Easy Way to Organize Your Digital Photos

For the longest time, I couldn't figure out how to keep my digital photography organized on my computer. I'd spend loads of time searching and searching for ONE picture that I took 2 years ago!

FINALLY, after all these years, I have found a way to keep those digital photos organized and worry free! After reading this, I hope you'll feel the stress lift as you get yourself organized!

Step One:
Create a folder on your desktop and label it with the year. For example, right now, my folder is labeled "2007" on my desktop.

Step Two:
Open up "2007" and create 12 folders inside. Label each of the folders the months of the year.

Step Three:
Take your pictures!

Step Four:
As often as possible, download your pictures off of your camera to your computer. I try to do it several times a month because I take a LOT of pictures. Copy and paste those pictures into the appropriate month's folder.

Step Five:
If there was a special event that has a lot of photos, create its' own folder in the "2007" folder. For example, we just spent several days in Pittsburgh for Easter, so I made a separate folder and labeled it "Easter '07". The reason I do that is because those pictures are often ones that I want to look back on later and make extra prints for people. You can even put that folder INSIDE the coincinding month that it happened if you want to keep your "2007" folder more streamlined.

Step Six:
UPLOAD your photos to a website and caption them!!!!!!! Many people think this is TOO time consuming, but as soon as I download my pictures, I upload them to a photosharing site like www.snapfish.com and caption them. That way they are stored online and if something happened to my computer before the year was over, I could still have my photos and or I can remember what was happening in the pictures. I also use this site and send out my pictures to family and friends every month. Make sure you use a site that doesn't delete your photos after a certain time period!

Step Seven:
At the end of the year, burn your pictures to a CD-R....NOT a CD-RW! You don't want to make a mistake and burn over your precious pictures. After burning the CD-R, CHECK IT and make sure it burned properly and all the pictures are on it, label it "2007 Photos". If you're like me and you take a lot of photos, it may require more than one CD-R. In that case, label them "2007 Photos #1 of 2" and so forth. Place the CD-R(s) in a box labeled "Photos". Keep the box organized and put the next year behind the previous year's.

If you want to REALLY be safe, make more than one copy of the photos, but unless you're prone to losing or breaking things, that is not necessary if you've checked to make sure that the pictures are all there on the CD's.

I hope this helps you in the organizing of your digital photos! It has been a complete life saver for me!

After that is all done, you can trash the photos on your computer and make room for the next year!