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Back it up…
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I heard a story on Radio Ulster the other morning about a photographer that got his house broken in to ! Not only was the camera, PC and all the equipment stolen but the memory cards and external hard drives were taken to. He had just done a wedding the friday before he was robbed and was appelling for help in the recovery of the lost images (memory cards)
The newly weds are still on honeymoon and dont know yet and am sure they will be quite anoyed. Really feel for this fella must be so gutted as all his work is lost !!Made me think about my backed up files which used to sit on an external HD on top of the PC but now i have it stored safely away out of sight incase the worst would happen. i update my files every week with any new stock or finished images, this may seem a bit much to some people but i would go clean crazy if i lost my stock due to a viris or theif etc..
How do you back up ? and how often ?
The lads have already been discussing this in quite a bit of detail over on this thread:
https://www.photographyireland.net/viewtopic.php?t=14576&highlight=
On a side to that story, every time I finish a shoot, I take the memory cards out of the camera and put them in my pocket. I also tend to back them up on to a portable storage device like the Canon M80. So, worst case if my camera kit is stolen, is that I still have the memory cards in my pocket with the images.
You can never cater for all possible situations, but you can make your best effort.
Having your home burgled or even (perish the thought) burned down, then the vast majority of my stuff would be gone. Some images (about 60%) I have stored off-site, but I only do that twice a year. Some stuff is online (between FlickR and my website). The rest, would be lost to history.
Sorry about the repeat thread :( didnt see the other one.
I have online storage but it would never hold it all or no where near ! a lot of the finised images are stored on XDrive (Aol free 5G storage) which is quite safe and handy if i want to send an image to someone.
How very topical. My house was burgled on Monday.
RGH_Photography wrote:
Made me think about my backed up files which used to sit on an external HD on top of the PC but now i have it stored safely away out of sight incase the
worst would happen.If the worst would happen then storing it safely out of sight means nothing, as they would go through every single space and drawer, like they did in my place.
Fortunately for me my thief was inexperienced and somewhat tidy :roll: and was most likely panicked, dropping the (my) backpack with random lenses & stuff and laptop in the living room – ready to go – before making off.
As for equipment I’m extremely extremely (extremely) lucky. I still have everything. He made off with my Canon M80 that I bought off Rossco last week, my older backup device that I was going to sell soon and a couple of other gadgets. Credit cards, passport, spare car keys, other stuff is all there – even though he went through them all.
The biggest worry now is that someone knows what’s there and could clean it out in no time if so inclined.
So it’s also forced me to re-think my back-up strategy. There’s enough paranoia about corrupt data and ‘how much is enough’ but off-site storage now seems to a be very reasonable and necessary (unfortunately) option. Copies of pics is one thing, but what about supporting applications, documentation & other resources too, so a backup routine would also be necessary (excellent resources on the other thread btw).
I’ve never been burgled before, it doesn’t follow me around, but it is an inevitability in today’s world. Seems that 2 or 3 backup drives at home isn’t good enough.
A bit shaken by the experience but I’m otherwise grand. I have been warned!
Stas
cant imagine how you feel, hope they get caught, but it just reminded me to take my serial numbers, i meant to do it twice before, you should put the gear on the stolen items forum.
gazhmm… i actually dont back up any of my stuff. Partly because I dont care much for anything Ive taken, cause my photos suck. Although, I also never really felt the need to cause my pc has a 640gb harddrive…somthin to think about though!! poor guy.
Thanks guys.. I felt so much better after finding all my kit still there… the backup devices are optional and ultimately replaceable, esp as I had already downloaded the most recent pics the day before. The 70-200mm f/2.8 L IS was almost in that bag and ready to go together with the laptop – that would have given me more to think about!
garyr wrote:
but it just reminded me to take my serial numbers, i meant to do it twice before, you should put the gear on the stolen items forum.
gazI still have the box for the old backup device but it doesn’t have the serial number on it anywhere… good thing I made a note of it before – best not to put it off so. You don’t know what’s around the corner.
Been looking for the/a stolen items forum actually… care to point me in the right direction? Thx
Now I just need to get my arse into gear and decide how to go about the off-site backup thing. Buying the gear and where to store it isn’t the issue, it’s figuring out the actual process (workflow if you will) of a new routine. I could never get burgled ever again (fingers crossed), but it shouldn’t put me off actually investing in it. I’ve no idea who the little runt hangs around with or what their plans or motives might be.
Off-site is definitely the best solution, whether you keep a disk somewhere else or backup your live (money making) stuff over the internet. There’s several service providers who do the latter. The company I’m working for provides that service usign Iron Mountain. We’ve got our first photographer in the sales pipeline looking to use a chunk of storage. It won’t be cheap but it’s cheaper than losing his business.
As for the technology and pipes … the first online backup takes a long time. No doubt. But after that, a good solution will use block level incremental backups, e.g. if a small amount of a 7MB file changes then only the small amount is transferred, be able to backup locked files and be able to do it on a frequent basis. Cheapest isn’t always best here. I guess the amount you’re willing to pay depends on how much you valure your data.
Archival services are probably cheaper than backup for non-live data. There’s loads of alternatives there, mainly offline storage. Just make sure it’s durable, fault tolerant and stored in a suitable environment.
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