Backing Up Your Work?

[EricM]

<blockquote>

<p>A matter of taste. Eric~ lives in fear that a whole city will disappear so a distribruted copy store needs to span multiple locations worldwide. Well, maybe. You could live in fear that your house burns down, so keeping a copy in the other room will be no good. And houses do indeed burn down. But your garden shed, your neighbour's house or your place of work hardly ever happen to go up in flames at the same time. So is it really safer?</p>

</blockquote>

<p>lol Q.G., Back to reality, I think it is safe with one copy across town and another in the garage. That's the way I do it, anyways. If the city floods, my dvd's float and can be rinsed and dried while I wait for an internet connection to Crashplan.</p>

<p>I'm looking forward to ssd's becoming cheaper as the lack of mechanical aspect in them really appeals to me for back-up archiving and storage</p>

<p>Derek, maybe consider NAS? I'm not much of a Drobo fan but maybe consider a 5 bay Synology. They can be found cheap on ebay and then stuff them with Western Digital 3TB Red drives? That might be my winter project this year so I can have NAS, cloud, and dvd and then stop the silly time consuming rotation of hard drive duplication.</p>

[q.g._de_bakker]

I would also stop the time consuming DVD circus, Eric~.<br>Do yourself a favour, and pick as large a HD capacity as you can to put in the NAS.<br><br>Steven, i haven't found an archival print solution. In the age of wet prints and labs offering what we need easy to find, i would print B&W myself and send the rest out. I still let a lab do the printing for prints that are to go on a wall (both colour and B&W - i gave up doing stuff in a head ache inducing dark room a while ago. Only wet thing i still do myself is process my films).<br>Online book print services now look much more attractive than single prints that slip into an album (of course not a substitute for prints destined to adorn walls). But those books probably aren't archival (and don't look as good as a traditional wet print). But the digitized negatives (and the 'real' ones too) are, so it will also be possible to redo the books or single prints.<br><br>I'm with you, JDM, on both the scan everything and scan once things.<br>But i'm sure the generations that follow us will find most of what we put in our archives rubbish and discard it. And i think that is a good thing. We can help them by documenting what the pictures show a bit, so they'll know what the archaeological treasures are, and what's just junk we kept because we thought it 'held promise'.

[digitaldog]

<blockquote>

<p>Online book print services now look much more attractive than single prints that slip into an album (of course not a substitute for prints destined to adorn walls). But those books probably aren't archival (and don't look as good as a traditional wet print).</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Not very archival as they are all toner based (think of them as huge color copiers). <br>

If you're looking for archival print properties, here are two good sites doing the science:<br>

http://www.wilhelm-research.com'<br>

http://www.aardenburg-imaging.com/documents.html</p>

[stevenseelig]

<p>Andrew..great reference links. What do you think is the best archival approach? Obviously, it depends on media, ink and storage. Do you try to archive images?</p>

[EricM]

<blockquote>

<p>I would also stop the time consuming DVD circus, Eric~.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Odd statement after my entries here...All it takes is one click on the wrong web site and *poof*, gone baby gone. Regardless Q., it wont be anytime soon as I'm still grateful for having those few dozen spindles of dvds being responsible for my body of work being with me today.</p>

<p>But who knows, maybe you're right and I throw caution to the wind in the near future when I build a nas. The nas however would be more for my convenience and not for back-up sake. I have two computers with aprox 15TB of hdd's that are aprox 3/4's full and would prefer to have that under one roof with nas and hot swappable hard drives and then be free of the current silly hard drive-back up rotation. Now that's time consuming compared to popping in a dvd in and burning it while I work. ;p</p>

[EricM]

<p>"So screw it, get on with building a nas and just do it, you already have the hard drives" I said to myself after this thread yesterday. I visited ebay and have now won an auction for a Synology Diskstation 5 bay NAS. Runs Plex as well. </p>

[AlanKlein]

<p>Just wondering for the average amateur photographer. Does it make sense to back up everything? I mean, there are only so many decent shots anyway. The rest you'll probably never use. </p>

<p>It reminds me when I use to get 36 prints from my rolls of 35mm film. Only a certain number went into an photo album. Yet I kept all the others anyway; "afraid" to throw them out. But it was really pointless. The ones in the album are all I'm ever going to look at. Yet I still have those boxes of rejected prints.</p>

<p>Isn't it the same with digital storage. Or are we just "afraid" to throw out the stuff that doesn't work and will never ever be looked at much less use?</p>

[digitaldog]

<blockquote>

<p> Does it make sense to back up everything?</p>

</blockquote>

<p>It's a lot easier to do and storage is cheap. Plus what you throw out today, you may very well need tomorrow.<br>

Or backup <strong>after</strong> you edit (delete the losers). </p>

[MichaelChang]

<blockquote>

<p><em>"Does it make sense to back up everything?"</em></p>

</blockquote>

<p>Alan, I think it's more of a matter of personal habits and value judgments. Some people choose to live throughout their lives with little physical baggage while others want to keep everything, often in multiples. There's no right or wrong unless doing one or the other makes you unhappy. </p>

[EricM]

<p>A friend of mine just had her apartment door kicked in. They grabbed a couple pillow cases from the bedroom and stuffed as much of her digital gear into those pillow cases as they could. In 3 mins, all her cameras, laptop, back-up drives...more or less everything that was shinny, was gone. She couldn't even plug in and charge her iphone to start to deal with the disaster....she sure wishes she had backed up everything with off-site copies</p>

[AlanKlein]

Michael: My post was a mea culpa. I've been

dragging around DVDs, prints and negatives of

shots that will never be looked at again. I've been in

my new home for a year and the boxes of old

photos still are not put away much less looked at.

