Transcribe, step by step

The same four steps — Prepare, Read, Decide, Finish — in more detail.

Your teamAI — a foundational model (Claude, for our projects) and supplemental modelsTranskribusthe lines meet: work passes overtested, logged and checked — every step

Many readers, people decide

Each reader works alone. Where they agree, a person still checks. Where they differ, a person decides with the image and every reading in front of them.

Plan your review

Choose how many AI systems read each page and how many people read each document. Collatorium works out who reads what.

AI systemsone foundational, the rest supplemental AI passes per pageeach pass with a different foundational model People per documentat least two Documents Your teamnames, separated by commas One more person on any document where the AI systems disagreed

What you get

Everything is saved as ordinary files in your own Box folder, in formats you can open without Collatorium.

Files you get

Word files (.docx) — the transcription of each page, with a note on every change
Excel workbooks (.xlsx) — the project log, the image list, review sheets and progress trackers
Working copies of your photographs, turned upright, and cut details (.jpg)
Transkribus exports (PAGE XML)
Every reading and ruling, with its metadata (.json, readable by other tools)
Your review plans, and transcripts of the working sessions

Software it works with

Box (or OneDrive, Google Drive, Dropbox, a disk), opened in Chrome
Claude, ChatGPT and Gemini — with your own accounts
Transkribus — with your own account
Word and Excel, to open the files
Later: Zotero, Tropy, Aeon Timeline

The site holds only the viewer's code. Nothing is uploaded; team sign-in is by an emailed code.

The rules behind each step, and what the readers' tests have shown: Methods and rules.