backing up and organizing photos | my ENTIRE workflow

Backing up your photos and keeping them organized is essential. Here's how I do it.

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[ChrisRoutledge]

There's an old saying in archive management: if it doesn't exist in three places it doesn't exist.

[afiskandar]

When it comes to storage, 2 is 1 and 1 is none. I have 3 hdd for backup. We need more of these short tips videos Matt :)

[themokap]

Heyy thanks for sharing! I love your honesty about not liking the storage part and not being too technical about these devices😂

[CookedLight]

Great job. I work in IT...a lot of our own engineers and clients aren’t this clued up about backup!! I am going to make sure they all watch this when they question why. A raid will be inside a NAS, network attached storage that you plug into your router, or sometimes they can be plugged into the computer where they get called DAS, direct attached storage. They work exactly the same. But you will still need an off-site copy, you could get a friend to buy the same box and you can back up to each other’s nas over the internet. The most cost-effective for individuals is RAID5 where you use 4 disks, you “lose” one disk capacity but any one disk can fail and the other 3 carry on regardless while you buy and install a replacement, usually while the nas is still running...”hot swap” is the term to look for.

[galtidea]

So interesting about creating a Lightroom catalog for each event and it follows the RAW files. That's so smart.

[BillMcCarroll]

Good tips Matt. My backup includes a Drobo 5DS with a backup to Backblaze. Can’t beat unlimited cloud storage for the price of Backblaze.

[cwdaly]

Great & important video. The Samsung T5 & T7 also have the ability to be encrypted. That’s how I use my T7s.

[nathanwabre]

Great video and so overlooked topic that causes a lot of anxiety and troubles in every one daily life.
From my personal experience as a professional photographer and filmmaker, I have tried a lot of different systems and methods: from the good old manual double backup to the 4 slot RAID NAS storage system and passing by the software processed backups...
Guess where I am now? Back to the hood old manual backup! And to me this is the ONLY way to go and keep the control on the most important thing ever: you creations, your files, your time, your memories, ...

All the previous mentioned methods will fail at some point and the process to bring those files back is... you will not do it and give up!
My rules ans process:
1. Buy enough SD cards so you NEVER format them before delivering the project to the client
2. Have at least 2 different drives (3 would be better but ok a budget 2 can be ok is you do the right things) which have all the same exact content on them
3. Each time you unload your SD cards you copy FROM the SD card to each and every single Drive you have for that.
4. Once the files are backup on each drive, keep on at your desk to work ok the files BUT BRING THE OTHERS ELSEWHERE!
5. When finished working on the project, save all modified files, all the data’s, presets, luts, XPM, XML, methadatas, etc.. first on the main disc you are working on.
the project to all of these same discs
6. Then, bring back to your desk ONE of the backup disk and update it with all the new and modified content of the project. If you have two backup discs (3 drives total), bring the other another time and do the same thing.
7. Make sure all the backup discs have now the same exact content on them ( number, weight of the projects)
6. Have an online backup now - or you can use the private gallery you have made for the client or Vimeo or something like this if you use it anyway.
7. Once you have the feedback of the client, wait a month or two and format your SDs.

Also, AVOID Western Digital products as much as Lexar SD cards!!!! All I had crashed!!!


Good luck and cheers!

[hossmacian]

I'm the same way with Lightroom. Have a main folder for the year, then a folder with the YYYY-MM-DD and description of the images in that folder, dump the files in there and create a new catalog for just that folder. But being in the IT field, data backup to the cloud is huge to me. I use Code 42 Crashplan for small business. All of my files end up on 1 computer that acts like "the server" (my iMac) and then Code 42 runs a backup every night. And it's saved my butt in the past when an 8TB drive died on me that had everything on it. Just got a new one then ran the restore for the cloud and everything was back exactly where it was.

[Jakob-Long]

In regards to ChronoSync:
i'm old school kinda guy and like to use command to get things done.
For my file sync needs I use rsync which comes with OSX and linux based system.
For you windows users out there robocopy does the same thing and it's free :D

[AeromaticXD]

Holy crap, this seems kind of overwhelming to think about. Hard drives are also kind of pricey too!

[PaulBuckles]

When the Mandalorian took his helmet off in the last episode I could have sworn it was Matt.

[ah]

One thing you can do to get a photo from your Mac straight to your photos is Bluetooth/air drop it as well. Saves you a step and it’s so easy for photos and files from Mac to Mac for example!

[usefulidiot]

PSA: If you don't have a backup off site, it's not backed up. Also - RAID is NOT a backup.

[AmpedGaming]

Getting a small NAS could be a great upgrade - you can get a cheaper one and a few terabyte SSDs and be comparable to the price of the Armorlock. Some also have built-in raid functionality.

[aperturecollect]

If you get a raid drive make sure those photos are backed up also. I had a raid drive die. The hard drives are still in there, but I need to get a duplicate raid box to read them.

[Chalito]

I like this approach to your back up. Simple and to the point.

[alanholzmanphoto]

Thanks Matt. Even 3 years after you posted this I still rewatch it for backup guidance. My least favorite part of photography as well.

[mayan]

From what I was told from my bother who worked at a tech repair shop is that you SHOULD NOT buy western digital drives because the main port is sawdered on so if it breaks the whole drive basically fucked while with seagate drives you can easily fix the port if it breaks. He did tell me this 2 years ago so it might have changed but I kinda doubt it.

[alexanderlopez]

Don’t ever give up on your dreams! You can achieve youtube greatest!!!