I am totally going to nerd out on this post, and don’t say that I didn’t warn you! Something that photographers (and other computer-based professionals) are nuts about is back up. You back up EVERYTHING that you possibly can, in multiple places. If something happens and your work is gone, so is someone else’s work, or their wedding. So it’s huge to have a great system in place for making sure that if something happens to your house or your computer, it won’t destroy any of the work you have created.
Until recently, my back up system was running a RAID array in my own computer, and backing up all the hi-resolution images onto an online cloud storage/gallery called PASS. A RAID array, for those who don’t know, is when you have two hard drives that mirror each other on your computer. So when I would load files onto my drive, another hard drive would automatically copy the pictures. If my main hard drive crashes, I have a back up.
However, I was not quite satisfied with this. Even though all my images would be safe in a fire, I wouldn’t have any extras, or my RAW (unedited, uncompressed) files. That would kill me! After doing a lot of research, I purchased a monthly plan from CrashPlan.
CrashPlan has been awesome so far! The most painful part was the back up of ALL of my files. This took weeks. I think I need to delete some stuff :) But after that, for a low monthly cost, it will automatically back up every file I need on my computer into cloud storage. No monthly limits, and no cost to download the files again if I need them. Another service by Amazon called Backblaze does this, but not only would I have to pay to download any files back from the cloud, but any files I delete from my computer would also be deleted from Backblaze. With CrashPlan, it archives every file ever. So if I deleted a picture and realized I needed it again, rather than sitting on the phone with customer service for hours, I would just access the online storage and have my pictures within minutes. That’s huge!
Finally, I mentioned that all my hi-resolution images are stored in an online gallery. This is actually my client delivery system as well. I upload all the final files in a program called PASS, then send the link to my clients. This gallery will be live for a year, and during that time anyone can download pictures from anywhere in the world. Such an easy system!
After the gallery expires, though, is when the magic begins. Even with an expired gallery, the images stay online for 10 years. That means if your wedding pictures are on your computer and five years later your hard drive crashes, you just have to pay a small fee to revive your gallery, and there are all your wedding pictures. Huge peace of mind for me and my clients. I love it.
So yes, this is a nerdy post, but so necessary. I’m so thankful for storage plans, back ups, and absolute peace of mind to KNOW that no files will be lost! That, my friends, is worth writing about!
A screenshot of CrashPlan doing its thing!
