Photo Management on a long cruise

[JM0115]

2 hours ago, Heidi13 said:

 

At present, I am using external hard drives, with discs, as I have a number of them. If I was to purchase new, I would be purchasing external solid state drives, rather than the older discs.

 

My laptop is also solid state, currently with 1TB and I will shortly add another 1 TB solid state drive.

I’m trying out a 1TB USB 3.0 flash (thumb)  drive. It’s amazing that they can squeeze 1 TB or even 2 TB onto a flash drive!

[Mich3554]

2 hours ago, Heidi13 said:

 

Definitely suggest bringing your laptop in the WC. You will no doubt see me sitting in the Living Room with the laptop working on photos, or wandering down to the Theatre for a lecture. Before it starts, I am again working on photos.

 

I prefer to name each photo shortly after it is taken and even do some basic photo editing.

I have a Lenovo Yoga, which has (I think) a 500 GB solid state drive.  It is nicely light (and bright orange).  Good to travel with, but not a huge screen.
 

 

[Heidi13]

4 hours ago, sjde said:

My husband was so sick of his cell phone too and said he'd give it up in retirement.  HA! That was almost 6 years ago and now he is on it MUCH more than ever.

 

Haha - not me. They gave me mine to keep, but it sat on the counter for 8 months without ever being turned on. Gave it back to them after 8 months and after 8 yrs don't miss it😀

[Heidi13]

3 hours ago, JM0115 said:

I’m trying out a 1TB USB 3.0 flash (thumb)  drive. It’s amazing that they can squeeze 1 TB or even 2 TB onto a flash drive!

 

Wow impressive, I believe my biggest thumb drive is a measly 64 or 128 GB. I actually prefer the portable drives, as being bigger, I have less chance of misplacing them. Something to do with memory and age.😁

[rkacruiser]

On 2/19/2021 at 12:07 PM, Heidi13 said:

The other thing I do is ensure the camera is set for the correct date and time, as I find that helps to differentiate between different places and the time may trigger the memory of where we were.

 

Setting the correct date and time is important to me as well.  I also write a daily journal and find that helpful as well.  Before I started doing this, I would get photos developed and wonder:  why in the heck did I take that picture and where was I?  My journal refreshes my memory.

[2552phxcrzr]

18 hours ago, rkacruiser said:

 

Setting the correct date and time is important to me as well.  I also write a daily journal and find that helpful as well.  Before I started doing this, I would get photos developed and wonder:  why in the heck did I take that picture and where was I?  My journal refreshes my memory.

Agreed on both counts.  My journal is one of my best resources.

[lissie]

I carry a laptop  for anything longer than a weekend trip. Everyday - at most 2 - I'll upload photos and my software will automatically make a copy to an external hardrive. Once the camera card is about 2/3 full - I'll swap it for another one. I rotate about 4 cards - but don't delete any photos from them unless I absolutely have to. 

 

I therefore have 3 backups- the card (in my camera or my spare card container), laptop's hard drive and my external hard disk. When we are travelling independently those 3 places are never in the same bag. 

 

I don't care about losing hardware - I care about loosing photos. 

 

Once I get home - or somewhere with free fast wifi  my laptop will automatically backup the photos to a cloud backup service and I'll reformat the camera cards. 

 

It amazes me the number of people who store all their important photos on their phones and nowhere else 

[Lesanne]

I take my MacBook Air with me on the world cruise, i have several cards that i change regularly and copy the photos to my laptop and an external SSD. I have enough cards to leave the photos on them till we return home. I then back all up to 2 external HDD and then go through sorting and creating an album for the cruise plus add any pictures shared with me

[Mary229]

Why aren't you using the cloud.  I use google photos and iCloud.  I have used google for my business since 2009 and those photos are still there at my beck and call. I use iCloud for personal photos and viewing shared family photos.  They are immediately available and immediately transferrable with a fair internet connection.  You don't need a super internet connection, just a fair one.

[Mich3554]

6 hours ago, Mary229 said:

Why aren't you using the cloud.  I use google photos and iCloud.  I have used google for my business since 2009 and those photos are still there at my beck and call. I use iCloud for personal photos and viewing shared family photos.  They are immediately available and immediately transferrable with a fair internet connection.  You don't need a super internet connection, just a fair one.

