Jump to content

picture retrieval in another 50 years


Recommended Posts

<p>for several years now I have been scanning through my shoe-boxes of mostly family pics although I worked professionally for about 10 years around the 60s and still have contact sheets that bring back many memories of a simpler time. 120 and 35mm even some half frames, some better than others I'll admit but all retrievable with a simple scanner. The oldest were taken over 50 years ago and I can't help wondering how it will ever be possible to have an entire photo-life so safely and easily stored and accessed in the future. With digital advances being made almost every few months how can anyone but major archives or top pros hope to keep up. </p>
Link to comment
Share on other sites

>>> The oldest were taken over 50 years ago and I can't help wondering how it will ever be possible to

have an entire photo-life so safely and easily stored and accessed in the future.

 

Many photographers who suffered through Hurricane Katrina (and other disasters, natural and otherwise) have had a different

experience.

www.citysnaps.net
Link to comment
Share on other sites

<p>This topic gets discussed here from time to time, and IIRC it sometimes degenerates into a film versus digital circus.</p>

<p>If archival storage is a big priority, then make it your priority to store archivally. You can back up digital stuff with lots of redundancy. If you want your work to last centuries, make silver prints. As for me, I plan to be dead in 25 years.</p>

<p>When the dust clears, I suspect the biggest threat to the longevity of your work is not poor fixation, or poor storage, or anything like that, but rather your kids or grandkids (or their in-laws!) discarding it all, shortly after they've put you in a home . . .</p>

Link to comment
Share on other sites

<p>I have always believed it was the responsibility of the photographer to preserve and propagate his or her work in his life time and leave the photos in a state that COULD be used by someone who finds them after death. . . You catalog, you back-up, you let loved ones know where your photos are and that you hope they will find them useful. Beyond that, it's all chance.</p>

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

<p>As I've said before, if I could come up with the capital, I would go around buying older computers and software, and I mean lots of computers so I'd always have spare parts. I'd make sure I had drives and software to cover every possible format for data, then start a business recovering old files. I wouldn't get rich, but I have a feeling my son would.</p>
Link to comment
Share on other sites

<p>I believe it is absolutely essential to print your photos. No matter how diligent you are about making backups and doing it in multiple formats, on multiple media and in multiple locations, digital files, storage media, software and computer gear, even connectors and cables are so varied and so subject to change. Today just about everybody can read a jpg on a CD or DVD. But remember all those Word Perfect files on 5.25 inch floppies that were the world standard just 20 years ago? Maybe you've still got the floppy drive but does the serial port conenctor on it fit the USB 2 connector on your new laptop? SCSI connections, Zip drives, etc. that were essential to digital photography once upon a time are already obsolete. Everything that is bleeding edge today will be in the landfill 20 years from now. Even if you have all this gear left for your grandchildren complete with instruction books are they even going to realize that's on all these little silver discs and thumb drives and hard drives? But you can still hold Matthew Brady's glass plates up to the light and see what's on them. If you want to make pictures easy to access for today, digitize them. If you want to truly preserve them, print them.</p>
Link to comment
Share on other sites

<blockquote>

<p>But you can still hold Matthew Brady's glass plates up to the light and see what's on them.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Yes, at least the ones that didn't get made into greenhouse glazing. Lots of classic prints and negatives have been thrown into the trash bin without a thought on the part of heirs, even for those lucky enough to have such. There's no profit here in re-rehashing the old digital vs. film screed.<br>

<strong>My over all answer is "Number Ten" -</strong><br>

<strong>to which Matt will reply, "Number 14" ! to the great amusement of the assembled gallery.</strong></p>

Link to comment
Share on other sites

<p>If you throw away all but your best images, storage won't be a problem. The storage requirements would be modest enough to be easy to update/upgrade/backup quite frequently.</p>

<p>For most people storage of film and prints wasn't an issue because there wasn't all that much to store (unless you were Winogrand who left behind 2500 rolls of undeveloped film and another 6500 rolls of developed film that had never been printed, even as contact sheets). Though even that (scanned) would probably fit on a 4TB drive by my calculations and a 4TB drive costs under $200 these days.</p>

<p>However if every time you leave the house you fill up a 16GB card, you will have problems no matter what "archival" system you want to use.</p>

<p>The current storage issue is as much to do with the volume of images being shot as the technology used to store them.</p>

<p>Over the long term you will want to switch technologies. I'm sure DVDs and CDs will be around for a few more decades, but during that time I expect new, higher density, storage systems to become mainstream.</p>

Link to comment
Share on other sites

<p>Having gone through so many hurricanes I hate to think about it, I have never lost one photo to them. You can easily wrap photos up in a water tight manner. Hurricanes give plenty of warning, and plenty of time to prepare.</p>

<p>Having had lots of files on hard drives, computers, and the like...... I have lost thousands and thousands.</p>

<p>The future is impossible to foresee, but if you wish to cover both bases, maybe keep your stuff near you in appropriate times of distress, and have backups on file online. Personally, I have no photos that might be termed irreplaceable. They are just photos, no matter how good or how bad they might be. I have many, many more things more precious to me than photos or other images. It's just stuff, and attachment to stuff leads to suffering. Letting go of things leads to, if not happiness, something good enough for me.</p>

Link to comment
Share on other sites

<p>Lately I've been thinking that my archive may become a burden to my kids. They will no doubt cherish the family photos but may have no interest in the thousands of landscapes I have taken. They are busy amassing their own at this point. I hope they don't feel they are required to continue the upkeep out of a sense of loyalty or duty.<br>

I have an acquaintance nearby that is well into his senior years and has about 30,000 images he has taken in the last 10 years, since he discovered photography. Some are wonderful... some not so much. As I am sure can be said for most of ours. What will his kids do with them? Throw them away? I would never be able to do that. So, perhaps they will become a burden that is a collection of harddrives kept in a box on a shelf somewhere.</p>

Link to comment
Share on other sites

<p>The most important thing to do is have redundancy. I run a RAID array, and judiciously edit my work. Anything I really like goes into my "Keepers" folder, that is photos I would never want to lose. That folder is periodically synced with Dropbox using Microsoft Synctoy. Once a year I refresh my archival grade DVD backups based off that folder.<br>

The trick with digital is delete, delete, delete. It keeps storage costs down and makes backing up far easier to do. </p>

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...