So Thankful for digital photography; I hate you.

What?
Really?
Well, it's true!
Back in the film days of photography, I wasn't too good at taking pictures and I didn't take too many. The cost of developing pictures was not in the budget much of the time. The pictures I do have from that time are precious, though, blurred, no real composition, just snaps of this and that.

The arrival of children changed my picture taking, but still, with film, I don't have as many pictures as I actually thought I had.

Then, here comes digital photography!

I still get my pictures printed. With the entrance of digital photography in my life came scrapbooking, too!

Oh, Lord.

I have SO many pictures.

Do you?

I had to come up with a way to really organize them so I knew what I had. I don't want them just sitting in boxes. My first few attempts were confusing, actually, and I had to do things differently until I figured out what worked best for me. (Especially, when I'd find I had printed events multiple times because I didn't realize I had already printed them.)

That's the key; what works for me. You need to figure out what works best for you.

First up is the process. From beginning to end; well, maybe not the end, but you'll see.

Here are the things I do with pictures.

1.Take the picture (or 100 pictures)

2. Edit the picture (or 100 pictures); this includes culling the bad pictures. You know, the accidental shot of you shoes on the pavement as you pull your phone out of your pocket. Yup. Those. Or picking one or two of the 100 shots of the dog playing because they're just so cute.

I have had a few different editing apps and programs over the years and struggled so much with most of them. These days I pretty much edit all my photos right on my iPhone. I also use the Pic-Tap-Go app. It's easy. It's awesome. I don't have to remember how to use it when I pull it up, because I forget that type of stuff so easily now.

This app is available for both Apple and Android phones.

3. Organizing and tagging photos/occasions.
     This is a multi-faceted step for me, because I really don't trust digital storage completely, so I have my photos online, on my photo organization program, and folders that I save on external hard drives. Yes, plural. One for archiving and one EHD to use when I'm actually working on photos. (Back it up! Back it up!)

I have an Excel spreadsheet that lists all my pictures by year.

I name the picture or group of pictures using the date first. 1.25.19 Anna & Bailey on the Porch is how I named the above photo. There will never be the same date again, so it is perfect to label them with the date and a description. 

On the back of the card I jot down what is going on in the pictures! 

4. Get the pictures in Albums. (Been really lax on that for quite a while! Getting back to it and it makes me happy!)

How you organize and display your pictures is all in what makes you happy! It can be a rather daunting task if you've never organized your 15 GB of pictures you have on your phone, but a few minutes at a time of reviewing and deleted some of those will get you on the right track.

I admit, I have a hard time deleting photos. Much harder to throw a printed one away, but I do more than I used to. (This is where the archive EHD comes in handy. If I just can't let it go forever, I can leave a copy of it there and delete it (them) off my phone or computer.)

These are the photo folders on my computer. They are all dated and named with what I gave them when I labeled the photo. If there are multiple photos, the folder is named and all the pix (sometimes 2, sometimes 50) from that event go in the folder. I don't use all the pictures and do go through and delete more as I choose what I want to print.

I use the Historian program by Forever, originally purchased from Creative Memories. There are many photo organization programs, but I've had this, well, forever, and it still works the best for me. You can also edit on this program. I can also mark each photo with it's print status; Not to print; Print; and Already Printed.

I upload my pictures into this program and label them the exact way that I did individually and the computer folders. The added benefit of this program is that I can tag them multiple ways; name, event, place. It also has facial recognition. I can look for all pictures with the tag 'Bailey' and I can see all the pictures of Bailey. (And there is a lot!)

 This is a screen shot of all the categories I have set up. It is primarily by year and, because we move a lot, by state.

This screen shot shows a single picture. You can see I've named the picture and also the highlighted tag on the left has the same name. I could also tag this with Bailey and Mary and it will come up in those categories.

Printed photos are in these boxes by year. I used to have them separated by people, travel and occasions, but that proved to be more confusing when working on my albums.

Here are printed pictures with my index cards separating things. I know it looks like a lot of work, but it has made it so much easier for me to find what I want. The cards are also there with details on the back ready to use on my scrapbook page. I'm not able to put the lid on this box, but they will be moved to a box that will close when I either empty one or order another one. 

In short, you can have as many or as few pictures as you want, but if you can't find them to view, scrapbook or share, what good are they?

I don't stress too much about editing every single picture. I use pictures that are a little blurry, where composition could be improved upon, and, every now and then, I've been know to use that 'head cut off' picture that happens more often than I'd like to admit.

Organize your photos the way it works best for you, even though you will find that you may have to switch up that process from time to time to really know what works best for you!

If you have a huge collection, start with your current photos and work your way backward. It doesn't have to be overwhelming if you take baby steps.

Thanks for looking in on me! I know it was a long post. I haven't written in so very long....