I suspect it is because the internet on board can be sketchy, and large uploads of pictures can be difficult.....if not impossible at times.  

[floridababa]

Does anyone use extra lenses on I phones? Trying to get better pictures from afar

[Heidi13]

6 hours ago, Mary229 said:

Why aren't you using the cloud.  I use google photos and iCloud.  I have used google for my business since 2009 and those photos are still there at my beck and call. I use iCloud for personal photos and viewing shared family photos.  They are immediately available and immediately transferrable with a fair internet connection.  You don't need a super internet connection, just a fair one.

 

In addition to connectivity issues, the size of each photo will dictate how easy it is to upload photos. In my case I shoot with full frame and RAW format, so each photo is at least 25 Megs. Uploading a few hundred photos of this size each day would take forever.

[Mary229]

58 minutes ago, Heidi13 said:

 

In addition to connectivity issues, the size of each photo will dictate how easy it is to upload photos. In my case I shoot with full frame and RAW format, so each photo is at least 25 Megs. Uploading a few hundred photos of this size each day would take forever.

One of the improvements that Carnival Corporation announced just before the pandemic was a major update to the internet aboard across all of their US brands.  I wish I could find that article again but if it works as reviewed by the techies we are about to get a totally new experience.

[Mary229]

1 hour ago, floridababa said:

Does anyone use extra lenses on I phones? Trying to get better pictures from afar

I have used the macro lenses.  They do work as advertised but they might be a little bulky and the connections to the phone might not withstand travel. It has been a few years for me so maybe there have been improvements

[Heidi13]

39 minutes ago, Mary229 said:

One of the improvements that Carnival Corporation announced just before the pandemic was a major update to the internet aboard across all of their US brands.  I wish I could find that article again but if it works as reviewed by the techies we are about to get a totally new experience.

 

I suspect you will definitely notice a difference, as we did with Viking Ocean, which already has improved bandwidth. While it is a vast improvement on traditional cruise ship connectivity, it still isn't close to what we have at home.

 

However, I definitely enjoyed the improved bandwidth while uploading my blog posts.

[AryMay]

I posted this on the Photo Forum, but this might be helpful here as well.

 

I am not a super techy person, but wanted some way to back up photos while we travel withOUT taking a laptop or having internet service. My solution has been a RAVPower File Hub. (The one I have is an older model than the link I've provided.)

 

 

This thing is a wireless router that lets you transfer photos from either an SD card or an iPhone to an external hard drive without having an internet connection. My 1 TB drive is about the size of a deck of playing cards but as mentioned previously a thumb drive is another option.

 

BEFORE a cruise, I set up daily folders on the external hard drive and then I try and dump all of the photos from my phone and a couple of different cameras each day. Sometimes I take a few of the better photos and transfer to my iPad so they are easy to show to traveling companions. I have also used the Power Hub to get copies of the photos that our friends have taken.

 

I take quite a few SD cards and switch them out most every day so that way I have both the cards and the external hard drive as backups. 

 

Once I get home then I sort through the photos and do any editing that is needed.

 

One tip that I will give is to make sure the times on all of your devices (including cameras and phones that spouse and friends are using) are all synchronized. By doing so, it will make it so much easier to sort and organize your photos. 

[Mich3554]

I think this trip I will definitely be taking my laptop to transfer files from my cameras.  I learned my lesson about this when we were in Africa.

 

Other than forgetting to pick up spare SD cards (so we had to go shopping for a card on safari when both DH and I ran out of memory), I really couldn't see the pics from the small screen on my camera.  I didn’t realize until I got home that my camera was set on auto focus, and I have some fabulous pictures of cheetahs with the camera perfectly focused on the strand of grass in the foreground.  I should have refamiliarized myself with my camera before I left.  Had I been transferring the pictures to a larger screen, I’d have seen my goof much earlier.

[Heidi13]

1 hour ago, Mich3554 said:

I think this trip I will definitely be taking my laptop to transfer files from my cameras.  I learned my lesson about this when we were in Africa.

