Let's say you lose all your photos

[kombizz]

If I loose them, I would get upset.
Then take lots of drinks including vodka till get drunk.
Then the following day up to few days I will be upset.
Then I start again to take images.
BECAUSE I believe I am a talented artist photographer, & photo journalist.
I have a good eye for photography.
So AGAIN I start to build it again.

 

[crownlaurel]

Just curious, how did you lose your pictures? Was it digital? If they were on a digital card and you haven't filled it again (I guess that's probably too late in ths case and assuming the card itself wasn't lost or destroyed), some or most can be recovered, and I think even if it was "formatted."

I take lots of pictures of the kids' birthdays and things like that (I'm taking less and less at special events though). After my dd's 7th birthday party, I also had somethign else on my sd card, so I downloaded the other pictures first and my computer must have asked if I wanted the card erased and I must have clicked "ok" without thinking...I was devastated. I couldn't very well bake her another butterfly cake and invite 30 of her closest friends over again to rewrap and regive her gifts .

I found some software online that recovers lost images from media cards. I paid about $20 for it and it was the best $20 I ever spent. It recovered all but 2 or 3 of the pictures from my card (plus it pulled up images form months before because I rarely fill the card completely).

There are also programs that will recover images from your hard disk. I don't remember the name of the program (I have it on a disk somewhere).

 

[crownlaurel]

Most of mine are on my other computer which has died. The hard drive is ok, (I believe) so when I get round to getting a new PC I'll back them up on to this one.

The one on the dead PC has about two months worth that aren't backed up on an external HDD, and any that I've done for family and friends are backed up on DVD.

Last year I was on the verge of deleting them all anyways (apart from family shots of course) but didn't get round to it as another PC died with the same HDD in - must be telling me something!

Time for a fresh start

I found out that you can get a box thing that will house a hard drive from a "dead" computer and you can read it on another computer (I assume by USB connection). I found out a day too late because when my brother died, he had written poems and a journal and who knows what else on his computer (he even had letters to my kids) but after his death the motherboard died and the computer place told sis in law there was nothing to be done and they trashed the computer. If only I could have gotten that hard drive, but perhaps it was best as much oof what he wrote would have been very painful for us.

 

[Newfive]

If you’re into modern photography with digital camera then you should have one more piece of equipment…a DVD burner.

Holds 4gigs or 8gigs on dual… there are even bigger burners but platters (discs) start costing few bucks.

Burning copies of raw or jpg (est.…) are so easy with XP or 98 (haa haa) that if you don’t make copies then you deserve to lose your stock. (Not really)…

For real, make copies, hell even visit CVS or your local store and make some 4x6 prints… show them off...make an album or two. Even if you don’t think your photos are worth anything your wrong again… thoughts and memories priceless.

 

[Aquarium Dreams]

Thanks everyone for all the responses. Some of your stories were really sad. In comparison, I lost very little--about two years of mostly local shots. No once in a lifetime trips. In the end I didn't really lose them, either!

@oldnavy, LaFoto: Some crying was done, usually followed by laying in bed staring at the ceiling. If this happens to anyone else, I recommend looking away from the ceiling and out the window! I took my camera on a lot of walks and shot a lot of pictures I never would have thought to take before.

@D-50, usayit, AlexB, abraxas: Some reshooting of old locations was done, too. It's never the same twice, and that turns out to be a good thing.

@crownlaurel, BoblyBill: I thought everything was lost while in the middle of transferring it from one computer to another. The external hd was working fine, until the day every bit of my data was on it, then it became unresponsive. It turns out the hd was formatted to FAT instead of NTFS, and FAT becomes unstable at high storage capacities. Mine became unresponsive at about 40g (on a 250g hd). In the end, my boyfriend was able to get everything off by using a Mac.:mrgreen: So if you're backing up on a new hd, don't forget to format it to NTFS first!

@newrmdmike, peniole, bakuretsu: Doesn't sound obsessive; it sounds efficient! I definitely have a new backup method, which will be facilitated by a new computer. When I was first getting into photography, everyone was like, "Oh, digital is so CHEAP compared to film." Everyone didn't know what they were talking about. I'm glad, though. If I hadn't been completely ignorant about the costs, I would have been too intimidated to start.:lmao:

So after two months of thinking I'd lost everything, this has turned out to be pretty awesome. Now I shoot differently and always have more than one camera, including a film camera, even if it's utterly crappy. Also, if I'm with someone, I lend them my p&s digital camera and let them go crazy, so there will be multiple documents of the adventure.