I've got an additional 30 framed photos 16x20" that

won't ever get re-hung but can't let go of them.

 

 

 

My wife and I just moved her mom to a nursing

home and have collected boxes and boxes of her

mother's slides movies and photo albums collected

for nine decades!

 

 

It gets tiring dragging all this

mainly useless baggage around. If I can't actually

get rid of it all, I'm just gripping just to get it off my

chest, that's all. Know what I mean?

[MichaelChang]

<p>Know what you mean, Alan. I'm in a similar situation of needing to purge but unable to for one reason or another. :-) </p>

[kevin_beretta]

<p>I can't see why we are debating either keeping all your digital pics and/or using off-site storage. For $60/year, you can get unlimited off-site storage. Why even worry? Keep or not keep ... your call. Off-site takes the crap out of your domestic life ... :-) (and prevents theft etc.)<br>

Or maybe you all's pics are not worth $60/year, that could be it too :-)</p>

[EricM]

<blockquote>

<p>Or maybe you all's pics are not worth $60/year, that could be it too :-)</p>

</blockquote>

<p>lol, haha</p>

[q.g._de_bakker]

Just because it is easy, and cheap (?) doesn't mean it is sensible, necessary or better.

[digitaldog]

<blockquote>

<p>Just because it is easy, and cheap (?) doesn't mean it is sensible, necessary or better.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Actually no, it <strong>is</strong> better, much better for those of us that prefer easy and cheap over expensive and complicated. I've been handling digital images for nearly 25 years and have never lost one I didn't want to lose, nor have I ever had a virus. That can't be said for some here, by their very admission, who are giving advise. If you prefer a more expensive and complicated workslow, I mean workflow, go right ahead. <br>

If you want to disagree to be disagreeable, you're in good company. </p>

[q.g._de_bakker]

<i>"backup <b>after</b> you edit (delete the losers)"</i> you wrote, Andrew. Which already is more sensible - thus better - and still easy and cheap.<br>The ability to store everything (and i mean everything) fast creates heaps of amalgamated rubbish and good stuff. We still have to sort things out. And paying for remote storage of rubbish is more expensive, unless you pay for far more storage space than you could ever use (then you would be paying too much too).<br>And remember that we are talking about a (paid) back up for rubbish: the original rubbish would still be on your own, local storage. Should you ever need it.<br>So just because it is easy and cheap (?) doesn't mean it is sensible, necessary or better.

[johne37179]

<p>I'm with Andrew on this, except that I no longer use DVDs. DVDs are fragile. Their advantage is that in the event of a catastrophic failure, like a fire, they can be located in another location. I am paranoid about backups. I, too, use a Drobo RAID backup with 24TB of space and three external drives. I'm on a Mac and use Time Machine as well. The only safe rule I know is that all drives fail at some point, but probably not all at the same time, if you keep them well firewalled. Nothing is permanent. Technology tends to be ridged and brittle. For that reason I use a variety of backups. I also have several galleries that have copies of some of my best work (in my mind only, I think). You can only fight the odds, you can't beat them. </p>

[stevenseelig]

<p>I would hate to count the times a client has come back to me and asked if I had a picture of 'Uncle Bob' because they needed a current picture for a 'Mass Card' and the picture was NOT one of my keepers. And I will tell you that in many ways, I feel great satisfaction in being able to provide it to them. Similar types of experiences happen 2-3 times a year.</p>

[digitaldog]

<blockquote>

<p><em>"backup <strong>after</strong> you edit (delete the losers)"</em> you wrote, Andrew. Which already is more sensible - thus better - and still easy and cheap.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>It's a suggestion yes, but it's not necessary. It's not as sensible if like me, time is money and easier and cheaper is <strong>always</strong> better than harder and more expensive. But that's just my workflow, everyone can take the comments and mold one they prefer. Like Steven said about Uncle Bob. I agree with him, I'd rather backup what you call rubbish only to find out later, it's not. </p>

<blockquote>

<p>The ability to store everything (and i mean everything) fast creates heaps of amalgamated rubbish and good stuff.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>And some of us have no issue with the mix! We may not have any sorting to do (and if we do, that's another discussion all together). </p>

