New Tutorial Added: Archival Digital Photo Backups

Colin Southern · 11th September 2009, 11:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Steaphany

I would like to make a suggestion which could be an addendum to your tutorial "ARCHIVAL DIGITAL PHOTO BACKUP", which could allow data storage and recovery with a > 100 Year life time, Store the Digital Photographic Data On Paper.

Very interesting thought.

The other angle which I like to consider is that as technology progresses it always seems to offer an upgrade path - say - from A to B and then B to C and then C to D ... but at that stage the "D" version technology may no longer support upgrading from "A" vintage technology ...

... so I'm wondering if a valid methodology is to include the need to migrate data archives as each new generation of technology becomes commonplace? Keeping in mind that since we're very much into the digital revolution, subsequent conversions should be lossless (eg a JPEG file from a floppy disk to a TIFF version File on a hard disk to a CDROM to a DVD ROM to PSB version file on an "infinity and beyond" class storage medium.

McQ · 12th September 2009, 08:27 AM

Yes, this is a very interesting backup method. Thank you for posting it here Steaphany. I thought everyone here could benefit from seeing this.

I would agree that printed paper -- either as digital information, or as an archival photographic print -- is the only way to ensure that your photographs can be opened 100+ years down the road. This method is particularly useful for situations where one may not be able to (or want to) continually maintain their data as each new storage or file technology comes out. Printed paper is also a form of redundancy, since many many pigments go into creating each printed character (in the case of printed digital characters), and many molecules go into each pigment droplet, toner unit etc when creating archival prints.

On the other hand, I think that *if* one plans on continually managing their data, redundant copies on several removable media (ext hard drives, dvds, tapes, etc) are a much more efficient way of storing information (space-wise). Archival photographic or digital prints would occupy a lot of sheets of paper for people with 100GB or more of photographic information. If each page contained 500KBytes, as PaperBak suggests, then this would add up to at least 200,000 printed pages. In that case, it might be more practical to only print maybe the most important photos...

Also, I think that the choice of file format is perhaps not one of the top two concerns with backups, excepting perhaps proprietary RAW files. If I were to rank them in order of my own personal concern, they'd likely be:

(1) Data degradation
(2) Backup media compatibility
(3) File format

(printed paper address 1 and 2 really well; 3 is up to what you choose to print, although the idea of including the file specification is no matter what a great idea for the really long-term planners)

12th September 2009, 08:27 AM	#22
McQ Senior Member / Administrator Join Date: Apr 2008 Location: California, USA Posts: 640	Re: New Tutorial Added: Archival Digital Photo Backups Yes, this is a very interesting backup method. Thank you for posting it here Steaphany. I thought everyone here could benefit from seeing this. I would agree that printed paper -- either as digital information, or as an archival photographic print -- is the only way to ensure that your photographs can be opened 100+ years down the road. This method is particularly useful for situations where one may not be able to (or want to) continually maintain their data as each new storage or file technology comes out. Printed paper is also a form of redundancy, since many many pigments go into creating each printed character (in the case of printed digital characters), and many molecules go into each pigment droplet, toner unit etc when creating archival prints. On the other hand, I think that if one plans on continually managing their data, redundant copies on several removable media (ext hard drives, dvds, tapes, etc) are a much more efficient way of storing information (space-wise). Archival photographic or digital prints would occupy a lot of sheets of paper for people with 100GB or more of photographic information. If each page contained 500KBytes, as PaperBak suggests, then this would add up to at least 200,000 printed pages. In that case, it might be more practical to only print maybe the most important photos... Also, I think that the choice of file format is perhaps not one of the top two concerns with backups, excepting perhaps proprietary RAW files. If I were to rank them in order of my own personal concern, they'd likely be: (1) Data degradation (2) Backup media compatibility (3) File format (printed paper address 1 and 2 really well; 3 is up to what you choose to print, although the idea of including the file specification is no matter what a great idea for the really long-term planners)

New Tutorial Added: Archival Digital Photo Backups

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