Backing up my Flickr shots...help?

[Daisy Mae]

Is there a halfway reasonably straight forward way for me to back up my Flickr pics onto external hard drive?

There are just over 1000 of them and ideally I'd like to transfer them in bulk.

Thanks in advance.

[Donald]

Do you mean pics that are on your computer that you have loaded upt to Flickr, or are you meaning backing up what is on Flickr, from Flickr?

The reason I ask is that I would consider Flickr to, itself, be a backup of the JPEGs that I have on my computer.

[jdathebowler]

Daisy Mae

I agree with Donald the use of Flickr is another form of backup.Every image I want to keep is on my hard drive but also backed up on a external drive.I also copy to a dvd disc.If the worst happens ie a drive failure the images are still there on the external hdd, and dvd copy.They are also still there on Flickr. Always make sure that you have at least 3 different sources to store your images.I learnt that lesson many years ago.The easiest way is to make a folder on the external drive then highlight your photos and drag them across
John

[Daisy Mae]

I must admit that I haven't always used best practice where work-flow has been concerned and the only place where my shots are in any coherent order is on Flickr. Now that they are messing about with the BT mail membership to Flickr that I have they have warned that some people might lose access to their accts and to their shots on Flickr. So I would like to back up my Flicker pics on an external Hard drive just in case there is a problem.

Thereafter I shall employ proper, grown-up work flow procedures forever...I promise.

So...can I move them en masse to a hard drive and how would I go about that?

quote John (The easiest way is to make a folder on the external drive then highlight your photos and drag them across)

John...is that really as simple as it sounds?

[jdathebowler]

Daisy Mae

Yes it is as easy as it sounds. It is just a matter of dragging each individual folder from the drive containing your photos to the external hdd which will be your backup drive. .You can do it all at once(Highlight all the folders)For starters just drag one folder at a time to see how easy it is.
John

[Daisy Mae]

Sorry to be so blonde but am looking to copy from flickr to external hard drive..I don't see how I could 'drag folders across' ?

[Geoff F]

Yes, copy and paste are probably the best, but slow, methods. Unless you can do a batch download after selecting the required images. Right click, or something similar, followed by Save Images to selected folder etc?

I save everything on an external drive plus DVD's. My P base images are simply for display because storing my full size Raw and/or Psd format images would simply take too much space.

Cloud Storage, from one of the specialist companies, is something which I have tried; but haven't really continued with the uploads simply due to the massive amount of time taken to send full sized images.

[Daisy Mae]

I have downloaded Migratr and 'hopefully' it is now busy copying my stuff from Flickr to my hard drive.

Will let you know how it goes.

[wlou]

Sharon, your site is stunning, I understand your desire to preserve it! Just amazing.

[Daisy Mae]

Sharon, your site is stunning, I understand your desire to preserve it! Just amazing.

Thanks Louise.

When I started taking pics I had no idea how important it would become....and then am always so interested in the creative bit that the workflow ( admin to me!) side has taken a back seat.


From now on I will be a good girl and organise myself better.

[PicBackMan]

Flickr doesn't allow you to bulk download photos to your external hard drive or your computer. In my opinion, you need a third party software / application to backup your Flickr photos to your hard drive. There are various bulk downloaders available in the space. Some of them are absolutely Free to download and install.

[Colin Southern]

Sharon,

Just a thought ...

... when you've got them downloaded, it might pay to double-check that you've got the maximum resolution versions (ie the same size as the biggest ones you uploaded).

For what it's worth, I pay Google the ridiculous sum of about $6 a month for 100+ GB of storage -- it's a piece of cake to upload entire folders as a safety net / backup (and to share then from there too if I wish).

[Donald]

For what it's worth, I pay Google the ridiculous sum of about $6 a month for 100+ GB of storage -- it's a piece of cake to upload entire folders as a safety net / backup (and to share then from there too if I wish).

Colin

How do you get them up to Google? The problem I encountered with looking at this was upload speed. Have you words of wisdom as to how this can be achieved efficiently?

[shreds]

Donald,

Upload speeds are dreadful 'in the sticks' and BT and the powers that be consistently only provide rhetoric and little more.

In the cities, with cable or better with 'BT Business' connections the speeds are generally good, but we still get the bull***. Our local 'BT cabinet' at the corner of the road proclaims BT Infinity and the exchange is about twenty yards from that. But we are told we can't have Infinity?

Frankly I don't see that changing any time soon. They just look at the potential business they can gain from film downloads, gamers etc rather than wanting to actually assist the economy.

Of course when you have independence…….

[Geoff F]

Colin

How do you get them up to Google? The problem I encountered with looking at this was upload speed. Have you words of wisdom as to how this can be achieved efficiently?

Yes I have tried a Cloud Storage system for backup but upload speeds for full size Raw images are unacceptably slow. So I haven't bothered recently. Just save to an external drive and DVD discs.

Uploading internet sizes in jpg are more reasonable, but I already have a P base site for that.

And those are readily viewable for anybody. Also Mediafire, and others, are available for occasional larger file sharing. My Cloud Storage option can only share with people who also belong to the same site.

[Colin Southern]

Colin

How do you get them up to Google? The problem I encountered with looking at this was upload speed. Have you words of wisdom as to how this can be achieved efficiently?

Hi Donald,

Really only 2 things I can say ...

1. "Pick your shots". If I'm out shooting a landscape I might end up with 50 to 100 shots of the same composition to which I'll pick one and only process that one. Although I keep all shots on my PC, I'll only upload "the one" to the cloud (DNG, PSD, and layed-up JPEG versions). In a similar vein, if it's a commercial shoot and a KNOW that I & they're not going to need the original RAW files then I sometimes just upload a full-resolution JPEG. At the end of the day, so long as the JPEG is close to optimal in terms of levels then on the rare chance that I lost the originals (both copies) AND they needed changes, the JPEGs would be adequate.

2. Don't watch paint drying, grass growing, or large files uploading. I'll just point the uploaded at several gigs of data and then go to bed or go home.

[Colin Southern]

Yes I have tried a Cloud Storage system for backup but upload speeds for full size Raw images are unacceptably slow.

It can be - it really comes down to things like connection speed - file sizes - cloud storage sizes etc. Some of my uploads are in the 2GB -> 3GB range, but I'll just start them and then go to bed or something else. When I come back they're done.

So I haven't bothered recently. Just save to an external drive and DVD discs.

It's a different approach, but one that encompasses a different selection of risks. If your PC hard drive crashes then an external drive will save the day. If you have a fire / natural disaster / lightning strike / virus / theft etc you may lose the lot. Normal DVDs are prone to dye breakdown over the years too (unless you're using M-Disk).

And those are readily viewable for anybody. Also Mediafire, and others, are available for occasional larger file sharing. My Cloud Storage option can only share with people who also belong to the same site.

Google will give you 15GB for free (shared with GMail), and you can buy more at a very reasonable rate (although it is a subscription service, so no doubt some will "spit the dummy" over that!). Off memory I think you can sign up for up to 16 Terrabytes (although that much is expensive!). With Google Drive you can share it with anyone though (or restrict it - quite versatile). Just be cautions with MediaFire - they can have as little as 2 copies of the data; gret for sharing and distribution, but they're NOT a backup / archive service.