Okay, so you're all caught up! You have beautiful photobooks, by year, that your family can enjoy anytime. Now what? How can you avoid the pile-up from happening again? Easy! And trust me, if you I can do it, you can do it, too! Not only am I the president of this club, I'm also a member ;)
Part II - Your Ongoing Digital Photo Strategy; Organized & Stress-free!
- Every month, download your pictures from your camera or phone onto your computer. Save them in a folder titled "Not Yet in Photobook." Then, sort the pictures by month.
- Take 5 minutes, and ruthlessly delete pictures that are just awful or are duplicates or that you aren't married to. Remember, the more you delete, the easier your selection process will be when making your album!
- Create a new photobook online (at Shutterfly, or wherever you choose). Give it a clear title (i.e., 2012 Photobook) so that you can easily find it when you want to edit it over the course of the year.
- Monthly, take 15 minutes and create a few pages in your photobook with your recently uploaded pictures. (See more about photobook creation tips in Part I of this post).
- Move the completed pictures into your hard drive folder titled "In Photobook."
- Repeat on a monthly basis. When year-end approaches, your photobook will be ready for printing (after googling for a coupon code, of course!). You edit out some pictures if the book has gotten too big, but that shouldn't take long.
- Photobooks also make wonderful gifts at the holidays! Create a copy of your finished product on Shutterfly (or your photo site of choice). Then, edit it according to the lucky recipient.
- Every six months, back-up your pictures on an external hard-drive . We purchased one years ago, and it provides piece of mind (we got something like this, to give you an example)! Or, if you don't want to spend the money on one, try dropbox.com. It's free, and provides up to 2GB (!) of online file storage.
