Editor’s Note: This is the first in a four part series discussing the preservation of photos. And as a reminder, Let’s Talk Photography will be moving in the near future to its permanent home on the Tuesday family page.

Welcome to another edition of Let’s Talk Photography! Today’s topic is one that I think will appeal to a lot of the casual shooters out there. I’d like to discuss the process of moving your images off the camera and onto the computer.

I know it doesn’t seem like a very complicated task or project, but preserving your images and organizing them in a way that you can recall them easily actually takes a bit of strategy and planning. And, if you put together a plan early and stick to it, you’ll find that your memories will be that much more meaningful when you’re looking back on them. Believe me, I’ve been through this and I know what a mess it becomes when you start looking back to find a photo and you are overwhelmed by the mess that is your photo catalog.

Before I begin, I must take a moment to make a very strong point here so you’re not upset with me at any point during or after this article. I’m going to share with you a method that I use and that seems to continue to work for me. You can Google photo organization strategies on the Internet and find many different ways to do this. I’ve tried several and this is my plan of attack so please take what you can from this and use it as a starting point.

The first thing to do in preserving your memories is to get them off that camera and onto the computer. When the photos are stored on your camera, they are just a bunch of ones and zeros sitting on a memory stick or flash card, or perhaps your camera has built-in storage in which case it is the same technology but permanently fixed inside the camera. This method of storage seems like it lasts forever. You’ve probably got years of photos sitting on your camera and they seem fine right where they are. Well, if this is your method of storage then you’re going to be in for a huge shock when the inevitable

happens. Flash storage like this has a limit and when the card starts degrading it can no longer hold your images safely. Also, these cards are highly sensitive to static electricity. If you’re carrying your camera or card around and you build up a high amount of static electricity then go to set it down somewhere that you might get a shock, you may have just lost all your data. That’s why it’s important to get the photos onto your computer quickly so you can start organizing them and looking at them on a much bigger screen than that little thing on the back of the camera.

Using the software that came with your camera is a great starting point for transferring the images off the camera. This software will automatically put the images into the default “Pictures” or “Photos” folder on your computer. It will also give you the ability to view the photos in full resolution and may even give you some ability to edit them. If your camera didn’t come with software, or you lost it or don’t want to use it, you can usually just plug the camera into a USB port on the computer or even remove the memory card and insert it into a slot in most modern computers and simply drag and drop the photos into the folder of your choosing. When you plug the camera directly into the computer with the USB cable, it mounts the camera like it’s a hard drive or storage device. You can browse the camera’s files just like you were looking for a file on your computer and when you find the ones you want, just copy and paste them into a folder on your computer.

Here comes a tip that is driven from experience: At some point in time you will want to begin to backup your files on your computer to prevent losing them in a crash. To avoid the confusion of having to create a custom backup plan for your images, it is my suggestion that you put your photos into the default “Pictures” folder on your computer. On Windows computers, this folder is called “Pictures” and on Mac computers, this folder is called “Pictures.” Are you seeing the trend here? Every photo organizing program that you ever want to use will automatically put your files into these folders by default and they will automatically search these folders for your pictures files by default. If you stick with these folders, you’ll be able to jump right into organizing and backing up your photos with minimal effort and no confusion.

Remember, your photos will always remain in the same physical location on your computer no matter what software you are using. If you move them off your camera with the software that came with your camera and then open a program like Photoshop Elements to do some fancy editing, you are looking at the same picture on your computer in the same folder location no matter which program you are using. When you put photos on your computer you are putting them in a physical location, not in a program. I’ve had questions like “How do I move my pictures from my camera’s software to Photoshop?” The answer is, if you use the default pictures folder, just open Photoshop and they’ll be there.

In the next installment of Preserving Your Memories, we’ll talk about putting together an organizational plan that may save you a lot of time.

Until then, happy shooting!

Is there a topic that you’d like to learn more about? Send feedback, share your photos, or offer topic suggestions to talkphotos@ecklof.com. If you’re looking for a place to connect with local photographers in Chautauqua County, search for the group “Shoot ‘n Share Chautauqua” on Facebook.