<blockquote>

<p>And remember that we are talking about a (paid) back up for rubbish: the original rubbish would still be on your own, local storage. Should you ever need it.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I don't pay any more for remote storage of what you are sure is rubbish. It's unlimited and at a fixed price. It takes more time to upload, I'm asleap when that's happening and could care less. </p>

<blockquote>

<p>So just because it is easy and cheap (?) doesn't mean it is sensible, necessary or better.<br /></p>

</blockquote>

<p>Indeed it does make it better. That's <strong>the entire point of setting up a workflow</strong> based on each persons needs and desires. Backing up '<em>everything</em>' if you want to put that way is easier, faster and in terms of cost (for my workflow), less money in time spent and my hourly fee pays for a year of off site storage in less than an hour of time saved!. Someone with the time to upload only picks can if they so desire do that; this is <em>their</em> preferred workflow. </p>

[EricM]

<p>It hasn't been mentioned yet, but although I'm in favour of dvd/optical burning, my concern is that they are not protected by encryption and just anyone can load them and use them...Maybe the milk crates with my cd's and dvd's will end up in an auction when I'm 80 and some whipper snapper will purchase and discover the next...</p>

<p> </p>

<blockquote>

<p>I don't pay any more for remote storage of what you are sure is rubbish. It's unlimited and at a fixed price. It takes more time to upload, I'm asleap when that's happening and could care less.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Crashplan should run in the background all the time, just in case something should happen. Why do you wait and need to be asleep? Weak computer? You're just bragging about your broadband speed in another thread.</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>I've been handling digital images for nearly 25 years and have never lost one I didn't want to lose...</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I haven't lost any of my wife and pet dog photos, either. Keeping ones files is not hard...we're in a huge club of other successful data sitters.</p>

<p>One media type is for back-up. Multiple mediums to be considered archived. </p>

[digitaldog]

<blockquote>

<p>Crashplan should run in the background all the time, just in case something should happen.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>It does but it runs faster without any foreground processing which is exactly the case when I'm sleeping. </p>

<blockquote>

<p>You're just bragging about your broadband speed in another thread.<br /></p>

</blockquote>

<p>I wonder if you get it. If and when I'm working on the computer, I don't want CrashPlan in any way taking over the processes or uploading data and guess what, it doesn't. It does it when the computer is idle which is why the smart people at CrashPlan built the product that way. </p>

<blockquote>

<p>Multiple mediums to be considered archived.<br /></p>

</blockquote>

<p>All of which can, and as many here are suggesting, be just hard drives. But heck Eric, use whatever backup schema you wish. As someone who's admitted data loss in the past, those reading the various recommendations can take the advise given based on the poster providing it. My track record <em>appears</em>, based on your own writings, to be more solid. </p>

<blockquote>

<p>I haven't lost any of my wife and pet dog photos, either.<br /></p>

</blockquote>

<p>You sure about that or your previous statement is incorrect?</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Or, like myself, that has had a virus infect <strong>everything</strong>...</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Seems you've lost data. </p>

[stevenseelig]

<p>I have seen Crashplan mentioned several times here and elsewhere so I investigated it. Based on the information the company gave me, it would take me 7-8 days to back up a single wedding and 3 years to create a Crashplan back up for all of my digital picture files, running full time 24/7. For my purposes, this really does not seem like a feasible path, even with the software running in the background. The company estimated I would get about 10 GB/day uploaded, an estimate that I have not confirmed yet.<br>

Even more problematic is whether Aperture libraries would come back intact as I don't think they play nice with FAT or NT disk structures. This issue would have to be seriously evaluated.</p>

[digitaldog]

<blockquote>

<p>Based on the information the company gave me, it would take me 7-8 days to back up a single wedding and 3 years to create a Crashplan back up for all of my digital picture files, running full time 24/7</p>

</blockquote>

<p>There is the option of sending them a hard drive. Once the major uploading or in this case hard drive data is in place, you can upload on-site. In the case of a wedding and Crashplan, you may want to put all the hero images on a drive then just plug that in when you want to only upload that data. Or dedicate an upload folder, whatever. This is what I do with my Lightroom database and all associated images. I have one drive that's always on-line. But of course I back that up to other hard drives. After that backup to another drive, CrashPlan will recognize that specific drive and only backup the new data from it. So it is possible to pack up everything to CrashPlan which may be overkill for some, but only backup the most important data when you so desire. You could also just deadicate an old machine for CrashPlan and let it run all the time expect it will slow down the overall bandwidth for other machines uploading or downloading data. So you could again set a time for this to occur when you're away or sleeping. <br>

<br>

There are lots of options. Based on how much data you upload, you can decide what and how often that data needs to go to the cloud. </p>

[stevenseelig]

<p>Yes, you can send them a hard drive. It is limited to 1 TB and I think I was told it can only be done once per operating system. Anyway, 7-8 days to back up one wedding is not a practical solution for me. And I would encourage people to look very carefully at how well Crashplan or any other cloud back solution will work for you. This requires knowledge of how much data you generate over a given time period. I am sure for some, Crashplan is a viable option.</p>