Storing Photos Onto Cd

[Earthdog]

I have a lot of pics on thumbdrives and would like to put them on to CDs. I attempted to store some of my mum's but apparently 30 photos are too many. I hadn't done anything to them apart from getting them from her SD card to the computer, then trying to save to CD.

I assume they were too big.

Can anyone tell me how small a file size I can reduce the pics to so I can get them on the CDs at a rate reater than 30? If I do that and want to print from the CD will any quality be lost?

Not sure if I am explaining myself very well.

TIA

[Earthdog]

Thanks for the answer. What do I look for on the label when I buy DVDs? Sorry for the silly ?s, but I'm learning still.

[Lab lady]

They come in either DVD -R or DVD + R

Most computers will take both but the - R are the most commonly used one.

If you have large files to store you can also buy dual layer DVDs but they are quite a bit more in price and single layer are fine for photos.

Another tip. make 2 copies and store one at someone else's place. A friend of mine had her house broken into and her computer and all her disks stolen, thankfully she had a copy at her mums so the photos where not lost.

[tlc]

Dvds will definatley be better. What sort of camera are you using (how many MP's ) you should be able to fit an average of about 1000 photos on a dvd if your camera is around 7 - 8 MP's

Another alternative is to get yourself a External hard drive. You can get them small now and they don't need a power supply and they will hold thousands of photos. They work by plugging into usb of your pc and you just transfer the files across. Don't reduce the file size because if you do this and decided down the track you want to make copies you will lose quality.

[Earthdog]

Thankyou all for your tips! Camera is 10mp. I had thought about an external HD as well.

Are there any to avoid?

[rubiton]

Are these photos jpeg or raw? You should fit a lot of photos onto a CD even a large jpeg. However try a DVD I prefer DVD +r for my photos but they are getting harder to find. Stick with the big name brands too (some mention for archival storage on the packaging). But then I use DVD-R for video but even these are hard to find with jewel cases (yes I tried the spindle idea but couldnt obtain the jewel cases!).

[tlc]

I have found WD ( western digital ) to be the best.

[Earthdog]

jpeg or raw? um, how do I know this?

[rubiton]

Are these photos jpeg or raw? You should fit a lot of photos onto a CD even a large jpeg. However try a DVD I prefer DVD +r for my photos but they are getting harder to find. Stick with the big name brands too (some mention for archival storage on the packaging). But then I use DVD-R for video but even these are hard to find with jewel cases (yes I tried the spindle idea but couldnt obtain the jewel cases!).

You can buy packs of jewel cases for a couple of dollars from places like Cheap as Chips and Officeworks also stock jewel cases. I only use spindle DVDs and never have a problem finding cases at these two places.

I tried two officeworks stores - nope no longer there and the place taken with pocket storage and other stuff. Tried Big W, Target, etc nope nothing yet plenty of spindles. I had to order them in from Sydney online (though the post office now has stock of them) and for now I have plenty. But you wouldn't think it would be that hard (but then I tried to go shopping for a P&S camera, MP3 player and some music CDs today - I got the camera though it was the only place that had the one I got and they were low on stock but the rest well forget it go to amazon for the CDs and might check out Harveys tomorrow for the MP3 or its back to internet shopping.

[Kirislin]

What do you mean by jewel cases or spindle? I dont know anything about copying but I need to do something soon because I dont have any of my many pics stored anywhere else, apart from the few on photobucket, flickr and redbubble.

[PossumCorner]

It's a huge question and problem. Look at the 'old' photos we treasure now, great grandparents weddings, their dogs in family portraits and so on. Nothing we are doing will 'last the same' for future generations unless they are stored carefully as good quality prints. Doesn't much happen though.

Cheap quality prints have already proved a disaster, CDs and DVDs degrade within 20 years. Plus with new technology they will go the way of super-8 film - only retrievable by specialists, and at a high cost, so no-one bothers. As with recorded sound, new systems will always leave old storage methods behind and un-useable, even if the images stored on them have remained fairly okay. I think it is a sad and massive reality that so much good and meaningful photography will be lost. That's on a family scale, and possibly even more on the broader scale (like the 'street' stuff that JS looks at) - and present-day photography will be the only record in a hundred or so years of 'how it was'.

What do we responsibly do: don't know. I think external hard drives are a better, safer storage than DVDs. Professional photographers could have better systems, but what happens when they retire and the business folds? I know I have no way of finding who my parent's wedding photographer was back in 1937, war-time, There does seem to be some responsibility on "all of us" to safeguard at least family and local community photography but no-one seems to have a clear idea of what to do that is simple, fool-proof and will last forever.

Just for a mini examples, our flyball photos only go back six years. Already we have enquiries for 'old' photos of dogs that have passed, because the owners can't recover their shots of them. And I know people with children who have 'lost' all their baby and toddler photos in computer crashes and the like, how sad is that!!

So - good question Earthdog, Short-term answers easy, long-term scary.

.

[rubiton]

Get good quality prints done at professional labs. If all else fails they should last (though basically as technology changes its a matter of upgrading stuff onto the new system such as copying VHS to DVD - not as good as the original but better than nothing).

Oh and film negatives do degrade over time - I have ones from 1987 that were starting to have issues about 6 or 7 years ago and then about 3 years ago it was clear when I was scanning the negs to DVDs that the older ones were clearly different to the newer ones that scanned as sharp as youd expect. The really old negs from the 40s however do keep very well but they are different again to most colour negs people have from the 80s.

[Earthdog]

Thankyou for all your replies. I am going to look for the DVDs tomorrow and also an external hardrive. I would like to be able to give DVDs to my children with recent pics that have been taken.

Possum Corner, you raise some very thought provoking ideas there.

Edited May 9, 2010 by Earthdog

[altheau]

There is a huge problem with external drives, in that alot are still mechanical. If you move then while they are spinning then you can damage them, this makes them alot more of a risk then dvds for some people imho

I can't wait for solid state drives to become more of the norm, as these guys have no moving parts so they are less delicate, but then I have a super small lappy with a solid state drive . . . .guess what failed in it within a few months . . . . the hdd

I used to work in tech support (have not for the last 2yrs) guess what was the first thing to fail in 90% of machines . . .hdds, about 10% of those in an unrecoverable manner. To make a mechanical hard drive out last a dvd you either need to nurse your drive, or be hard on your dvds.

Please be careful with your external hdd.