[PCWorld]

Post your comments for 10 Efficiency Tips for Digital Photographers here

[Carl38]

KoffeePhoto provides a one-stop solution for both photo sharing and photo backup purposes.

[theFlyingD]

I would have recommended tip #2 to be as follows:

TIP #2...Rename your photo's.

Rename your photo's from your July 21, 2008 trip to San Francisco as follows: from "DSCF6816" to "20080721 San Francisco Vacation 816", thereby you can easily easily sort all your pictures in chronological order, as well as partially preserving some of the original

[HeronMoonDesignworks]

I'm reasonably savvy with Photoshop CS2--I can retouch, resize, change formats, even make some decent original artwork with it--but it's pretty cumbersome, and I haven't dug deeply enough to figure out whether I can easily perform batch operations with it. (I find all of Adobe's Help files to be nearly useless, so most of what I've learned, I've learned through trial and error.)


The recommendations for batch resizing and renaming (but preserving the originals, untouched) are excellent idea. My question: is there a sleek, simple piece of software I can use to do those things, without firing up Photoshop? I would very much appreciate any recommendations your readers might have to offer.


Thanks,


Terri, of Heron Moon Designworks

[mantosz]

I use ACDSee Pro 2 to do batch processing image like resize, rename, and change formats. It is easy to use and yes you still could keep the original images.

[Adama]

Hi Terri,

I'm glad you're a Photoshop fan. I have looked into getting it, but the cost is kind of high.

I have been using Serif PhotoPlus X2 and I really like it. I haven't tried this yet, but I think it can do all those things you were asking about, and you certainly do not need PS for any of that. One of the things I like about Serif is that it does not take over your Associations, it gives you a choice whether you want to allow the Associations or not.

My first experience with a photo editing program was with PaintShop Pro X2, and it took over my computer (because it does not give you the option of not applying the Associations.) Sometimes, when I tried working with a GIF it would give me a message that only the first frame would be usable and the other ones would be lost. So I got rid of that puppy ASAP! That's when I decided to try my hand with Serif.

They are a well known company from England and they have a slew of things you can use for photo editing, web, video, desktop publishing, drawing, and many many others. And their Forum is full of knowledgeable people.

www.serif.com Here's the link for you.

[Balayage]

h4. 1. Don't Procrastinate
How can this be the #1 efficiency rule? This is the reverse. It is the most inefficient way to manage images in both time and camera battery life. With a good image viewer program it is so much easier to zip through 2 or three hundred images, weeding out the bad, than trying to do it in-camera. Even if you delete as you shoot, the action of checking each image after it is shot is so disruptive to the flow of photography you will miss many great potential shots.

The only time in-camera deleting can be justified is when you are out of memory cards and you have more shots to make.

If it is "Don't Procrastinate", it should be do your first round of culling images as soon as you put them on the PC. Don't wait until you have so many loaded that it will be a daunting task. After a day or two, go through the images again and cull those you know in your heart you will NOT use in the future. Now you have an "efficient" group od images.

[DragonWolfe]

This is VERY well thought out and excellent advice. My only negative comment would be the "String" tripod. Most of (MYSELF Especially...) are NOT that graceful, and will eventually TRIP or get TANGLED somehow on that sting.

A inexpensive tripod (espcially for smaller digital cameras) are easily found ( I have TWO Manfrottos WITH ballheads) that I found at a garage sale for TWENTY BUCKS!! (Not that they are suitable for the little cameras)

Other than THAT,

Folks who follow this advice will INDEED be very happy with their results, and isn't that "OOOOHHHH-AAAAHHHH-"You Took THIS"? Factor so wonderful???

[artsyambie6]

Lots of great advice in this article! The only criticism I have is that the advice about not procrastinating is actually a horrible idea. If something happens to your media drive, you may not be able to recover a lot of pictures. By deleting during a shoot, you are creating empty spots in the memory and that could lead to data fragmentation.

Those images that could have been saved using data recovery software, could be loss forever or end up being only partially recoverable. My advice is to wait till you have downloaded your images and backed them up. Then you can delete like its going out of style!

[GrampyPeter68]

Terri, I use IrfanView (www.irfanview.com). It is free and has a lot of features, and it opens much faster than the hi-powered photo editors. Grampy Peter

[gordm]

All pictures are unloaded into a folder called "incoming pictures". All pictures are then either deleted or moved to a more descriptive folder such as "vacation 200806" or another descriptive title. When the pictures are moved they are renamed to something more appropriate. By doing this a little at a time we keep everything up to date.
We keep two backups. A CD by folder which is updated regularly and a external hardrive with all photos and files copied monthly (well maybe quarterly). The CD's are kept in plastic sleeves in a three ring binder - ie a digital photo album!!!

[u1234]

Thanks.