Digital Memory Management
I was just talking with a friend about this: how I organize my photos and videos. I’ve had a rock solid system for years, that I’ve likely blogged about before but it’s worth revisiting. Like organizing anything, finding the system and getting started takes time. Falling behind takes time, too. The regular maintenance is a breeze, though, and makes me feel like I have a good handle on the output of all the snapping I do.
Phone to Computer clean out and organization
About every other month I move my favorite photo/videos from phone to computer. My convention for computer saving is simple: a folder for each year, and within each a folder for each month.
I batch select photos from my phone and send them to my computer to save. Once they’re on my computer, I delete them from my phone (unless they’re a FAVORITE like the most recent family photo). This keeps my phone decluttered, easy so sift through, prevents storage issues and also makes it very clear where I left off from when I go through this process next time.
External hard drive back up
2-3 times a year I move the very, very best photos from my computer to an external hard drive. This is my omg-if-the-computer-exploded-would-I-have-the-important-memories-safe!? insurance. I have the external hard drive folders structured like the computer folders: year & month.
Family yearbooks
Each year around Christmas break I put together our annual family yearbook. I’ve been using Mixbook for this. I upload my favorite photos from each month and organize them into layouts/pages. I like to start the book with a few paragraphs recapping the year. Some year I add a few sentences on what we did each month. I enjoy spending downtime during the holidays building this and doing the reflection. It’s fun to click “order” and flip through each new book in early January, and even more fun having our photos physically at reach anytime.
Printed photos
This is something I started recently: 1-2 times a year printing out 4x6s of our real good photos. I typically print 2 or 3 copies: 1 for me, 1 for general use (to send to daycare, for Dad to take to work, to cut up for a kids craft, etc.) and 1 for the boys to display in their rooms or hold on to. I do this especially for the boys to have access to their memories. C has really started treasuring things like family photos, school pictures and soccer team photos. These have been very helpful for storing prints.
Kids art
Boy is this starting to pile up at our house! We put things on the fridge, we let the boys display some in their rooms. I keep a pile in the basement. When it gets big, I go through it and toss the tossable art and take photos of the keepers. Those photos get printed in a book (typically Chatbook), which goes in their big individual school memory boxes.
A good Instagram idea
Now here's a thought: there are some photo book companies that will print your Instagram photos right into a photobook. You could do this on a regular basis from an account you have today. You could also create another (private or public) account and upload there regularly for this purpose. It would be an easy way to capture the quick moments.
All of these processes feel like a chore. I keep reminders on my calendar to stay on top of it. In reality most of these tasks take less than 15 minutes. I’m not too precious about it, I select the photos I like without spending time on each in detail and move/save them. Space hasn’t been an issue for me (yet), but knowing I have our treasured moments well secured and available to me in a variety of ways gives me so much peace of mind.
Phone to Computer clean out and organization
About every other month I move my favorite photo/videos from phone to computer. My convention for computer saving is simple: a folder for each year, and within each a folder for each month.
I batch select photos from my phone and send them to my computer to save. Once they’re on my computer, I delete them from my phone (unless they’re a FAVORITE like the most recent family photo). This keeps my phone decluttered, easy so sift through, prevents storage issues and also makes it very clear where I left off from when I go through this process next time.
External hard drive back up
2-3 times a year I move the very, very best photos from my computer to an external hard drive. This is my omg-if-the-computer-exploded-would-I-have-the-important-memories-safe!? insurance. I have the external hard drive folders structured like the computer folders: year & month.
Family yearbooks
Each year around Christmas break I put together our annual family yearbook. I’ve been using Mixbook for this. I upload my favorite photos from each month and organize them into layouts/pages. I like to start the book with a few paragraphs recapping the year. Some year I add a few sentences on what we did each month. I enjoy spending downtime during the holidays building this and doing the reflection. It’s fun to click “order” and flip through each new book in early January, and even more fun having our photos physically at reach anytime.
Printed photos
This is something I started recently: 1-2 times a year printing out 4x6s of our real good photos. I typically print 2 or 3 copies: 1 for me, 1 for general use (to send to daycare, for Dad to take to work, to cut up for a kids craft, etc.) and 1 for the boys to display in their rooms or hold on to. I do this especially for the boys to have access to their memories. C has really started treasuring things like family photos, school pictures and soccer team photos. These have been very helpful for storing prints.
Kids art
Boy is this starting to pile up at our house! We put things on the fridge, we let the boys display some in their rooms. I keep a pile in the basement. When it gets big, I go through it and toss the tossable art and take photos of the keepers. Those photos get printed in a book (typically Chatbook), which goes in their big individual school memory boxes.
A good Instagram idea
Now here's a thought: there are some photo book companies that will print your Instagram photos right into a photobook. You could do this on a regular basis from an account you have today. You could also create another (private or public) account and upload there regularly for this purpose. It would be an easy way to capture the quick moments.
All of these processes feel like a chore. I keep reminders on my calendar to stay on top of it. In reality most of these tasks take less than 15 minutes. I’m not too precious about it, I select the photos I like without spending time on each in detail and move/save them. Space hasn’t been an issue for me (yet), but knowing I have our treasured moments well secured and available to me in a variety of ways gives me so much peace of mind.