Do you document for insurance? How?

[Rokcet Scientist]

Someone with a lot of antique paintings, china, classical arms, statuettes, and so on, asked me if – and if so, how – I could take a few pictures of each item (there are a couple of hundred in the collection) and compile all of them onto a DVD. Purpose 1: excellent documentation for insurance; may significantly decrease the annual premium (which is a king's ransom at present!). Purpose 2: to enable showing certain, or all, items off-site (you don't want just any art/antiques lover 'off the street' on your couch at home, do you?). Purpose 3: to have pictures available for a possible book on the collection sometime in the future.
I was thinking to set up a table-top 'studio' on a large table, white background paper without horizon, couple of flashguns with umbrellas, a reflector, camera on tripod (remote shutter release).
Seems straightforward enough. Too easy, even. Am I forgetting something? Who has done this before and maybe has some pointers for me?

Thanks in advance, friends,
RS

[nsurit]

I'd probably start with a tent and then the strobes you suggested. For insurance, which is what I do for a living, I'd probably shot film, because I know it will last my lifetime or if I shot digital, have prints made and store them some place other than at the location where the stuff was kept. What one needs to have a virtual gallery is rather different from what you might need for publication. Some cameras will shoot either a raw and a jpeg at the same time or a tiff and a jpeg. If I knew I needed both, I'd likely shoot it that way. If you haven't done much, if any product type shooting, you might find the information available at photoflex.com to be of value. Bill Barber

[Rokcet Scientist]

Originally Posted by nsurit

I'd probably start with a tent and then the strobes you suggested.* For insurance, which is what I do for a living, I'd probably shot film, because I know it will last my lifetime or if I shot digital, have prints made and store them some place other than at the location where the stuff was kept.* What one needs to have a virtual gallery is rather different from what you might need for publication.* Some cameras will shoot either a raw and a jpeg at the same time or a tiff and a jpeg.* If I knew I needed both, I'd likely shoot it that way.* If you haven't done much, if any product type shooting, you might find the information available at photoflex.com to be of value.* Bill Barber*

Thanks for your comments, Bill.
I won't use a tent as the resulting shadowlessness will make the pix much too flat for my taste – and, more importantly, for my principal's taste! Especially with 3D items (ever tried to read a shadowless coin?).
I did this same collection 15 years ago (half the size then). On film then (obviously). This is the '2005 upgrade'. There will be a main set of (at least!) 3 identical DVD(set)'s and 2 sets of prints. The DVD(set)'s: one on-site, one off-site, one at the insurance company. And those 3 DVD(set)'s will be REburnt on, and replaced by, brandnew DVD-R's every second year. One print set on-site, one print set at the insurance company.
Thus a bi-annual update will be relatively easy to make.
I shoot 8 mp RAW+JPEG's (about 16MB average) on 2GB cards, I store on an iPod, I edit on a 1,25Ghz iMac in PS2, GraphicConverter and PhotoLine32, I sort using PhotoMechanic – all apps handle RAW, and I do batch resizing/simple editing with PhotoToolCM.
The DVD(set)'s will have the RAW's, and their resultant edited JPEG's in full size, two email sizes, and in a QuickTime slideshow. The JPEG's in a database with attached descriptions, attributions, apprisals, etc. etc.
Thanks for suggesting http://www.photoflex.com/photoflex/index.html. I'll dig a bit there. FYI: I mostly use LastoLite products (http://www.lastolite.com/).
Thanks again,
RS