Picture Taker Loc: Michigan Thumb

I have about 14 years of back and use an external 8TB back up. I also have 2 of them, the reason is I should have 20 years of back up. but lost them because Im only had 1 drive (and could not recover).

nanasmiles Loc: LaFollette Tn

OMGOSH........................SOUNDS LIKE A PLAN.

cbtsam Loc: Monkton, MD

I do pretty much the same thing, except that I do a yyyy-mm-dd-description. That way, the computer automatically sequences the folders by year, then month, then day. Very rarely, like on a vacation to Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park, I'll have two cards on the same day, which I might convert to two sub-folders labeled "am" and "pm" or "1" and "2." Also rarely, I might have what seems like an ungainly number of images for a given day; then it's sub-folders as before. And sometimes there's a batch taken over a range of days, so it's yyyy-mm-dd to mm-dd-description, and occasionally it's description, description, description, when a day's worth covers many subjects.

It isn't perfect. I still can't find the mushroom images, unless I can recall the date, or I put "mushroom" in the description. And there's no way I could find the six folders that each contain mushroom images. Still, it's worked ok for me over the years, and the 77.7K images I've got so far.

I've thought about using something like Lightroom, where I could tag each image with multiple key words, but that's a prospect I wouldn't look forward to for the next 30-40 images, never mind the prior 77.K images on the drive. I'm sure there might come a day when I'll regret not being able to find all those mushroom shots, but I do this as a hobby, e.e., for fun, and cataloguing is not what I call fun.

Picture Taker Loc: Michigan Thumb

I do the same as cbtsam but store year.mo.,day only using tow sets of digits. Today is 190103 that is enough to keep in date order.

LarryFB Loc: Depends where our RV is parked

I feel your pain after having the same issue. I now use Lightroom, but getting my photos (about 34,000) of them into some kind of order was certainly labor intensive. About 5,000 of those photos were actually scanned from prints which complicates the problems since the extf data doesn't show when the photo was taken, only when it was scanned.

Now, when I download photos from my SD Card into Lightroom, I change the title to "date+Photo data as recorded from my camera), this leads to a photo named something like "20181229-DSC_4209.JPG." I know that the photo was taken on December 29, 2018 and the camera identified it as photo number DSC_2049.jpg. At least now I can easily identify when it was taken. When I import the photos into Lightroom, I add the State, and the City in that state to the Metadata. I may import several batches of photos at a time if we are traveling. After the photos are imported, I will used the Lightroom folder "Previous Import" to look at each individual photo to add significant details to the Metadata. After spending a lot of time going thru probably 15,000 photos or more, I have cataloged most of the early photos and scanned photos that were pre-Lightroom and it took several weeks. After starting to use Lightroom, it took me a while to figure out how I wanted to identify the photos. After finally figuring out a system that seemed to work for me, it now takes me 5 to 30 minutes when I download a bunch of photos into Lightroom with the keywords I want to use.

Now, how do I use this information and the keywords attached to the photos. Well, I have a couple of grandkids who graduated from high school. When they graduated, I presented them with a book of their photos with the adventures we had with them when they were growing up. I simply have Lightroom to make a folder with all the photos that have the grandkids name in the metadata and make an "album". Then I go through that album and rate the photos to determine which ones I want to use. When I finally get down to a reasonable number, then I know I have the photos that I want to use in a special photo book for them. It may take a few hours to select the photos and make the book, but it works and when you have 1500 photos of one grandchild, and want to find maybe 50 for a special photo book, it just works!

Now, I have used this general procedure for several grandkids, various places we have visited, looking for specific photographs, and several other things.

I'm not promoting the way I identify my photos, it works well for me but not might work for everyone. I am promoting what Lightroom can do as far a organizing your photos, that is amazing.

If you use Lightroom, it is worth the time to work out an Identification system and to use it rigorously. Certainly, starting out with a number of photos which are not organized, and spending the time to organize them is not easy nor it is quick. But, once it's done, it's done. Once you have an identification system (using keywords works well), it takes only a few minutes and it's done and finding a specific photo is quick and easy.

nanasmiles Loc: LaFollette Tn

Hi
I don't have Lightroom as it is a monthly payment, am too frugal to pay, (lol)..

SusanFromVermont Loc: Southwest corner of Vermont

I think the idea of planning your organization system ahead of time is a good one. As you can see, everyone has their own idea of the best way for them. You have to decide what would work for YOU!

