Keep Your Family Photo Memories Safe With Archive Photo Storage
October 22, 2009
With the advent of digital photography, most of us take more photos than we even did on film. No longer having to worry about the cost of processing and printing frees us up to snap away, to experiment more and to take loads of photos of our children, recording every special minute of their life. Downloading them onto the computer is easy enough but with the temperamental nature of computers we need to find a better long-term way of keeping our best photos safe. Everyone should find a way of backing up their photos that works for them and you should also look into archive photo storage to keep your best photos in good condition for at least the duration of your lifetime.
One reliable back-up method is burning your photos to CD or DVD as soon as you download them. CDs are supposed to be long-lasting, but it has now been discovered that they can actually degrade within 2 years and start losing content, if exposed to acidic elements in the air. The boxes that they come in don’t even guarantee their protection, as the plastic used in them can give off vapors that contribute to their deterioration. So if you want to keep precious family photos safe for many years what are your best options?
You can buy special pocket pages that protect CDs from corrosion and help them last for 40 or more years. These pages can be kept in an archival quality CD album or storage box which gives added protection and makes them easier to organize. For long term storage of your digital photos you should also choose archival quality CDs to burn them onto and label them with a special non-corrosive pen that won’t damage their surface.
It is up to you whether you store every single photo you take, or just choose your best for this special treatment. If you take loads of pictures but don’t want to keep them all, a good idea is to make a selection of your favorites about once a month and burn an archival CD to preserve them. This will ensure that you have a continuous record of your family history stored safely, without creating an unmanageable bulk of CD albums by storing every single picture. You should still back up all your photos to an external hard-drive or to your D-drive as you download them, to avoid losing them to computer failure before you have burned your CDs.
Make sure you protect your digital photos so that you and your children can enjoy them for years to come.
Mum and Photographer
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