gvarner Loc: Central Oregon Coast

Does anyone have a designated beneficiary for their photos, someone who who will know where they are, who will access them, how they will access them, who will care to access them? They’re not like cherished albums of prints in the closet. Some of us have thousands of photos stored for posterity. I have a couple thousand of what I consider "family" photos that I’m going to copy off for my two daughters into folders organized by year, but the rest may only have value to me. I’d like your thoughts about what your own general expectations are.

In-lightened Loc: Kansas City

I have 3 adult children. My daughter is most likely interested in them and asked for them in a printable, sharable and digital format. That is my Flikr page for more casual and SmugMug for more professional level printing should she or someone every want it. These are organized into albums each in it's own but obvious way. I have made a password list for my daughter, so she knows where things are and can decide to keep these services. Or not. I mostly do nature photography there isn't alot of memory there for her which is one reason I do photography. I plan to create a private section for family photos and I have let her know if something happens before I get that all done, it's all on my LR external hard drive. She can hire someone to help her with it and if she decides to let the hosting services go. I have kept up with keywording and the organization is obvious when you get into it.

As for the rest of it as you put it, maybe you could leave some ideas for your kids. I have always printed an annual calendar. Maybe this carries on. Printing for nursing homes? I do think once we are gone, what helps those left behind to remember us is different for each person.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

Interesting and good question. I would find it worth reading too see other Hoggers ideas. I have no kids to pass my photos on to and I am not sure my wife knows how to access my digital ones on my PC. She has a few ofhers own on her PC. We have printed photo albums too and a printed and framed images but who would want them after we are both gone?

tradio Loc: Oxford, Ohio

Why not burn them on to CD's?

PHRubin Loc: Nashville TN USA

You have got me thinking. I am surprised that even though people know where I have photos on Smugmug, they can't seem to find what they want there in spite of the fact that I thought I arranged them in an intuitive manner.

I have no kids so that isn't an option.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

That will work only if the recipient in XX years will have a CD/DVD drive in/on their computer.
Otherwise they will have to purchase an external drive.
Our new laptops have no internal CD. I purchased an external.
Low probability my kids will have a CD drive on their computer...
Then, one would have to keep creating new CDs for all the recent photos after the initial burn.

In-lightened Loc: Kansas City

Yes, this was a topic of discussion with my daughter about the format issues going forward. We have video from their childhood that has already been burned to CD...but no one has a CD player anymore. What to do about that one??

I do think as things stand now, storage looks to be done in the cloud that are hosted at large server farms. BackBlaze seems to be a good option according to all the research I have done on the options. Amazon prime also offers free storage, but retrieval should you lose everything from a hard drive perspective is the weak spot here.

bsprague Loc: Lacey, WA, USA

My family doesn't pay much attention to my photography while I'm alive. Why would they suddenly care when I drop dead?

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

I recently had some old Super 8 and VHS family movies converted and put on USB fobs for the kids.
I also have them on my system, backed up to HD and the cloud, and copies on the original fobs I received.

Now, what to do with the original tapes and film reels.......

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Probably true in most cases.

They usually won't have the interest level we do.

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

The permanence of CDs you burn yourself is questionable, and not nearly as permanent as commercial CDs or DVDs. They are certainly not permanent enough to rely on passing them on to future generations, even if they still have the ability to access them.

cony25

LOl, the best thing I have heard this week,,, so true

cony25

CD's are history, and will USB at some point,print I would print the best and place them in albums..

Kmgw9v Loc: Miami, Florida

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

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