Do you remember digging through your parent’s shoeboxes of 4×6 photo prints or maybe flipping through countless scrapbooks? I do! That’s how my family kept our photos for safekeeping. I want to chat with you about how to do that for the digital age: how to create options for the digital safekeeping for your photos.

It’s rare that we print our photos these days since we take exponentially more images than we ever have before! But what happens to all these digital files as technology continues to change and shift? There are 3 easy things you can do & I’ll be sharing some of my favorite tools for digital safekeeping as well.

Printed Copies

The first way to preserve your photo memories is by going old school! Print your images! Whether you choose to frame them on your walls, hang them on your fridge, or bind them into an album this is the most tried and true way to make your photos last.

I still love flipping through my parents’ wedding album, so this is a great safekeeping technique that uniquely allows you to share your memories at the same time. Just be sure to handle prints delicately and avoid getting oily fingerprints on the surface of the paper.

Hard Copy / Hard Drive / Flash Drive

I cannot stress enough how important it is to have multiple hard copies of your digital image files. The apple photos app on your laptop will not suffice! Not only that, but the application compresses your images and dilutes the quality of your photos.

I encourage all of my couples to download each image from their digital gallery and copy them onto some type of external hard drive — a simple flash drive works great for this! Now, you all know that I can be extra so when I talk about flash drives, I have to find a way to make it FUN.

That’s why I’ve partnered with USB Memory Direct to make the cheekiest flash drives around: introducing the slap bracelet flash drive!!! I mean come on, every 90s kid was obsessed with snap bracelets. It’s the perfect balance of function & nostalgia and I cannot wait to use them!!

Cloud Copy

Lastly, you want a copy of your files in the cloud. This sets you up for success in the rare case that you lose the hard copies of your images that we just covered. If your home were to be damaged by water or fire (knock on wood!) you’d lose the hard copies of your precious photos. That’s why having a cloud back up is SO important!

What exactly is the cloud? Who runs this so-called cloud? How am I granted access to said cloud? There are TONS of cloud storage options out there. Basically “the cloud” just means that your image files live on a server that is not operated by yourself.

Popular cloud services you may be familiar with are Dropbox, Google Drive or Amazon Photos. Personally, I have A LOT of very large image files to store since I have a hard copy and cloud copy of all of my clients’ images in addition to my own personal images, so I use an amazing unlimited cloud storage service called PhotoShelter.

And those are the key elements to digital safekeeping for your photos!