Photo organizing software - need help
 

Hey guys -

I spend a lot of time over in the stereo threads helping guys sort out that tech world and it occurred to me this morning I need some help of my own...

Being the parent of twins and getting into the DSLR game, I've now got zillions and zillions of photos that are in serious need of organizing. I've used Picasa which has a great user interface but for the life of me I dont understand why they set up that program to make copies of your entire photo album when you make changes and such.

Is there such a thing as a great cataloging program out there? I'd sure appreciate some guidance. What software are you using and why do you like it?

-Brian
Exile Audio

It is hard to beat iPhoto (Apple) if you don't need Plug-Ins for advanced stuff. I know a lot of PC guys use Lightroom which I hear is very good.

I use Aperture 3 and like it a lot.

Lightroom is awesome.

I'm a Windows user and I use the organizer in my editing program (P.S. Elements 8) It's ok but I hear lightroom is very good. I think I will end up there soon.

On a related note, what is everyone using to back up your photos, external hard drives, DVD's and how offen do you back up?

Aperture 3 or Lightroom are the 2 industrial strength organizers.

lightroom 3 is the best, which comes with adobe bridge. best one in my opinion

Back up
 

Just getting into the photo/video thing - I use Carbonite for backup because I'm lazy. For $60 for the year it backs up all my photos, videos and everything else every day. It only backs up new files or changes to files. This is great for those of us who pretend we are going to back up but really won't

iPhoto is fine until you start getting in the 5 figures. My Lightroom catalog is well into the 6 figures and dating back to the late 90's, the way it organized photos is excellent.

I use a combination of iPhoto and Flickr Pro. Both have tools that make uploading and organizing mass amounts of photos easy and very fast.

For backup I use Time Machine, Max OSX's native backup program. I also have switched out the hard drive once I have a year or more of backups on it. Also having my photos on Flickr provides some redundancy.

I use a Aperture 3 with a Mac Book Pro. My libraries are stored on a 1T external drive (my Mac's drive was getting full too fast). I have a question-- Is there an easy way I can buy another 1T drive and have it "mask" my other one or would I manually have to back it up?

I use Time Machine on my Mac and wonder if I can do something similar with my external drive.

I'd like to have this:

MAC BOOK PRO >> 1T External Drive >> 1T External Drive (copy of other 1T drive)

Rob, the 2nd drive may have to be done manually. I don't think there is a mirror app/software for a time machine backup. However, if you are serious about backups and redundancy I would recommend a Drobo. RAID 5 will guarantee you will never loose any data!

http://www.drobo.com/products/index.php

For those interested in Lightroom 3.. It's on sale at Amazon for $169

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...SIN=B003739DVY

Or B&H for $$179
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc..._Software.html

^^^^^^ If you are interested in LR3 and have a student in your household with a valid student I.D., you can get the full version of LR3 for $89

https://store1.adobe.com/cfusion/sto...&quicklinkbtn=

Speaking of LR3, I am using the 30 day free trial to decide if LR3 is for me. The thing that kills me with software programs is the complete lack of an instruction manual on how to use the damn thing. I suppose you have to pay for 3rd party tutorials, etc? That being the case, do any of you have a recommendation for an easy to follow instructional book or resource for LR3?

http://www.kelbytraining.com/online/...gory=lightroom

Pay for a month (only $25) and watch 'em all.. better than any book you can buy.

You can also check out Lynda Training: http://www.lynda.com/home/viewcourses.aspx?lpk0=234

I can't personally vouch for the Lynda Training classes, but I did have a 3 month subscription to Kelby training and watched a TON of cool videos during that time! Besides the LR stuff they have great training videos on camera settings, shooting techniques, using strobes, etc.. I highly recommend it!

I have access to Lynda training, but I didn't see LR3 on there? They have CS5 and Elements 9 though.

I went ahead and downloaded the trial version of Elements 9 to play with since I can use Lynda to help me figure it out. Can anyone give me a cliff notes version of the differences between LR3 and Elements 9?

I'm really looking for an editing program to tough up and crop family photos. Would Elements 9 be able to handle that?

Nauty - The link I posted has 4 x LR3 training videos... Adobe calls it "Photoshop Lightroom"

http://www.lynda.com/home/viewcourses.aspx?lpk0=234

Sorry, but I have zero experience with Elements, so I'm no value added in that department.

Yep, I found it in there. I watched a few videos for LR3 as well as PE9 and I think PE9 will do everything I'm looking for, for now. I was also able to find it for $48 after a $20 rebate. I may get into LR3 down the road, but I think I'll get my feet wet with PE9 first.

Thanks for your help!

How's PE9 working out so far?

I'm really digging PE9. So far it's doing everything that I had hoped it would. I will say that without Lynda.com I would have been completely lost on how to use it. Lynda.com has 11 + hours of videos to watch on PE9. I'm just now starting to get into the editing portion of the training and I have already been able to produce some pretty cool stuff.

There is one downside to programs like Photoshop and that is discovering that my computer is vastly under powered. Yesterday I shot some photos in RAW for the first time and it took FOREVER for my computer to process each one. I also find myself wanting a bigger and better monitor. So with that in mind, it looks like I'll be dropping some coin on a new computer and monitor in the very near future.