Photo Management / Storage

[Alex2614]

We are currently looking into new ways to store and manage photos. We have tens of thousands of pictures, video clips, etc. and we would like a way to keep them all managed and easily accessible.

We will be using Flikr after the season to help with the management, but I would also like a physical storage (I don't trust off-site cloud management. I want backups).

I also want a way to effectively collect photos from people after events. We have a problem with getting photos from people after our competitions and outreach events, even after pestering for weeks and weeks. We need some kind of policy or procedure to mitigate this problem.

Bonus: I would like to tag photos to be searchable by subject, people in the picture, event, etc. So if I want to find a picture of inspiring children for a publication, I can find it more easily than sifting through pictures for hours.

Does anybody have any experience with this? What has / has not worked for you? Any advice in general?

Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance for all of your help!

[Alex2614]

Also, if you have any tips on sustainable document management/storage, that would be a big help too! Always looking for ways to improve!

[Mschmeh144]

You could always buy a cloud storage device to keep in the classroom that will back up not just photos, but all your files in general. They're small enough to fit on your desktop

[Pretzel]

Originally Posted by Mschmeh144

You could always buy a cloud storage device to keep in the classroom that will back up not just photos, but all your files in general. They're small enough to fit on your desktop

I believe both Seagate and Western Digital make 4tb "cloud drives", which are external hard drives that plug into your router via Ethernet cable and provide remote access to their contents while maintaining the physical backups.

[Boltman]

I use OneDrive as it is basically UNLIMITED storage (with a major cloud player) and syncs with any desktop or laptop too for your requirement of backup. Its cross platform and also allows you to share any folder with secure links that can be RO or RW. So for people who need to get you photos create a secure RW link for them to upload later to OneDrive.

Want to tag photos sure:

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/w...#1TC=windows-7

Here is a way to get unlimited OneDrive storage and Office 365 for up to 5 computers/tablets

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/of...104367920.aspx


Get Office free from your school
Office 365 Education for Students is available for free to students who are enrolled at qualifying schools. Install Office on up to 5 PCs or Macs and on other mobile devices, including Android, iPad®, and Windows tablets.
All you need is a person with a .edu email.

Also those comes with OneDrive for Business which allows you to set up protected sharing/collaboration similar to Sharepoint too if you need that.

This is by far the cheapest and most effective way to manage stuff. The cloud should be part of your strategy.

3 copies of data
2 different media
1 off site

3-2-1

As for consumer level drives for "personal cloud" fine but don't use them for remote access. I have WDCloud (NAS) as part of my strategy but not for remote access..OneDrive is much better for remote access/colboration/sharing and more secure than your home network ever could be.

Use THIS to sync if you need to between a computer and NAS. Onedrive has built in cloud to desktop sync with its own app.

https://bvckup2.com/

(Free beta or pay the guy his name is Alex..this is by far best sync program out there)

Here is what I do:

Laptop to Onedrive to Desktop To NAS to mirrored HD backup in caddy using WD Safepoint

Thats:

SD card (sync) Original copy on HD (sync) Onedrive folder (sync) onedrive cloud(sync) Onedrive folder (sync) NAS (mirror) HD

6 permanent copies of data nearly automatic or a single button push. Only ONE copy out of my hands.

For photo management...Picasa

[Drennael]

1676 uses a Google Drive folder shared with everyone who takes photos. After events, everyone is responsible for uploading their pictures to the folder for that event. Then, our photo guy can go through them and rename/sort. We also store our documents, presentations, and graphics files here!

The hierarchy would look something like this: Non-Tech Folder->2014-2015->Photos->Build Season->Week 1

I just did a test, and you can add "details" that act as tags and are searchable.

Hope this helps!

[ToddF]

Originally Posted by Alex2614

We are currently looking into new ways to store and manage photos. We have tens of thousands of pictures, video clips, etc. and we would like a way to keep them all managed and easily accessible.

Good luck with this. This is a problem with which professional photographers struggle with continually.

My own system is based on organization by when photos are taken. I organize into folders with a date code and brief description of subject. For example:
140116 shop work
140118 catapult prototype
140127 shop work
140201 testing
140209 control panel
140215 shop work
140217 robot pics
140218 bag day

I use the windows subfolder system rather than a software solution for organization for a simple reason: I don't trust software companies. They go in and out of business, and make unwanted revisions to their software that they then require you to pay for. I want an organization system that will work 10 years from now.

This method allows the folders to self sort by date, because the year, month, and day are built into the folder name. You can make changes to the contents of the folders later (adding a cropped version of a photo, for instance) and the folders are still in order. For larger events, like a regional, I create subfolders named for each camera.

Originally Posted by Alex2614

We will be using Flikr after the season to help with the management, but I would also like a physical storage (I don't trust off-site cloud management. I want backups).

I avoid cloud storage for these reasons:
- Despite advances in broadband technology, cloud storage for RAW photos and HD video is SLOW. If it takes forever to upload and download the data, it never will get used.
- Free / inexpensive cloud storage kills the quality of your images by downsizing and compressing.
- I don't trust tech companies to be around 10 years from now.

Originally Posted by Alex2614

I also want a way to effectively collect photos from people after events. We have a problem with getting photos from people after our competitions and outreach events, even after pestering for weeks and weeks. We need some kind of policy or procedure to mitigate this problem.

