do you keep every shot you take? or do you delete those that don't cut it? eg: if you took 30 shots to catch that perfect one, do you delete the rest?
do you tag all your shots? some of them? none?
and how do you organize them? by date? by subject?
do you back them up online? to an external disk?
back in 2010 i had a fairly good file system on my puter, but then in 2011 i got a new puter and didn't replicate it... this year i've taken so many shots that i've actually just bought a daytimer to write down the subjects i've shot each day...
My system is:
- load all pix of SD into Lightroom, storing in hard drive folders by date (year/yyyy-mm/yyyy-mm-dd).
- tag with camera, lens, basic tagging (e.g. 'flower', 'sky')
- add geo- tagging info, if applicable
- review pix, deleting any junk (out of focus, or blatantly awful)
- save tags & back up pix to NAS (local network drive)
- delete SD card
- once a week I do a full back-up of all pix & edits to external drive
Most of the backing up is managed by a programme called PureSync, which runs automatically when I exit Lightroom or it detects the external drive being plugged in. It's freeware and very easy to use. I'd recommend it. It can also detect cameras/memory cards and automatically copy off files etc, but I let LR do all that.
I organize by month and year. Now, I am also archiving on Flickr since my computer can't handle such big files all of the time. I save only the ones I love, and forget the rest.
I upload from SD card to lappy.
Delete until I have 1 or 2 to choose from of each picture.
I have folders for each month and sort into that.
I delete off the SD card once I'm done.
I still have to back up onto an external drive as well.
My system is slightly more complicated than the usual, but only because photography pays my bills...
My main machine is an Apple, and on that I have a Time Machine backup (hourly backup of my main system) running on an external 3TB drive. So, when I copy my photos from the CF card, a backup is made soon after. While I do delete photos I don't want, the backups remain on the Time Machine drive (for a while). Obviously, it doesn't really matter if something goes wrong and I lose the copies of those files, but unless something does go wrong, they are there if I happen to want them later. But still, they are on my secondary backup.
My secondary backup system is a Drobo S. This is a bit like an external RAID array with built-in redundancy. It can hold up to 5 3TB drives, and with dual-drive redundancy switched on (an option I use) I can lose any two drives simultaneously without losing any data whatsoever. Whenever I copy photos from my CF card, they are automatically duplicated on the Drobo S. So, now I have two backups of every raw file - one on Time Machine (which I will will eventually lose, regarding the photos I delete from my computer) and one on the Drobo S (which I will never lose, short of a house fire or theft).
So, my system is as such:
Two small boxes on my desk - one for "new photos" and one for "cards already imported". Basically an inbox and an outbox. This ensures I don't forget to import a card, then accidentally wipe it and lose the photos.
Import all images via Lightroom: I don't use individual folders by date (this is something I used to do - a habit of almost every photographer who ever worked with film) but rather add a few keywords immediately so I can search for the images by job name. Lightroom's filter system allows for searching by date anyway, so there is no need for keeping the images in separate folders. The one thing I do separate is private versus client photos. Neither do I tag photos by lens, camera etc (again, I used to do this), because in Lightroom you can filter by these anyway, as it is recorded in the metadata. There are reasons one might do this (for Flickr, for example), but for personal searches in your own library - none. Duplicates are made on the Drobo S at this time - backup completed. At this time I also adjust the times of the captures, if necessary, to account for different cameras going out of sync.
Flag with the reject button - X - any "useless" shots. I don't immediately delete them, but this greys them out. I also choose any keepers with the flag button - P - as I can filter by this technique to only look at the "money shots", so to speak. Sometimes I also use the star rating tags - useful for "maybe" shots or for five-starring something that I absolutely must print/put in wedding album/etc.
Time Machine at some point within the hour will back up all of the files, and all my flagging information (due to copying my Lightroom catalog files). So, I have backups with dual-disk redundancy, as well as a second complete backup, all without having to actually do anything. When I do my edits and such, I delete the rejects from my computer, colour flag the edits (often using different colours for different galleries), and make further backups (of the edits) to the Drobo S.
