Digital Storage

On Saturday I showed you how I store my rubber stamp collection - 8 categories that I can remember and all located in one drawer cabinet.   Today I'm going to show you how I store my digital collection.

 

The World of digital stamping  is growing at the speed of light I think!!  Long Long time ago I helped  a company make their rubber stamps by finding quality public domain art work that could be etched into rubber.  Now thanks to the internet levels of ease and access, you can have the art without the rubber! Both forms have their pros and cons.  They both need organization, maybe the digitals to a higher degree.  If your real stamps get out of control they can be like Tribbles, but you will know where they are and eventually find what you are looking for.  If you don't keep the digitals wrangled , they will just disappear in your computer system and you will never find them!! 

  Many high quality digi's are free and it is oh so easy to spend a couple hours on the computer and acquire a hundred or so new images! Storing them becomes crucial to really using them.

 

So this is what I do:

 

 

I work with two computer screens, I have a very large screen I do the bulk of my "work" from and then I have a smaller screen that acts has the information host. I use a PC but I use it like it was a Mac, a bad habit that I developed after working with a mac for 6 years, a long time ago.  It's a bad habit according to some - but it works splendidly for me.

 

My digital stamp inventory exploded over the last two years, firstly because I was able to go back to producing my own images - many of which I share on my blog - that would include over 9,000 images in black and white line art drawings.  I have close to 2,000 colored and fine art images.  So with this much art work it was imperative I kept things organized and usable.  I not saying this to brag about what I have, I know there are many of you that could easily double those numbers. If I could go from zero to 12,000 images in two years I need to have a plan.

 

So being essentially pretty lazy, and not wanting to type one letter I don't have too, spreadsheets were not in the picture for me.  Actually the whole idea of Me setting up a spread sheet, makes me think I might have to quit stamping!  A West coast friend of mine has every stamp she owns real rubber and digital in a spread sheet.  Her collection is under 2,000.  BUT to have 2,000 entries of name , company, image, when purchased for what price, to have all that is just an unbelievable amount of work that I am not will to put myself through!  Besides the whole point of this hobby is not the stuff  but WHO I MAKE IT FOR. 

 

So here is my Oh So Simple Solution: 

 

Picture number one, my information desktop:

Here you can se all my folders that I work from, I am on two design teams and I keep the images I am working on according to the sets I am give.  On the Left you see two colums of folders for Nicecrane designs.  One master folder with the ones under it containing  the images that I am currently working on.  The other folders are my resource icon and project icons, making everthing very easy for me to access. 

 

 

If you will notice an icon in the upper right that says digital images: This is a huge folder containing 75% of my images.  When I click on this access it opens up to this:

 Then if you click on one of those folders you will see this:

 

 

I add new folders when I add new categories.

This system makes storage and retrieval very, very simple and another important factor: It makes putting them away  simple and that is really a good thing!

 

Of course it take an effort to keep things organized, but this system is simple and usable.  I have very little typing or data entry involved to manage it.

 

There is one more thing I want to mention and it too is very important:  Have your images backed up!  I keep hard drive backed up on a portable storage drive and I keep all my art work backed up on two thumb drives and the portable drive!  I have been through a house fire and flood since 1998, I still have all my art work from 1997- present.  there were a couple times I almost lost it , now I don't want to take any chances there is now way I could replace those years of work

 

 

It is well worth the cost and effort to keep everything organized and protected.

 

I hope this post will be of some use to you in your organizational efforts!

I'd like you to stop by and join my face book group   "Christian Cardmakers Around the World"  It is a resource group for those who Love using scripture and making all kinds of cards to spread the light and encourage people!!

Have a wonderful day!

Ginny M