A variety of objective and subjective approaches are currently used to assess the quality of
fingermarks produced during research projects. It is particularly important to consider user
competence and/or consistency in assessment with subjective approaches given that
projects often include several thousand marks. Intra-institution controls are likely to help
manage variations between researchers from the same institution and/or project (s), but are
unlikely to manage differences between projects, particularly if different approaches are …

Significant numbers of institutions are carrying out fingermark based research, yet there
appears to be little inter-institution consistency in the approaches used to assess the quality
of the samples produced. Inter-institution consistency in quality assessment would lead to
inevitable benefits in collaborating research projects, given that data from multiple projects
may be combined, or compared. In order for such quality assessment schemes to be
effectively used across multiple institutions, proficiency in using such approaches should be …