Once a month or so, I make a full backup to another external drive, which I then keep off-site. I have two drives for this purpose, and I rotate them. This protects me in case of a "house burns down" situation.
Edit: Oh, I also have a hard drive caddy on my desk. This is hooked up to my secondary computer (a PC) and allows me to make further backups (via my network) to the PC and a bunch of "old" internal HDD's I have lying around. It is reasonably quick, as it is USB3.0 and is also RAID-enabled (I can use two drives in the caddy in a RAID-0 or RAID-1 configuration, or as individual drives) and takes desktop drives or laptop drives. This is also useful if I have a computer failure, as I can use it to extract data from any old computers (assuming the drives are intact).
@pocketmouse@manek43509@humphreyhippo@cfitzgerald@claireclinch@grecican@jinximages@andycoleborn tx... guess i need to stop being such a packrat and cull more... AND i need to be more organized with tagging... it feels like this will take a lot of time, altho' i am pretty sure there is a way to batch tag somehow... quin - i am SO tempted to ask what you do if a picture warrants 3 tags... do you print it out 3 times? ;p
I cull what I don't need... it's not uncommon for me to take 1,000 pics in an outing - yes I'm shutter happy! LOL! I also bracket often too so that adds up.
My routine normally includes downloading raw images using Lightroom onto a portable 1TB ruggedised LaCie drive which is my dedicated photo drive. I arrange my folders by year then by subject matter than by date or event within the subject folder. Then I do a couple passes through the photo's:
1st pass is removing all the OOF or wrongly focused images that aren't salvagable as well as poorly framed and exposed images.
2nd pass has me looking for double ups as quite often I'll take a couple shots of the same thing and pick out the best image in each set. What's left are my 'keepers'.
3rd Pass I'll then look for the final presentable images which I tag with a colour for quick selection and proceed to process and use. So out of 1,000 pics I may have 50 final images, but 200 still usable images in the drive in case I need to go back and use one for some reason. I don't normally tag images with keywords - I used to but got fed up with the extra work required... Probably should get back into the habbit I guess!
My backup routine includes another external drive which automatically backs up with time machine. I really should have a 3rd backup and keep it off site. Work critical paid work files I do keep in dropbox so I can share with my workstation at work. My main editing PC at home is a MacBook Air 13" mid 2011 with an i7 - great little thing - with a Dell 27" monitor plugged in. Impressively quick but does lack internal storage with only 250Gb SSD hence why I use the external drive to store my library. But it's an extremely portable setup which I take with me when shooting away from the studio.
Write a Reply
Sign up for a free account or Sign in to post a comment.
Tweets ahoy!
Join the Group
Pin With Me
Used to tag, can't be bothered (unless it's for theme of the week).
Organised by date - I have 1 folder for every month. :) Named 2012-01, 2012-02... etc
And yes, backed up onto my external hard drive.
- load all pix of SD into Lightroom, storing in hard drive folders by date (year/yyyy-mm/yyyy-mm-dd).
- tag with camera, lens, basic tagging (e.g. 'flower', 'sky')
- add geo- tagging info, if applicable
- review pix, deleting any junk (out of focus, or blatantly awful)
- save tags & back up pix to NAS (local network drive)
- delete SD card
- once a week I do a full back-up of all pix & edits to external drive
Most of the backing up is managed by a programme called PureSync, which runs automatically when I exit Lightroom or it detects the external drive being plugged in. It's freeware and very easy to use. I'd recommend it. It can also detect cameras/memory cards and automatically copy off files etc, but I let LR do all that.
Delete until I have 1 or 2 to choose from of each picture.
I have folders for each month and sort into that.
I delete off the SD card once I'm done.
I still have to back up onto an external drive as well.
My main machine is an Apple, and on that I have a Time Machine backup (hourly backup of my main system) running on an external 3TB drive. So, when I copy my photos from the CF card, a backup is made soon after. While I do delete photos I don't want, the backups remain on the Time Machine drive (for a while). Obviously, it doesn't really matter if something goes wrong and I lose the copies of those files, but unless something does go wrong, they are there if I happen to want them later. But still, they are on my secondary backup.