Been there. There is only one thing that works. Get the photos while you are still at the event. Once you are home, that data is lost to you forever. We are often among the last to leave events because we stay and help tear down the field. While the students are working, I take my laptop and track down every parent with a camera and ask if I can download their photos. Or, if you don't get everyone, do the same thing when the team stops to eat afterward. If possible, also track down any students who brought personal cameras. You get a whole new perspective on the events when seen through parent's and student's cameras. Just remember, despite their best intentions and promises, once you get home, no one will ever give you their data.

Originally Posted by Alex2614

Bonus: I would like to tag photos to be searchable by subject, people in the picture, event, etc. So if I want to find a picture of inspiring children for a publication, I can find it more easily than sifting through pictures for hours.

Photo organization software for professional photographers offer these kinds of features, but that's going to put you at the long term mercy of a proprietary solution.

Originally Posted by Alex2614

Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance for all of your help!

- It's not a question of if a hard drive will fail, but when. I have migrated my photo and video storage onto portable hard drives that I purchase in pairs. The working copies live on my desktop hard drive, but shortly after working with the data, it gets backed up to BOTH archive drives. Using USB 3 drives makes this process go relatively quickly.
- All SD cards and card readers are not created equal. Especially for HD video, purchase a fast SD card and card reader. This can cut file transfer times by 2/3 or more. My favorite SD card right now is this one paired with this reader. Having a fast card reader is especially important when downloading SD cards after events. I'm considering upgrading my laptop before our first competition just so I can get one with a USB 3 port on it. It makes that much of a difference.
- While having all those pictures and video is great, it does no good if those pictures and video never make it in front of an audience. Historically, as a team we have been very bad at turning captured content into viewable product. This frustrates me to no end. Why capture gigs and gigs of video footage and do nothing with it? <Beats head against wall.>

[sanddrag]

FreeNAS

[Alex2614]

Thank you everyone for your suggestions! Keep em coming!

I will say though that a number of people suggested personal cloud storage devices. While they are great, we are not allowed to have them. We are not allowed to have anything that broadcasts (we get away with the robots because it is only on for brief periods of time). I personally have a time capsule at home and it is wonderful! But, We aren't even allowed to have a wireless printer, even if it is connected to WVU's wireless network. We are a community (non-school) team and we meet on the campus of WVU. WVU is very overprotective and weird with stuff like that.

I'm also finding increasingly that people are using phones to capture stuff. And I'll be the first to admit I rarely give photos to the team because it is such a hassle.

[Boltman]

Originally Posted by Alex2614

Thank you everyone for your suggestions! Keep em coming!

I will say though that a number of people suggested personal cloud storage devices. While they are great, we are not allowed to have them. We are not allowed to have anything that broadcasts (we get away with the robots because it is only on for brief periods of time). I personally have a time capsule at home and it is wonderful! But, We aren't even allowed to have a wireless printer, even if it is connected to WVU's wireless network. We are a community (non-school) team and we meet on the campus of WVU. WVU is very overprotective and weird with stuff like that.

I'm also finding increasingly that people are using phones to capture stuff. And I'll be the first to admit I rarely give photos to the team because it is such a hassle.

Most phones have auto backup to cloud and from there share.

[Alan Anderson]

Originally Posted by Alex2614

I will say though that a number of people suggested personal cloud storage devices. While they are great, we are not allowed to have them. We are not allowed to have anything that broadcasts (we get away with the robots because it is only on for brief periods of time). I personally have a time capsule at home and it is wonderful! But, We aren't even allowed to have a wireless printer, even if it is connected to WVU's wireless network. We are a community (non-school) team and we meet on the campus of WVU. WVU is very overprotective and weird with stuff like that.

What do you mean by "broadcast"? You seem to be equating cloud storage with wireless networking. That's not the case.

[guniv]

We use Flickr completely to back up our photos and videos. Only issue we've run into is videos being too large, but I usually throw them into an editor and cut them apart. I'm not too worried about losing anything on Flickr and we're happy with it as our primary backup. It's also really handy for when people ask us for photos of the team, we can link them our Flickr and let them choose. Flickr also lets you apply tags and stuff which is handy.

http://flickr.com/lnstempunks

[Sperkowsky]

My mentor last year made a personal team app that allowed us to take pictures with our phones and automatically update them to his server. This worked alright but because of the mass amount of people with I phones (android app only) it didn't take off. Now because I'm the webmaster blogger and videographer I just keep a spare camera in the room and flash the sd card when needed.

[Boltman]

Originally Posted by Sperkowsky

My mentor last year made a personal team app that allowed us to take pictures with our phones and automatically update them to his server. This worked alright but because of the mass amount of people with I phones (android app only) it didn't take off. Now because I'm the webmaster blogger and videographer I just keep a spare camera in the room and flash the sd card when needed.

That's why you use a common Cloud solution in apps like OneDrive that's cross platform.

Blog here

OneDrive API to provide a foundation to continue evolving the platform and enable all developers to access the full functionality of OneDrive. It provides better speed and functionality, with new features including:

-The ability to retrieve new changes to files and folders to efficiently keep a large set of files in sync with minimal calls
-Resumable uploads of files up to 10 GB via file-fragment uploading for working with rich content, like HD videos
-Customizable file thumbnail images for delivering a more integrated experience across your app and OneDrive