Are my photos protected?
The photographer just left and now you wait for the final gallery. What happens to your photos in that time? Are you photos properly protected? This is an important conversation to have with your photographer while booking.
In my close to 10 years of being a photographer. I’ve learned that you can never be too careful when it comes to data management. I’ve seen horror stories of a hard drive crashing or a memory card corrupting and all the photos are just gone. It’s nightmare scenario for everyone involved. Especially when it’s not a shoot that can be redone. This is why it’s so important to have a conversation with your photographer about their data management after your shoot.
Everyone has their own process, but are likely very similar to others. This is what has worked for me.
During the Shoot…..
Most professional cameras have two card slots now. With that second card slot your photos can automatically be saved on two memory cards throughout the shoot. I make sure to have backups on my second card for every shoot. Even if they are just smaller size jpgs, you still have a backup incase a memory card randomly corrupts during the shoot.
Immediately after the Shoot….
There are times when I’m heading home from a shoot that I need to make a stop at the store or pick up dinner. Whenever that happens I make sure my equipment, at the very least my memory cards, are with me at all times. I will take my camera bag with me through Meijer, even if it’s just for a minute, so there is no chance of anything being stolen. It only takes a second for that to happen, and it’s not worth the risk.
Once I get home the photos are immediately transferred to my computer, unless that was already done during the shoot. Once that transfer is done, I will make another copy of the photos on an external drive. If I have a large editing backlog I will often make a second copy of the photos to another external because I might not have the space to keep the photos on my computer. I will make sure all the of copies are done before I go to bed. It could be midnight after a wedding, but I need to make sure the backups are done before I can comfortably go to sleep.
At this point I have two copies on memory cards, a copy on my computer, and two external hard drive copies. Once I make sure the copies are complete I can delete the backup sd card and use it for the next shoot. The main memory cards and the backup external will then go into a fireproof safe and stay there until the gallery is delivered. I still have the gallery on my computer and/or my main external to work off of.
Most of the time these backups are unnecessary, but it’s nice to have them when you need them. I’ve had a few files from a wedding end up corrupting in the gallery and I was able to go back to the memory cards and get the images back. In this case these photos were almost identical to others that weren’t corrupted, but it was still nice to know that I had the backups available to me.
After Delivery….
Once the gallery is delivered via online gallery(another backup), I no longer need all the backups. The gallery that I’ve been working off of is backed up one final time to my photo server with an automatic cloud backup. The memory cards are formatted and ready for the next shoot and the external drives can be deleted as well.
In the event that the gallery needs to be sent again or more edits are needed. I still have access and can make the edits as needed.
To summarize, It’s important to make sure your photographer is properly handling your photos.
You wouldn’t want something to happen to memories that can’t be replicated.
Talk to your photographer about photo management!!