data | Photocrati

Lessons Learned… Again. I hope.

Having had this happen once before you would think I would have learned my lesson.

A few years back, one of my external hard drives decided to take a sabbatical and never come back. Unfortunately it took a lot of information with it. Was the information vital to my business? Not really; but still it was part of the cyber attic pile of crap I decided to keep and never part with, it was so important that today, I have no clue what was on the drive and really don’t care. After that, I got into the regular routine of backing up, and backing up often. After a shoot, I usually pull the images off my card, put them on my HD, and then burn them to disc, and then and only after they were safely on disc, view them. Well let’s just say I got out of my routine…

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Workflow processes and data management

Anyone in this business for a while will have to contend with storage, archiving and workflow of digital images. The system I’ve been using for the past 10 years or so has evolved, and continues to do so. It’s based on invoice numbers. For the past four or so years I’ve been using blinkbid to generate invoices and estimates. I like this particular program because it’s simple and was written specifically for photographers. I know many photographers that use quickbooks, quicken or MS Money. Which business software to use is a decision that you should make individually or perhaps with help from your accountant. (more…)