How to increase the chances of not losing all those digital photo moments!
Everyone hopes to have their digital images kept safe. Here are a few ideas for you to consider.
(BTW, a good rule of thumb is to use 3 modes of back up.)
- A desktop computer/laptop.
- External hard drives. Be sure to buy one from a reputable company to lessen the chances of it becoming corrupted. It's a good idea to keep these in a safe, but easy to access, area when not in use to avoid damage. If you like to be organized, it's a great idea to keep a stat sheet of what's on the drive, even if you just list the years. External Drives can be purchased to hold HUGE amounts of data. It's up to you to decide if you'd like one drive that will hold decade's worth or info all in one place, or if you'd be more comfortable spreading out your files over a few such devices. (That is what I do, and some files are more than one external drive, just in case.)
- USB flash drives, or thumb drives, can be useful if you have a lap top or desktop computer. They're small, though, and easily lost, so I wouldn't use these as my first choice. Using a permanent marker and coding your jump drives, and then keeping a list of what's on the drive becomes very useful after your collection starts to creep up in numbers. (Yes, been there!)
- Did you know that you can store a whole load of photos for free on Google Drive? Just look up How to Back Up Photos to Google from my (insert phone type) and you'll be surprised to find out how easy it is. (Read the small print about what might happen if you delete photos from your phone or Google, and read about what size file will be stored.)
- I exceeded by phone storage limit on my iPhone a long time ago, so opted for the iCloud upgrade to 200BG which is currently $3.99 a month. (Settings/iCloud/Manage Account Storage/Change Storage Plan.)
- Drop Box is another company that stores digital files online. I have the free version and only use it to store photos temporarily, but for around $13 month you can get up to 2 TB of storage.
- Flickr accounts will hold up to 1000 photos a year for free. (They might be publicly viewable, though. It's been a long time since I used Flickr.)
- Of course, for photos that can be made public, there's always Facebook and Instagram. (But, what happens if you lose your account or they close?)
- PRINTING! I can't stress enough how important it is to make print back ups of your most meaningful images. These don't have to be frame worthy photos that you print, they can be of those moments in time that take you right back and open the floodgates of memory every time you view them. Stick them in an album or put then in a shoebox. It doesn't matter as long as you have them. (Plus, you can also scan older photos and make them into digital files, if you wish. (I've done some and while time consuming, it's nice to have them for sharing and archiving.)
- Printing can be done via kiosks right from your phone at Staples ( I just learned about this one today when with my friend Liz), or kiosks from jump drives. (Just do a local search to see where they are in the community .)
- Printing can be done by uploading your files online to a lab such as Carsand's here in Truro, or a print lab connected to a box store or other online print company. It really all depends on the quality of print that you are looking for, and any print is better than no print!
- For albums, there are many online options for DIY photo albums/photo books. Again, you will pay for higher quality paper, ink and print control, but there are options for all budget levels. I use pro labs for client books and they are not inexpensive, especially with shipping factored in. If a professionally designed and printed photo book isn't something you feel is necessary, you can always put one together yourself with an online consumer lab. It's time consuming to get the images together and place them in the album templates, but you'll be glad you did.
If you have some other suggestions for storing digital files, let me know and I'll add them to the article!
