ABSTRACT
Though I often suggest shooting a lot and shooting in RAW when in doubt, there is a price if you want to keep all those images: disk space. As we accumulate digital images and discover digital delivery and storage methods, we make fewer prints. That’s great for limiting the number of boxes in the basement, but though digital images are more compact than a stack of prints, they can be lost in a blink. Hard drive failure is the most common cause of image loss; accidental formatting is another. But even if the mechanism stays intact and you don’t delete the data, magnetic media fades over time. Though many of us were taught that CDs and DVDs are indestructible and last forever, that’s far from true. The maximum expected life of a CD or DVD that you got on sale is five years. You can buy archival-grade disks, but there are no guarantees that your data is safe. You can increase the likelihood if you store them properly: In jewel cases, standing vertically, and at reasonable room temperatures, out of direct sunlight.