Now I just have to get that flame-retardant, heat-resistant, waterproof safe.

 

[gmarquez]

or would you shoot the same things for a while, attempting to recapture some of the lost images?

Been there, ended up wasting a lot of time trying to recapture what I lost. The "fresh" stuff always came out better, so I gave up trying. In other words, for me, it was a BIG waste of time, I didn't really enjoy doing it, and I could have been using the time to photograph fresh stuff.

 

[ANDS!]

I lost an entire trip to Japan. Was very devastating. But I went back and got those pictures back (while also having the benefit of more experience).

 

[S2K1]

Haven't lost any photos, but I keep them on two computers(sometimes 3) and an external HDD. I need to put them on CD's or DVD's though too.

 

[table1349]

I would learn from my mistake and have redundant backup. Currently I have my photos on an internal hard drive,(not the main drive) On DVD's and a second external hard drive.

 

[DSLR noob]

Most photography I am proud of is unofficially backed up on photobucket or some other online upload site. I'd be sad if I lost any full resolution images and such but hey it is a method.

 

[RacePhoto]

I'm sorry, but I always have to take these threads as an opportunity to plug the benefits of film.

Lost many my slides and negatives and over a dozen cameras... all film, in a flood. However my CDs and DVDs all survived fine. I just washed the mud off. The photos and film that was above the two foot line survived, but unfortunatly the best were in a box together, so I have my "crap" photos, and lost my best.

Score one point for digital.

Meanwhile, to answer the original question. I moved on and just kept going. There's one photo I'd like to re-take, of a church at Sunset. Otherwise, it's part of a journey and there's no going back in time.

I can't re-photography my niece at 7 years old, because she's now in her 30s. :er: Sporting events, are long lost to history. Construction and demolition, well you get the idea.

I just said, that's life, time to get over it and do something better, with the knowledge from the past.

 

[rmh159]

I'm sorry, but I always have to take these threads as an opportunity to plug the benefits of film.

What's this "film" word you speak of? Haha jk!!!

 

[todd harrison]

if your shooting your digital camera you should always make a backup of all your photos. back it up on a hard drive and also a DVD. but if I lost all my photos I would try to get new shots. not try and get old shot I had already taken.

 

[elsaspet]

Man, In my business I would be sued to hell and back. And I would have it coming......
Lesson learned. ALWAY BACK UP!!!

 

[neea]

I'm sorry, but I always have to take these threads as an opportunity to plug the benefits of film.

:thumbup:
Thank god for firesafe boxes!! That's where all my negatives are. As well as a list of every batch with each frame number listing what they all are.

Digital however... I got my digital camera 3 weeks ago.
My computer kicked the bucket 2 days ago. THANKFULLY.... I did do a backup of everything but one folder. Copied to DVD... all jpegs and raw.
Next time I wanna upgrade my ram I'll just take it to someone... then I can blame them. However, I'm hoping it's a minor problem I'm overlooking and the computer will be up and running this week... and faster than before.

I've lost pictures before.. Lots and lots of them.
The scary part was that the only pictures I could recall was personal ones. Christmas, mine and my bfs first holiday road trip to the mountains.
Turned out most of the pics were 'backed up' on a friends server from an online gallery I had. Until a few months ago when his server crashed and we were sure they were gone forever.
He sent the server away to get everything recovered and UPS LOST IT!!!!!!
I never cried so much in my life. It was the last place all those 'lost' pictures were.
Long story short.. UPS found it (thanks to my friend for refusing their 'payment for replacement') all 1800+ personal pictures were recovered and are now backed up in a dozen or more different ways and places.

Seems that majority of us learn the backup lesson the hardway.
So to all of those who dont currently backup.. listen very carefully and try to imagine the amount of pain and frusteration losing your pictures would cause... AND BACK UP... and back up your backups.. and store copies at your grandmas, moms, sisters, and best friends boyfriends cousin.. everywhere!