 

Other than forgetting to pick up spare SD cards (so we had to go shopping for a card on safari when both DH and I ran out of memory), I really couldn't see the pics from the small screen on my camera.  I didn’t realize until I got home that my camera was set on auto focus, and I have some fabulous pictures of cheetahs with the camera perfectly focused on the strand of grass in the foreground.  I should have refamiliarized myself with my camera before I left.  Had I been transferring the pictures to a larger screen, I’d have seen my goof much earlier.

 

When in auto-focus are you able to select the number of auto-focus points and select a single point. I use my camera in auto-focus in almost all conditions except low light or poor contrast.

 

With a similar situation on a safari, I selected single point auto-focus and then selected the point over the preferred subject. Worked well.

[Mich3554]

2 hours ago, Heidi13 said:

 

When in auto-focus are you able to select the number of auto-focus points and select a single point. I use my camera in auto-focus in almost all conditions except low light or poor contrast.

 

With a similar situation on a safari, I selected single point auto-focus and then selected the point over the preferred subject. Worked well.

I can choose the point to select to focus on out of options, but didn’t realize it until I got the photos home and looked at them on my computer screen.  The screen on my camera didn’t provide that much detailing due to size.  
It had been a few years since I had used the camera, cell phones had been sufficient up until this trip.  It was definitely a goof on my part...an expensive goof!

[floridababa]

On 4/5/2021 at 11:04 AM, AryMay said:

I posted this on the Photo Forum, but this might be helpful here as well.

 

I am not a super techy person, but wanted some way to back up photos while we travel withOUT taking a laptop or having internet service. My solution has been a RAVPower File Hub. (The one I have is an older model than the link I've provided.)

 

 

This thing is a wireless router that lets you transfer photos from either an SD card or an iPhone to an external hard drive without having an internet connection. My 1 TB drive is about the size of a deck of playing cards but as mentioned previously a thumb drive is another option.

 

BEFORE a cruise, I set up daily folders on the external hard drive and then I try and dump all of the photos from my phone and a couple of different cameras each day. Sometimes I take a few of the better photos and transfer to my iPad so they are easy to show to traveling companions. I have also used the Power Hub to get copies of the photos that our friends have taken.

 

I take quite a few SD cards and switch them out most every day so that way I have both the cards and the external hard drive as backups. 

 

Once I get home then I sort through the photos and do any editing that is needed.

 

One tip that I will give is to make sure the times on all of your devices (including cameras and phones that spouse and friends are using) are all synchronized. By doing so, it will make it so much easier to sort and organize your photos. 

I'm so not tech oriented that even the picture confuses me. We will have an iPhone and a regular camera. The white is the Rav Power? And the blue?

Thank you for your help

[Heidi13]

15 minutes ago, floridababa said:

I'm so not tech oriented that even the picture confuses me. We will have an iPhone and a regular camera. The white is the Rav Power? And the blue?

Thank you for your help

 

The blue one is the external drive (storage device)

[AryMay]

19 minutes ago, floridababa said:

I'm so not tech oriented that even the picture confuses me. We will have an iPhone and a regular camera. The white is the Rav Power? And the blue?

Thank you for your help

 

2 minutes ago, Heidi13 said:

 

The blue one is the external drive (storage device)

 

Yes, the blue one is a 1 TB external hard drive and the white is the Rav Power (although not sure it comes in white anymore.)

 

Once downloading an app on the iPhone, you can wirelessly transfer photos from the phone to the hard drive even without an internet connection. The Rav Power also has an SD card slot so photos from a camera can be transferred as well.

 

The app on the phone is confusing (to me) so I have step-by-step instructions saved on the Notes app so I can remember the order to do things. It isn't intuitive (to me) and I only use the Rav Power when I travel so need a little reminder each time.

 

The Rav Power can also serve as a "hub" so that more than one user can connect to one internet account (such as in a hotel or probably on the ship.) I've never tried using it that way so can't say how well it works. With T-Mobile free service in over 200 countries, I've never bothered to purchase internet on the ship...I just wait and use my phone in port.