Are We The Lost Generation?

[Kayla Lamoreaux]

If all your digital files had to reside outside your computer would they look something like this? I am afraid mine could be something very similar or even worse!

So much of our lives are in digital content, computer documents, digital scrapbooking files, and digital photographs. We focus on backing up our images but truth be told if you had to go through all your backups to find an important image, could you find it?

Last week I took a great class by the owner of my favorite photography store about digital image archiving. I learned so much from him about digital images - RGB - Pixels - backup - metadata - all integral parts of digital asset management.

He said one thing that really made me think . I had heard it before but in the context of what he was teaching it had more impact: We are so digital and all of our images are stored on computer hard drives (which it is only a matter of WHEN they will fail), we could be the LOST GENERATION.

Think about it. If your hard drive failed tomorrow, what would you lose? If a major disaster hit your house do you have an off site backup of your most important digital files?

Think to the future - if your grandchildren went through your hard drive, (assuming it will last until they are born which it probably won't) would they know which photographs were most important to you and why? By the time they get to it will the format you saved those images in still be valid?

When you think about formats think about those old 5" floppy drives. Remember them? What if all your photo files were stored on them? 3.5" floppy drives? Zip drives? The list could go on forever.

It all brings up more questions than answers. Yet these are important questions and things we should consider as scrapbookers. I love this recent quote I read by Peter Krogh -

"Some people put off Digital Asset Management (DAM) because it sounds boring or worse seems irrelevant to their photography. News Flash: DAM applies to everybody; pro photographer, designer, amateur, family snapper, videographer... If you create any digital content, be it pictures, Word documents or invoices you need some sort of DAM. DAM will add value to your images because it will help you find them and protect them. The pixel value of your best images are worthless if you can't locate them."

We used to worry about not writing the who, what, where, and when on the back of our printed photographs. If we all don't make some changes - forget the tags of who, what , where and when - we won't even have the images.

I realize this post is full of more questions than answers - it is here to make you think. Some more things to think about:

1.) Are you backing up your images in three different places?
Different ways to backup your images include external hard drives, online storage, prints, CD/DVD (make sure you are working with a product that will last beyond 7-8 yrs. hint the office supply cd won't do).

2.) Are you using something more than file names and folders to describe the content of your images?
Managing them this way is a start, but it sets you up for all sorts of issues in the future. For example of you have a photo of two of your children, do you duplicate the file three times and put it in each of their folders and a siblings folder? Using the filename to describe an image is also something people do - the problem is it sets you up for all sorts of issues down the road - illegal characters, problems with different OS accepting naming conventions, length of name, etc.

3.) Are you using photo management software that is as easy to get out of as it is to get into it?
There is nothing more frustrating than spending days, weeks and months to add metadata to your images only to learn that when a better program comes along you won't be able to get all that work out of it. So before choosing any software to organize your photos, make sure that any information you have entered moves on with you to the new software.

The only thing constant in all of this management of images is change. Our instructor shared the following video with us in class and it opens your mind up to all the possibilities and change that is coming down the line. Personally I can't wait for the new fiber optic cable from Japan - maybe then true online backup that takes minutes instead of days will be a reality!

[Ann Johnson]

Kayla - that video was very interesting. Where will we be in 5 years. Crazy world - My back-up system for the digital word is still printing everything. I would love to get a handle on the digital world, very overwhelming.

[Suzan Mabry]

What an eye-opener! I have been backing up my files in three different , but I don't have an "off-site" location. It makes sense...fires, tornadoes, etc., could wipe me out. I'm going to call my sister and tell her about this. We could exchange backup DVD's! Thanks for the info.

[Marcie_H]

Great post Kayla! This is something I think about off and on but I really just don't know where to start. I would definitely be interested in taking a class on something like this.

Thanks,
Marcie