What type of emergencies do you need to be prepared for as a photographer? Let me give you a few case scenarios.
#1. It was my third wedding. I came home after the wedding ceremony pictures and downloaded everything on my computer. Then a few hours later went back to the reception. After the reception I also "downloaded" (or so I thought) the pictures from the reception. I had just switched editing programs, and unlike the one I had used for the wedding (which downloaded things automatically to your computer when you plug the card in) the new program had not yet been programmed to do so. Even though I had viewed the reception pictures on my computer, unbeknownst to me, I had not actually downloaded them. When I suddenly had the need to use my camera that day, I immediately formatted the card. Yah...you can guess what happened. I soon found out that I had just DELETED ALL MY WEDDING RECEPTION PHOTOS for my client. Let us ponder upon the grave feeling of distaster that I felt in that moment. The supreme humiliation at my lack of professionalism, and my horrific imagination at the confrontation that I would soon have in trying to explain to my client that I had just lost their pictures. The pictures that could never be repeated. Never reshot . A once in a lifetime moment that would never happen again, and now was lost forever. Or was it?
To my extreme gratitude, my discovery actually happened in the presence of another professional photographer. When he discovered what I was suddenly wheeping and whaling about;) he said, "Hey! You can get them back! Don't worry!" Of course I suddenly perked up. He was on his way to Salt Lake City to the camera store Pictureline, which happens to have some "recovery sotware". I called them up, explained my situation, and since I had only reformatted the card, and not yet taken any other pictures, they said that they were almost certain that they could recover them all. Yes, it cost me $40... but I would gladly gladly pay $40 any day over facing a wedding client to inform them that they would go through this life never having a record of their day;)
#2. Well, its been a while since that experience, and as so, I have learned my lesson. I NEVER reformatt my card without certainty that my pictures are 1. downloaded on the computer 2. (usually but not always) also backed up online. Well, this past weekend I experienced another EMERGENCY, but this was a different sort. I shot a wedding, came home to download the event, and only half of the images from the event could be read from the card. In other words...half of my files had become corrupted!!!!! I knew they were on the card, I knew I had shot the pictures, but the camera, as well as the computer would not read them. Well, I called up pictureline again, who could have come to my rescue once more, but I also called another professional photographer friend who routed me another direction. This time? I spent the same $40 downloading software from the internet that does the same thing. Essentially I saved on gas, time, and now own a program that hopefully I will never have to use again, but in the event that I do, I'm prepared. LC Technology International has software that will recover photo files, as well as other files that you may have lost on your hard-drive...accidentally deleted, or maybe you experienced a fatal hard drive crash. Don't feel like all is lost until you first check out this option! They can recover things from compact flash cards, memory sticks, hard drives...etc. etc. Definitely good to know!
Well, this morning I am sitting here as a happy camper with my recovered photos. Thank goodness for recovery software and prayer!
Here are some helpful tips for backing up your photo's to avoid these dreadful situations:
1. BACKUP PHOTOS ONLINE. There are several sites now that provide you online storage options for photos. I personally am a member of smugmug.com. I LOVE smugmug! You pay a yearly fee (quite modest even to my super cheap ways). You can then create galleries online to preserve all your images. They host high quality jpg files and now even host RAWS. They offer unlimited storage space and back up everything in four different states! Aside from the backup characteristic, it is nice to be able to have family and friends see your photos online from anywhere in the world. You can also order prints and their print quality is AWESOME!
2. Have a portable hard drive backup. I recently purchased an Epson P3000 (pictured below). This can be found here at amazon or a few other places online. There are different GB sizes, but this one is 40 GB. When I finish a card from a shoot, I put the card into this guy, and he downloads everything. Now I have the pictures in two places. The card, and the Epson. I can download all my images from the Epson to the computer (which is about 1000x faster than the card reader), and I can also see the images on the Epson's 4x4 screen and delete ones I won't use so all that makes it to the computer is usable work. This also works wonders for travel, and it costs about the same as buying 40GB worth of cards.
Always be sure to be prepared. Back up your images in more than one location, and don't think the world has completed ended if your card becomes corrupted, your computer fails, or you delete your images. Usually there is a recovery!
