian native plant represented in the Australian Plant Image Index.

Portraits of plant flowers form the bulk of the Index, but photographs of fruit, bark, shrubs or whole trees are also included. A collection of other illustrative material is also catalogued.

Photographs in the Index are taken as 35 mm colour slides.

The most significant aspect of the Index, and that which will separate it from many other photo libraries, is our emphasis on accurate botanical naming of the plants.3

An internet gateway to the database catalogue of the photograph collection is available, as well as gateways to related information. Only a small percentage of those photographs in the collection have been digitized, they are available at low resolution on the web.4

Function

• Visualisation tools
  • Images
• Taxonomy
  • Identification tools, keys
• User interface
  • Personal use
  • Visual presentation

Why use this tool?

• Plant images

Who will use this tool?

• Data creation
  • Experts - taxonomy
• Data capture
  • Curators – specimens, identification
• Data users
  • Expert
  • Interest groups
  • General public
• No special skills required

How will the tool be used?

• Online database
• An internet gateway to the database catalogue of the photograph collection is available, as well as gateways to related information

Search can be made by:5

• genus and species
• plant family
• simple or complex search criteria
• lists of plant genera or plant family
• non-plant photos
• line illustrations for selected genus

Where in the data chain could this tool be used?

• User’s machine

When could this tool be used?

• At the time of a user request

Availability

• APII: http://www.anbg.gov.au/anbg/photo-collection/photo.index.html
• Search: http://www.anbg.gov.au/anbg/photo-collection/index.html
• Contact: The Photograph Curator, ANBG, photo@anbg.gov.au
• Cost: free for government web pages; reproduction costs apply for other uses

  http://www.anbg.gov.au/anbg/photo-collection/photo-collection-use.html

• Copyright: Images are copyright. Some personal and non-commercial use is permitted with attribution and linking to ANBG.

  http://www.anbg.gov.au/anbg/photo-collection/photo-collection-use.html

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