Did You Backup Your Photos?

One of the biggest mistakes any phtographer can have is over confidence in their hardware. This includes your computer, your external hard drive, your CD's or DVD's and your memory cards. I can tell you from personal experience that recovering your hard drive data can be very costly. Here's a fantastic article by Paul Salmon. I recommend you heed the advice here...unless of course, you have the $$$ to burn!

How Do You Backup Your Digital Photos?
By Paul Salmon

I have seen many times in the past someone lose their data because of a hard drive failure. While some documents can be recreated, albeit it can take many hours to recreate one document, the files that can't be recreated are digital photos. Imagine losing photos of your children when they were babies? Unless others have the same photo, a hard drive crash could cause the photo to be lost forever.

For this reason, it is important to develop a data backup workflow. You may not know what you need to do, but I'll explain my process below and you can then develop one similar that works for you.

1. First, before I do any editing or printing, I copy all my digital photos to an external hard drive. This is my accessible backup copy because the hard drive is always available in case I need a photo. I organize my photos in the following directory structure: Pictures\[four digit year]\[Event]. I don't rename my pictures, but instead I use photo organizing software that allows me to tag my pictures.
2. Next I start my online backup software. I have signed up with an online backup service provider to store my photos in case something was to happen to my home. They provide a small application that I install on my desktop. This application will then copy any changed/new files automatically onto their server in the background. I usually keep it suspended since my external hard drive is usually powered off when not in use. I then unsuspend the tool when I want to run the backup.
3. I then backup the photos to two DVD+R's. When backing up any type of file to a DVD, it is important to always make two copies. In case one DVD becomes corrupt, you may be able to restore the file from the other DVD. It is also important to buy high-quality DVD's as cheap no-name brand DVD's aren't good enough for long-term storage. I also store these DVD's offsite (outside of my home) so I don't lose them in case of an event destroying my home.
4. When I need to edit a picture I always copy the picture to the local hard drive in my computer and perform any edits on that file. This prevents my from accidentally altering my backed up copy.

If I were to lost a picture, I can restore them in this manner:

1. First, I would use the file stored on the external hard drive.
2. If there was a problem with that file, I can go restore the file online.
3. If I don't have an Internet connection, or there was a problem with restoring online, I can then retrieve the file from one of the two DVD's.

The above backup workflow is what I use on a regular basis, not only for my digital pictures, but also for my important data. It is important to always have a backup workflow in place in case an event damages your computer. Also, make sure that you create a workflow that works for you.

Paul Salmon currently maintains Technically Easy, as well as knowledge regarding offsite data backup storage solutions.

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