Do You Backup Your Digital Photos?

If it was eight to ten years ago and you asked someone about their digital camera they would probably look at you funny. In only a few years digital cameras have taken over the world of photography. Whether you are someone who takes photos for fun, or are a serious professional, chances are you use a digital camera.

With so many people using digital cameras, there is also a large amount of digital photos that need to be backed up. Unlike many other files, you usually can’t recreate the image of a digital photo. Many people, however, probably don’t think about backing up their images, and unfortunately they won’t unless something terrible happens.

Backing up your photos doesn’t have to be complex, but it may be necessary to protect your memories. To get you started, I will outline how I backup my digital photos.

  1. The first thing I do is copy the digital photos from my memory card to an external hard drive. This allows provides me with easy access to my digital photos when I need them.
  2. Unfortunately, if something were to happen to my home, I would lose that external hard drive. To ensure I won’t lose my photos, I also use an online backup provider, which provides offsite backup storage. A program in the background monitors the folders that contain my digital photos on the external hard drive, and then copies an changed/new files to an online server.
  3. Once I have enough photos to fill a DVD, I back them up to two DVD’s. When dealing with optical discs, I always like to make two copies to ensure I won’t lose my data if one of the discs becomes corrupted. I then move these discs offsite (outside of my home) and keep them in a cool, dark place.
  4. When I want to edit a photo, I copy the file from my external hard drive to the computer’s local hard drive. I modify the local copy while keeping the original intact.

By using the above data backup workflow I am able to keep my digital photos handy while also keeping than safe and secure. The important thing to note with regards to a backup workflow is to develop one that meets your needs. Make sure the workflow works for you, and if it doesn’t, you can modify it to make it so.

About the Author

Paul Salmon currently maintains Technically Easy, a blog that provides information on using various technologies. He also manages another blog that provides information on data backup.