A lot of people like dividing images up by years, others like to use categories and topics, some like to completely or partially change the file name, others like to leave that alone. Of course there are variations within each of those preferences which can work as well. My own system is a combination of categories, topics, and years. It works for me because I like to keep topics/locations together, regardless of when the photos were taken. So I put photos from different years into a year folder, but within the topic folder! I could go into more detail, but I think you see the overall concept. For file names, I keep the numbers, using the prefix to designate which camera, with a minor change to that when the numbers roll over at 10,000 so I won't have duplicate file names. I also will add numbers, letters, and/or words [abbreviated] at the end to indicate different versions or types of versions. [HDR, Pano, Composite, etc.]

As for how to begin, I think the first thing is to divide the images into different groups, depending on how you choose to organize them. If by year, that is where to start - create folders for each year and just start dropping images into the right one. If by topic, then you could set up major topics folders and start dropping images into the appropriate one. Don't even think about anything like whether they are keepers or duplicates. And do not initially worry about sub-groupings.

Once the first groupings are done, that is when the real work begins! Most topics have sub-topics, so those need to be chosen. Most years will have sub-topics as well that will need to be chosen. Note: both of these statements are relevant whether you are using a date system or a categories and topics system!

The most important thing is to keep it as simple as possible, and also true to the way you think, and that would make it easiest for you to find images when looking for them.

Since you are using PS only, that suggests putting the images into Bridge. That way you can easily move them in and out of PS. I have the Adobe CC subscription, so all my images are organized within LR, and can be moved between LR and PS very easily.

The topic of external drives was mentioned - don't start out too small! With the number of images you have now, 4TB will work. If you think you will be doubling your number of images within a year or so, then get a larger external HD. Two drives would be better so you can back up the backup. It is not a matter of IF a drive will fail, rather it is WHEN! I went for years without a failure, then a drive I had owned for less than a year failed! I was very glad I had another backup, so I would not feel anxious while waiting for the replacement drive to arrive. [Replaced by the manufacturer under warranty.]

Any questions? Want more details? This will take time and patience, and surely more questions will come up as you move along.

Susan

JD750 Loc: SoCal

For those who don't wish to pay for Database software, LightRoom, PhotoMechanic, et., al., the computer OS will work just fine.

I have a buddy who travels a lot takes 1000's of pics on a trip he manages all using the Windows Explorer. He can find any image quickly, and he has folders for slide shows etc. It can be done. You can even "tag" files/folders with text, you can use that function for key-wording if you like.

It requires a little planning as for file naming and folder hierarchy, but it's more future proof because the computer OS file manager will always be there, unlike "after market" image managing or "Cataloging" programs (Aperture - RIP).

You can also use any good database program for the same purpose.

dat2ra Loc: Sacramento

I have a Master Folder that contains a folder for each year ('18). In each year folder, I have sub folders for each class of image's ('18 POR for portraits, '18 EVNT for events, etc.). There are 7 classes. Within each class I put the individual sets labeled with the date and subject ('18 POR 10-3 Sarah in red). I only keep 4 and 5-star photos as sorted in LR, and do minor PS edits, cropping, etc. I see no point in keeping the others. If I do additional post processing those go in the above folder as ('18 POR 10-3 Sarah in red POST). I find Light room handles these nested folders well, and I can quickly locate pix I want particularly because LR makes collections of POST and 5-star. The main thing is keeping all the photos in the Master Archive and not storing them all around on various hard drives or sundry folders.

ltom

Thanks everyone for all the help. I finally have a system that I can work with. Now I need more time to spend cataloging and figuring out what to do with jepgs and raw files to reduce the amount of data.

SusanFromVermont Loc: Southwest corner of Vermont

Glad you have decided on a system that works for you. Organizing is easier when you have a plan. It can be time consuming, and best not to try to accomplish too much at once. The brain gets fatigued...

Keep in mind that storage is cheap these days. This means that it is possible to keep as much data as you want, without getting rid of anything you might want later on. My advice is to be sure to KEEP the RAW files. They are like negatives were in film photography. You can always regenerate any image from the RAW or re-edit to reflect newly learned techniques.

The only .jpg files I keep are ones that I will share in social media, in a folder called "Watermarks" because I add a watermark to them. They can be reproduced by creating a new image copy from the original edited version and saving it as .jpg.

If you have a huge number of images, you may want to get some larger external HD's. And be sure to back up your images with at least one, but better two, copies. It is not IF a hard drive will fail, but WHEN!