Organising Digital Photographs

[Garden Manager]

As a user of a digital camera i have accumulated loads of pictures and have tired various means of organising them , primarily either by date or by category (garden, holidays etc).

I was wondering how fellow digital photographers out there organised your photos and also where you stored them, as prints, on the PC or on CD/DVD.

Thanks

[Garden Manager]

[WASSISNAME]

I store mine on the PC but make backup copies onto a cd or dvd when I have the full amount i.e. 700 megs worth for a cd.
Organise them is another thing ::) ::) I usually rename them when on the pc to a name that indicates what the photo is, 'cos file no dsc00000072 does not mean a thing to me

[Garden Manager]

I store mine on the PC but make backup copies onto a cd or dvd when I have the full amount i.e. 700 megs worth for a cd.
Organise them is another thing ::) ::) I usually rename them when on the pc to a name that indicates what the photo is, 'cos file no dsc00000072 does not mean a thing to me

Thats a bit like what I do. There are a couple of issues with renaming the pics. Firstly it takes ages to do when you have a lot of them (i started to do this and soon gave up when i got bored).

Secondly if you want the pics in chronological order they tend to get out of order once they are renamed, particularly if you have a problem with the computer and have to take them off and reload once the PCs OK again.

This happened to me  just over a year ago. Every photo taken before the problem 'lost' its date and time information (which the camera gives it when taken). Thankfully I had not renamed that many (see above) so the original names could be used as a reference to get things back in order. So the 'names' given by the camera can be quite usefull (if a little undescriptive!).

[wardy]

My camera automatically makes a new folder (by date) and files the pictures into it but it's meaningless so I file them like I would anything else.  I always imagine files as drawers so instead of pants and socks I've got lotty, dog, family, website, In Bloom, etc  Also I have a folder for occasions like parties or holidays so that each time I have a pic I can "put it away" in the proper place.  It also makes it easier when you come to put them onto CD as well.  So when I want to find a photo there's always a logical place to look.  Well that's the idea  :)

[KevB]

Hi All, Go to the link below, it not only chronologically (bet thats spelt wrong)organises but allows various tweaks as well that even a novice can cope with!!

FREE programme from google!!

Cheers KevB

http://picasa.google.co.uk/

[WASSISNAME]

Yes re naming them can be boring, but it's better than watching paint dry 'cos that's really boring

[kenkew]

I put relevent pics in folders, such as Family, garden, dog, plot etc and then name them individually with a name that gives me some info. IE:
Pic's about building my new greenhouse would be; 001Ghouse.2Nov04.   the next one would be 002Ghouse.2Nov04 etc. The code is, pic number, subject, day, month and year.
That way I know the order I took the pic's, the subject matter, and the date. So even if I took many pic's of the same subject on the same day they would still be in order.

[tim]

Kev - b....y amazing!! Thanks.

[Derekthefox]

Like some others, I save according to subject, within relevant folders. After that they are sorted generally by date, or alternatively by topic. It seems to work ...

Derekthefox :D

[KevB]

Kev - b....y amazing!! Thanks.

Glad you found it useful Tim, there are quite a few tweaks you can do with it!!
Cheers Kevb
ps Merry Christmas

[redimp]

Try this looks good but do not know what it is like.  http://www.joejoesoft.com/rm.php

[montanum]

Go to Google and download Picasa it's a super program and easy to use.
                                          Montanum

[Gardengirl]

I organise my photos as much of the others have done, eg: family - pets - holidays - days out etc.  Then within each main folder I have sub-folders for each separate occasion.  I do not have to date my photos as the camera does this for me - gives me the date and the time the photo was taken.  When the folder is getting quite full I burn them onto CD's as backup and then add to them as when required.

[Garden Manager]

I used to organise the photos thus:

garden pictures  (in chronological order)

Everything else (in chronological order with seperate folder for each year)

This was then backed up onto rewritable CDs (so they could be updated), with the folders on the PC structured the same as the disks so that I knew what ws on each disk and could back up easily.

Garden pictures were done seperately since there are so many more of them than any other category!

Recently I have found ths a bit cumbersome, with some categories split into 2 or three sections. Hence why i started this topic to get advice on how to do it better. i am now thinking 'by category' is better and will make pictures easier to find in future.  At the end of the day, the simplest ways are often the best!

Thanks for replies

PS I have donloaded 'picasa' just to try it out.

[jaggythistle]

  Ok am the dim one so will ask....just how many pics can you get on a disc...

                                         ???????

    Is it gonna be like how longs a piece of string..??

[redimp]

Depends on the size and the quality of the photos ;D

[WASSISNAME]

jaggythistle, as said it depends on the size and quality of the photos, you will obviously get more Jpg files than Tiff or Raw or Psd files onto a disc, BUT as a rough estimate a  file of a photo measuring 7 inches by 5 inches uncompressed will be about 1 meg and maybe compressed by jpg perhaps 100 kb so you should be looking at 700 plus photos Hope this helps with you question. If my calculations are not right I am sure that someone here will correct me  ;D