File Organization Considerations

Transcription

1 Tripod Camera Club

2 Topics to Cover File Orginization Considerations Backup Considerations One Persons Approach: Folder & File Layout Whole Media Backup Camera Backup Single Day Workflow Multi Day Travel Workflow

3 File Organization Considerations Why is file organization important? A great photo is useless if you can t find it Easy access to your photos makes your editing & viewing time more enjoyable Consider what is best for you and your photo collection: Pick a Storage location on your computer that you will remember, like My Pictures. Decide on a file structure that helps you find your files in a way that works for you. Split files for Personal, Client, Bussiness, Competition? Group by Year, Month, Location, Subject, Client name. or any combination? Group by media type: RAW, JPEG, MPEG, GOPRO..?

4 Use Software to Help Organize Software packages like Lightroom help with advance organization and search capabilities which speeds up workflow: Assign Keywords to photos, this allows fast searching of your whole library for related images. To be useful, it requires adding keywords to all your existing photos and to all future photos Rate your photos - You can rate your photos with one to five stars. Color code your photos great for identify which images have been edited, in process, not touched. Create your own definitions for each star and color ratings. This allows searching by color or star ratings, which narrows down your search. You could then create Smart Collections with any keyword, star or color rating which automatically populate. (Think of a collection as a photo album)

5 Why Backup? Digital media is stored on a drive, although very reliable they will at some point fail or become corrupt. Without a backup you WILL loose some or all your data! The primary purpose of a backup is to duplicate all files onto a second drive in case your main drive failures. The secondary purpose of a backup is to have a duplicate incase a file is deleted by the user in error. Any backup strategy starts with a plan of how and where the data will be organized.

6 Make a Backup Plan A good Backup Plan answers the following 4 questions: 1) What Method works best for you? Hardware: External Drive, CD/DVD, Cloud Manual (Drag and Drop) or Automated (Windows Backup and Restore, Mac s Time Machine) How many backups 2) Where to keep backups? 3) When, and how often, will a backup be done? (Daily, Weekly, Monthly or as needed) 4) How should you guard against my storage becoming obsolete or close to the end of life?

7 Backup Devices? What type of back device should I use? There are several options you should consider for or storage: Copy to an external hard drive Copy to an external solid state drive Copy to an USB thumb drive Copy onto multiple CDs or DVDs Upload to a cloud based storage services How many backup? 3 Backups 2 that use different media types 1 that is off-site

8 My File Structure I organize, view and edit all my photos within Lightroom and its catalog function. Simple folder system: Photograph's Folder All image and file types. Lightroom Folder All associated files. My system is simple and portable, I use the same format on both my Master Drives (Silver) and Travel Drive (Orange).

9 Photograph Folder Flow Store all my photographs under one folder structure. Photographs > Year > Event > RAW / JPEG/ FINAL If I shoot multiple days at the same location I will subdivide by Day or Subject.

10 Lightroom Folder Flow Store all my Lightroom Files under one folder structure.

11 Camera Setup & Backup Always Format Card in the Camera RAW JPEG If the Camera takes 2 Memory Cards Set Slot 2 to Backup or RAW S1 & JPEG S2

12 Image Transfer from Camera Copy Images onto Master Silver Drive In New Folder within Photograph File RAW JPEG

13 Import Photos > Lightroom Master Catalog Import Photo s RAW Files only Note: You can let lightroom move file directly from a card into a folder during the import. I prefer to be in control and know the files are in the correct folder before importing into Lightroom.

14 Home Backup Road Map Mac Laptop Small, Lightweight, Flash Memory 3 TB Home Network Drive & Time Machine Backup Carbon Copy Backup Software USB USB 2 TB 2 TB Master Drive Silver Backup Drive Black (Stored Off Site)

15 Travel - Nightly Backup Copy Images onto Rugged Travel Drive in New Folder for Each Day within Travel Photo Folder RAW JPEG

16 Travel Editing > Lightroom Travel Catalog When traveling for several days I am impatient to see my images, I have to take and look and edit. I use a Travel Lightroom Catalog to import and edit images on the fly. + Travel Catalog

17 Return Home Transfer + Master Catalog + Travel Catalog 1 TB Using Lightroom Import Travel Catalog into Master Catalog And select option to Copy Travel Photos Folder to Master Drive.

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