Ideas or tips on organizing, saving and culling all these files

biza43 said:

l_d_allan said:

biza43 said:

My way of optimizing imaging workflow starts in the field: I am disciplined and do not shoot "just for the sake of it", thus avoiding ending up with many images that would end up in the bin anyway. This is an approach that I have learned since shooting slide film.

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If that "old school" approach works for you, great.

I'm not meaning to be argumentative (moi?), but for others that would seem like an artifact of what I consider "the bad old days" of film.

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I learned a lot during the bad old days, including the experience to rely on my instinct to select a good time to click the shutter.

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Agree ... the "Decisive Moment" is difficult to "hit" ... even with 5 to 10+ FPS.

biza43 said:

biza43 said:

However, it seems like that approach may be missing out on what I consider a significant advantage of digital photography with HUGE flash cards capable of holding 1000+ RAW images ... lots of images to choose from.

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In the bad old days of film, with the EOS 1V, I could go through a roll in 4 or 5 seconds. Today that limit is not present, of course. Still, purely relying on the "pray and spray" approach can make one lucky a few times, but then luck runs out eventually.

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Also agree ... neither of us advocate "purely relying on 'pray and spray'". BTW: I used to buy bulk film in 100' rolls.

biza43 said:

In the end, the best approach is somewhere in between: acquire the instinct from experience, and "spray and pray" only when required. That is all I am saying.

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And again agree. I'm trying to do fewer captures when I have time to think things thru, such as landscape'ish and "photo booth" type events.

biza43 said:

From your shots, I got curious: why not select a smaller aperture to increase DOF, and why not getting low on the ground for a better angle/composition?

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Don't disagree ... the "action" was happening "fast and furious" at the crowded event. I would glance around the room for "photo ops" and then take "grab shots" and "hope for the best".

Also, I didn't want to interfere with the candid interactions between the people involved ... get fewer "photo booth poses" and more of the "real world" while trying to be a "fly on the wall".

This is an interesting thread, particularly for the technical aspect.

I used to enjoy photography, happily shooting thousands of pictures.

Then one day while on vacation with a friend and taking lots of pictures, he asked me innocently, "what do you do with all those pictures you've taken?"

I told him I've either printed them and put them in a photo album or saved the digital files to my computer or smartphone/minipad. Then he reminded me of all the pictures I've taken years ago and asked, "When was the last time you looked at those photos?"

It got me wondering again about the purpose of my photography hobby and what to do with all the thousands of images I've taken over the years.

Halwick said:

This is an interesting thread, particularly for the technical aspect.

I used to enjoy photography, happily shooting thousands of pictures.

Then one day while on vacation with a friend and taking lots of pictures, he asked me innocently, "what do you do with all those pictures you've taken?"

I told him I've either printed them and put them in a photo album or saved the digital files to my computer or smartphone/minipad. Then he reminded me of all the pictures I've taken years ago and asked, "When was the last time you looked at those photos?"

It got me wondering again about the purpose of my photography hobby and what to do with all the thousands of images I've taken over the years.

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I think you can enjoy both the act of photographer and the separate act of reviewing photos now and years from now.

If I had all my photo prints and digital copies destroyed in a fire and I could never look at them again, it wouldn't spoil the joy that went into making those images.

Halwick said:

This is an interesting thread, particularly for the technical aspect.

I used to enjoy photography, happily shooting thousands of pictures.

Then one day while on vacation with a friend and taking lots of pictures, he asked me innocently, "what do you do with all those pictures you've taken?"

I told him I've either printed them and put them in a photo album or saved the digital files to my computer or smartphone/minipad. Then he reminded me of all the pictures I've taken years ago and asked, "When was the last time you looked at those photos?"

It got me wondering again about the purpose of my photography hobby and what to do with all the thousands of images I've taken over the years.

Click to expand...

... what to do with all the thousands of images I've taken over the years? Maybe nothing, and that is perfectly OK I would think. It is the PROCESS that counts - the taking of the pictures, the way it makes you look at the scene, the processing and learning.

What do painters do with their paintings? Sell them or give them away, never to be seen again by themselves or their friends. Or if they lack canvas, they paint on top of the old one if need be

BBQue said:

Halwick said:

This is an interesting thread, particularly for the technical aspect.

I used to enjoy photography, happily shooting thousands of pictures.

Then one day while on vacation with a friend and taking lots of pictures, he asked me innocently, "what do you do with all those pictures you've taken?"

I told him I've either printed them and put them in a photo album or saved the digital files to my computer or smartphone/minipad. Then he reminded me of all the pictures I've taken years ago and asked, "When was the last time you looked at those photos?"

It got me wondering again about the purpose of my photography hobby and what to do with all the thousands of images I've taken over the years.

Click to expand...

... what to do with all the thousands of images I've taken over the years? Maybe nothing, and that is perfectly OK I would think. It is the PROCESS that counts - the taking of the pictures, the way it makes you look at the scene, the processing and learning.

What do painters do with their paintings? Sell them or give them away, never to be seen again by themselves or their friends. Or if they lack canvas, they paint on top of the old one if need be

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I agree I enjoy the entire process from A to Z but the actual shooting and seeing what I got most of all. When I get a stunner I post it to 500px and only have about 250 real nice images and out of those probably only 25 to 50 that are really something. I enjoy sharing them and am proud of what I have amassed to far. I take a lot of photos of my friends, my racing, other functions and enjoy put those on Facebook and my friends all know that anything I post is done by a photographer due to the quality of the composition and images and that is fun too. I get as much satisfaction out of sending others very good pictures of themselves, family and friends. It is nice to take someone's picture and be able to give them nice pics. I almost always stop on the street when I see someone taking a photo of their partner or family and ask them if they want to get in the photo and let me take some. It is a good feeling knowing the photos they will get are much better even with their phones than they could get. Especially enjoy doing it for tourists and foreigners. They do not haver pole sticking out of their heads or head of feet cut out, they are framed better and I may move to not be shooting into the sun or ask them to move so it is all fun and rewarding.

Very interesting thread and comments from all. My 4 cents...

Take few vs. take many shots: depends on your subject, the time available, the objectives for the image you hope to make. I hear how it's better to really study, then only make one excellent image. Best wishes trying to capture a baseball and bat connecting, or that split-second look of pain on a wrestler's face. When time permits (and the imagined shot is worthwhile), I agree - take it slow and plan every detail. But, every single time, I will fire off 10+ shots during a sporting event (maybe sometimes during a concert) to get that image that's only available for a micro-second.

What to save or discard: I keep RAW images. I first make a copy of every RAW when importing into LR (onto the same external hard drives everybody else uses). Yes, I have a number of them. Once in LR, I ruthlessly delete images with any issues at all and then go through alternately processing and culling by adding stars. Once I'm at three stars, I have sharable images. Four stars are for portfolio consideration. Five star images ARE my portfolio. Adding a fifth star means I need to consider demoting an image already assigned that fifth star.

I only export JPGs to show others (via website, Instagram, email, etc.). I don't feel a need to keep JPGs for myself.

I don't know how to deal with the A9. It is a different animal. I never trusted wide-area auto-focus before, but the A9 seems to nail it 90+% of the time (it does still grab the wrong subject sometimes). So, I am learning to make use of the awesome autofocus capabilities. Maybe I need to learn to love JPGs OOC.