Organizing Your Digital Photos

If you think you can get overwhelmed organizing your traditional film photos you’ll be doubly overwhelmed with how quickly digital images can add up! It’s important to keep current and keep your digital images organized.

Organizing Your Digital Photos
 

• Immediately delete any images you don’t want while taking your photos. This is the first step in organizing digital images. If you aren’t happy with a photo, delete it, and re-shoot on the spot.
   
• Don’t leave images in your digital camera. Download the images into a folder that includes the event and date in the folder name. This is also a good time to delete any images that you don’t want.
   
• Once images are downloaded into a folder on your computer, make an index file. Create a word document and use it to describe the event, people in the photos, location, date, and journaling. This is a must!
   
• If you have time, rename the images to include name, date, location or other reminder of what the photo is about. This can be done later, but it is important. This is also another opportunity to delete any unwanted images or to send images to others via e-mail. The longer you wait to organize digital images the more likely you are to forget the details like location, date, and even people in the photos.
   
• It’s a good idea to back-up your photo inventory on a timely basis so you don’t lose any images if your computer has problems. It’s a good idea to keep different categories of CD or DVD copies too.
   
• There are several excellent software programs that help keep your digital photos organized. Programs like Greenstreet Digital Photo Album Deluxe, OnTheGoSoft Photo Backup and Preclick Photo Organizer. These programs organize, backup, and even allow for digital albums.
   
• Use subfolders for key events like birthdays, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, and other annual events that you know you will take photos. The main folder should have the event name and all subfolders will have the year. For example: Main Folder is Maria’s Birthday; Subfolders are 2003, 2004, 2005, and so on. Vacation folders should include location and year with an index that includes specific dates and people.
   
• If photo editing, make sure you keep the original image intact. Make a copy of the image you want to photo edit and work with that. The more you photo edit, the more the image loses some quality so it’s important that key original images be kept as backup.

Maria Nerius is the author of Creating Your Family Heritage Scrapbook: From Ancestors to Grandchildren, Your Complete Resource and Idea Book for Creating a Treasured Heirloom