Photo storage problems ??????????

TONY C.

TONY C.

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Hi all, i dont know where to post this question so will try on basics, i have been taking lots of pics recently using Raw, it seems that i am using lots of disc space on the computer i keep getting warnings ie (disk space filling up) my question is what does everyone else do in this situation? does raw use lots of space? do you store them somewhere else off the computer. :shrug: any advise would be appreciated, cheers, tony.
 
Google - external hard disk, and yes raw files take up a fair bit of room.

If you don't need raw just save as jpeg.
 
Hi Anthony


I'm sure someone will come along & ask technical questions like what computer system are you running , how much RAM, memory etc etc.....

I run 2 portable hard drives ,up load to my computer , do editing & whatever then back up my images on to both ( I do suffer with paranoia , especially since 1 of them had a fit & wouldn't let me access it ! ) to clear the computer down. If I want to edit more I simply do it straight from the hard drives . Hope this helps ?
 
Sounds like you may be running a laptop or older PC for storing your RAW photos, Because they do tend to come with fairly small hard drives 250/320 & 500gb being typical. Easiest solution is to get an external hard drive, Good makes to look out for are Buffalo, Seagate, Western Digital or Samsung. but i would buy one anyway to backup files, Or if you've got a desktop tower PC install another hardrive, You may need advice if you dont know what type of drive your PC needs or if it needs its jumper setting to slave. Any local PC shop should be able to advice correctly.
 
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I've noticed that some Win Vista/7 configurations partition the (usually singular) hard drive into a smaller 'C' (for system) and a larger 'D' (for data) drives - and then defaults all document storage into the smaller C partition, causing the system partition to become full very easily (especially if extra software is also installed). This might not be your scenario at all, but I thought I'd toss it into the mix.

I've got three physical hard drives in my computer and I also have two external USB hard drives - which were intended to be used for on and off-site backup but have ended up being used more for 'overflow' and also like extra large memory sticks - nothing like a fingers-crossed approach to back-up, eh? ;)
 
I store everything up to the current year on external hard drives. Just have current stuff on the desktop that I may still need to edit (and have it backed up of course to externals).

Raw files can be pretty big, but storage space is very affordable these days. You don't need fancy Thunderbolt, Firewire, or even USB 3 drives for backup. You're not going to be working off them, so just get affordable (but decent quality) drives to bung everything on.

Besides that, try using fewer punctuation marks when typing to free up a few extra bytes. ;)
 
Hi all, and thanks for your reply's i have taken all the above advice and bought an external hard drive it holds 640 GB so should get me started. i have been downloading my raw files straight into Elements 10 and saving as tiff, instead of into canon zoombrowser not sure if that is the best way? but i was getting warnings flashing up saying my disk drives were filling up (i use a laptop) so hopefully problem should be solved. Cheers Tony.
 
Unless you plan to print your images very large, or are using the Tiffs for something like HDR, then saving as a Tiff is a very wasteful use of memory imho.

A maximum quality Jpeg should be enough for most uses. :) And also save a lot of disk space compared to Tiffs. ;)
 
I'm guessing that there will be a way of saving edited photos in light room as a finished jpeg and that way i can get rid of the raw file?
Don't want to get rid of all my raw files but there are a large number of photos i would be happy to just keep the edited jpeg and ditch the raw.
 
I would never get rid of the RAW file unless it is a really duff. Digital Negatives and all that. Should always keep your negatives imho.
 
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