Easy ways to organize your photos
We all know that a picture's worth a thousand words, but that's only if you can find it.
The editors at Good Housekeeping magazine have a number of tips for organizing and storing both traditional and digital photos, and they shared them with me.
Sorting through piles and photographs or clicking through digital photos can make your head spin.
Good Housekeeping's Home Editor Laura Fenton says it's a great idea to get those photos in one place and organized.
"The best way to store your prints is in photo boxes with envelopes," she said. "When you're shopping for photo boxes, you want to make sure that you're buying ones that are archival quality, which means that they're both acid free and moisture-free."
Next, toss away any unattractive or blurry photos. If you have doubles, give one to a friend or a relative. Only save your favorite shots.
"You don't need to be afraid of breaking up your rolls of negatives. Say if one roll of film contains multiple events, it's OK to separate them and then put them into separate envelopes," said Fenton. "Another way to make organization easy at a glance is to use colored dot stickers. That way you can look into boxes quickly and see the things you're looking for."
Back up your digital photos frequently. Save them to an external hard drive or burn a copy onto a disc, so you'll be covered.
Photo Web sites such as Snapfish and Flickr are an easy way to save and back up your photos.
"Online photo sharing Web sites are a great resource because you can share your photos with your friends and family easily. They're a great resource for affordable prints and you can even today get albums made or a coffee mug with a picture of your favorite pet," said Fenton.
The sites give you free storage because they want you to buy something from them. It's very common now that if you don't buy a print or a picture frame or something else within a certain amount of time, your account can be deactivated.
Online storage is great. I just wouldn't want it to be the only place my shots are saved; I'd use it as a backup.
Here's a tip for people who don't take digital photos: buy a disc of your prints when you get your photographs developed. This is a lot easier than storing doubles of your pictures and it's also safer.
The editors at Good Housekeeping magazine have a number of tips for organizing and storing both traditional and digital photos, and they shared them with me.
Sorting through piles and photographs or clicking through digital photos can make your head spin.
Good Housekeeping's Home Editor Laura Fenton says it's a great idea to get those photos in one place and organized.
"The best way to store your prints is in photo boxes with envelopes," she said. "When you're shopping for photo boxes, you want to make sure that you're buying ones that are archival quality, which means that they're both acid free and moisture-free."
Next, toss away any unattractive or blurry photos. If you have doubles, give one to a friend or a relative. Only save your favorite shots.
"You don't need to be afraid of breaking up your rolls of negatives. Say if one roll of film contains multiple events, it's OK to separate them and then put them into separate envelopes," said Fenton. "Another way to make organization easy at a glance is to use colored dot stickers. That way you can look into boxes quickly and see the things you're looking for."
Back up your digital photos frequently. Save them to an external hard drive or burn a copy onto a disc, so you'll be covered.
Photo Web sites such as Snapfish and Flickr are an easy way to save and back up your photos.
"Online photo sharing Web sites are a great resource because you can share your photos with your friends and family easily. They're a great resource for affordable prints and you can even today get albums made or a coffee mug with a picture of your favorite pet," said Fenton.
The sites give you free storage because they want you to buy something from them. It's very common now that if you don't buy a print or a picture frame or something else within a certain amount of time, your account can be deactivated.
Online storage is great. I just wouldn't want it to be the only place my shots are saved; I'd use it as a backup.
Here's a tip for people who don't take digital photos: buy a disc of your prints when you get your photographs developed. This is a lot easier than storing doubles of your pictures and it's also safer.
