I recently blogged about the importance of backing up your digital files.  Today I am going to nag you to print your files onto actual photographic paper.  😉

I have a handful of old family photographs, not many, sadly, as I’ve moved countries a few times and a few have fallen through the cracks.  Although I’ve scanned them and now have them backed up, the only time I actually choose to view the images now is when I get the box down off the shelf, get a cuppa and leaf through them.  Some of them date from the 1940s, when my mum and dad were born. Thank goodness my grandparents made sure they took photographs and saved them so well.  They are so precious to me now.

It really does worry me that there are less and less actual printed photographs in the world.  We may be taking hundreds more but they’re hanging out in the ether, on Facebook or on dusty old external hard drives.  I know I’m guilty of this, too.  Like a plumber who never bothers to fix the little issues in his own bathroom, there are two professional photographers in my household and neither of us orders prints often enough. You’d think that we would have many fat photo albums on the bookcase, with minute by minute images of Max’s three and a half years.  We don’t have one.  This I WILL rectify this year.  It’s my unofficial New Year’s resolution.

So, please, print your images as soon as you receive your disc or USB from your photographer.  These days, it’s inexpensive to do a large print order.  Do it.  You won’t regret it, I promise you.  Looking at photographs on a screen is just not the same. (Obviously, I still felt the need to add some images to this blog post, haha!)

Have a great weekend!

x

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Jenny
April 12, 2013
You're so right Kirsten! I worry about not printing out photographs enough either, especially as I so enjoy leafing through my Mum's albums. I'm going to change that and print out more! x
April 12, 2013
I try to have a running iPhoto book in production at any given time - every time we go out and take pictures I add a few more pages, then when it's up to 100 pages I order it. It's an easy way to keep up to date with printing images and such fun to receive the finished album in the post each time!
Kirsten Mavric
April 12, 2013
Now that is a FANTASTIC idea! I love it!!!
April 12, 2013
Yeah Rosie, that is an absolutely genius idea! Can't believe I haven't thought of that before! Off to set it up right now!
April 12, 2013
I couldn't agree more. I took inspiration from a friend who also has a 3 year old...she edits personal photos at the end of each month uploading the best ones to Create new pages in a book for that month...by the end of each year she has a photo yearbook laid out in month by month order and its not a mammoth task as she does a little bit each month. I do that too now and it's lovely looking back on how my little one has changed so much.
April 13, 2013
Right on sister! I've just ordered a load of prints and brought some albums for exactly that reason. Life passes by so fast and we should be documenting our experiences. Love your idea Rosie!