My secondary backup system is a Drobo S. This is a bit like an external RAID array with built-in redundancy. It can hold up to 5 3TB drives, and with dual-drive redundancy switched on (an option I use) I can lose any two drives simultaneously without losing any data whatsoever. Whenever I copy photos from my CF card, they are automatically duplicated on the Drobo S. So, now I have two backups of every raw file - one on Time Machine (which I will will eventually lose, regarding the photos I delete from my computer) and one on the Drobo S (which I will never lose, short of a house fire or theft).
So, my system is as such:
Two small boxes on my desk - one for "new photos" and one for "cards already imported". Basically an inbox and an outbox. This ensures I don't forget to import a card, then accidentally wipe it and lose the photos.
Import all images via Lightroom: I don't use individual folders by date (this is something I used to do - a habit of almost every photographer who ever worked with film) but rather add a few keywords immediately so I can search for the images by job name. Lightroom's filter system allows for searching by date anyway, so there is no need for keeping the images in separate folders. The one thing I do separate is private versus client photos. Neither do I tag photos by lens, camera etc (again, I used to do this), because in Lightroom you can filter by these anyway, as it is recorded in the metadata. There are reasons one might do this (for Flickr, for example), but for personal searches in your own library - none. Duplicates are made on the Drobo S at this time - backup completed. At this time I also adjust the times of the captures, if necessary, to account for different cameras going out of sync.
Flag with the reject button - X - any "useless" shots. I don't immediately delete them, but this greys them out. I also choose any keepers with the flag button - P - as I can filter by this technique to only look at the "money shots", so to speak. Sometimes I also use the star rating tags - useful for "maybe" shots or for five-starring something that I absolutely must print/put in wedding album/etc.
Time Machine at some point within the hour will back up all of the files, and all my flagging information (due to copying my Lightroom catalog files). So, I have backups with dual-disk redundancy, as well as a second complete backup, all without having to actually do anything. When I do my edits and such, I delete the rejects from my computer, colour flag the edits (often using different colours for different galleries), and make further backups (of the edits) to the Drobo S.
Once a month or so, I make a full backup to another external drive, which I then keep off-site. I have two drives for this purpose, and I rotate them. This protects me in case of a "house burns down" situation.
Edit: Oh, I also have a hard drive caddy on my desk. This is hooked up to my secondary computer (a PC) and allows me to make further backups (via my network) to the PC and a bunch of "old" internal HDD's I have lying around. It is reasonably quick, as it is USB3.0 and is also RAID-enabled (I can use two drives in the caddy in a RAID-0 or RAID-1 configuration, or as individual drives) and takes desktop drives or laptop drives. This is also useful if I have a computer failure, as I can use it to extract data from any old computers (assuming the drives are intact).
My routine normally includes downloading raw images using Lightroom onto a portable 1TB ruggedised LaCie drive which is my dedicated photo drive. I arrange my folders by year then by subject matter than by date or event within the subject folder. Then I do a couple passes through the photo's:
1st pass is removing all the OOF or wrongly focused images that aren't salvagable as well as poorly framed and exposed images.
2nd pass has me looking for double ups as quite often I'll take a couple shots of the same thing and pick out the best image in each set. What's left are my 'keepers'.
3rd Pass I'll then look for the final presentable images which I tag with a colour for quick selection and proceed to process and use. So out of 1,000 pics I may have 50 final images, but 200 still usable images in the drive in case I need to go back and use one for some reason. I don't normally tag images with keywords - I used to but got fed up with the extra work required... Probably should get back into the habbit I guess!
My backup routine includes another external drive which automatically backs up with time machine. I really should have a 3rd backup and keep it off site. Work critical paid work files I do keep in dropbox so I can share with my workstation at work. My main editing PC at home is a MacBook Air 13" mid 2011 with an i7 - great little thing - with a Dell 27" monitor plugged in. Impressively quick but does lack internal storage with only 250Gb SSD hence why I use the external drive to store my library. But it's an extremely portable setup which I take with me when shooting away from the studio.