Digital Photo Management - Alternatives to the Shoebox
When is the last time you saw someone use a film camera? Yeah, me too! Back when you used a film camera you probably looked through your developed photos, picked out the best to go into an album and then tossed the envelope with the rest of the photos and negatives into a shoebox in the closet. Now, you offload your digital photos onto your computer, click through them and post the best on Facebook or email them to grandma. But where do you go from there?
There are lots of ways to deal with digital photos, many of them excellent options, so I am not saying there is a right or a wrong way to go. In the interest of simplicity, I am focusing on the programs and websites that I personally use to manage, backup, and store my digital photos.
By the way, all of these options work with Macs, iPads, and iPhones as was as with Windows and Android devices. If you'd like some help setting any of this up, call me to schedule an appointment!
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Photo Organization - Picasa
When you import photos into Windows they automatically go to the "Photos" file, in folders that you name yourself. This is a fine system, and for many years I didn't go any further than that. However as you accumulate more and more photos on your computer it become difficult to keep track of your pictures and find that perfect one you are looking for.
There are many photo organizing software programs out there, but I use Google's Picasa. It's relatively easy to use, includes some nice photo editing software, and is free, my favorite word!
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Picasa leaves your photos in their original Windows folders - it just gives you an easier way to look at them, sort them, and organize them. One of my favorite features is "Name Tagging". Picassa will pick out every single face in your photos and allow you to assign a name to it. It creates a virtual folder for each name, so you can easily find that perfect picture you KNOW you have of Aunt Matilda!
Cloud Storage - Flickr
Your pictures represent irreplaceable memories, and keeping them in only one place is a terrible risk. At the very least you should copy them to an external drive or burn them onto DVDs on a regular basis. If you don't know how to do that type of backup I can help you set it up, but to be truly safe you will also want to keep your photos somewhere offsite, in the "cloud".
There are a lot of cloud photo sites out there, but I recently copied every single photo I have to Yahoo's Flickr. Why did I choose to do that? Because Flickr has chosen to offer everybody who signs up for an account with them ONE TERABYTE of photo storage absolutely free. To put that into perspective, I have been using digital cameras since 2000, have over 12,000 photos on my computer, and my photo folder is only about 80 gigabytes. In other words, I will most likely never fill up the space Flickr is giving me for free.
It can take a while to get all your photos up on Flickr, but once you do you can create both public and private albums, sharing as much or as little as you like of your photos with family and friends. It's a bit of effort but it's certainly worth it to have a free, offsite, complete backup of your digital photos.
Smartphone Photos - Dropbox
In the past few years I have found myself taking more and more pictures with my phone, and I am not the only one. Both iPhones and Android phones come with decent built in cameras, and it's very convenient to only carry one device. However, transferring the pictures from your phone to your other devices can be a pain in the neck. My solution is to use Dropbox and its automatic camera upload application.
Dropbox is a cloud based file sharing program, which people use for many different reasons, but none are simpler than using its iPhone or Android app to automatically upload every photo you take to your Dropbox account. Simply sign up for an account, install the application on your phone, and tell it you wish to use the camera uploader. You can either log into your Dropbox account from any computer to view your photos, or you can install Dropbox on your PC or tablet and open the Dropbox folder there to see and transfer pictures.
Dropbox starts you off with 2 GB of storage for free, but you can earn more by following various steps such as referring friends to the service. If you decide you want to try it, click on this referral link to sign up, and you and I will each get an additional 500 MB of Dropbox storage space when you install the application on your computer!
Julie Marto, the ComputerMom, has been providing friendly and personal technical support and training in Medfield and neighboring communities for over 16 years. For more information visit http://www.thecomputermom.com/ or like her on Facebook
