Help, I lost my travel photos!
Every time someone mentions they lost their photos, I cringe. I’m a photographer and understand the value of the photos.
It is sad that the memories made on their trips will be lost forever and all precaution should be taken to ensure that this does not happen to you.
There are a few ways to ensure lasting memories.
Don’t leave it on the memory card
I have met people who have accidentally formatted their card, or had thousands of photos on a memory card where a file system became corrupted and thus they could not retrieve their photos.
Besides losing your camera, your memory card could have a damaged spot in its memory storage or your camera could accidentally write one single instruction that could render all the files inaccessible.
By backing up your files to the cloud or a USB / HDD drive regularly, you can minimize the loss of the photos when these unfortunate events occur.
Use an External HDD
If you have the space to carry around a laptop, make sure you transfer your photos to your laptop routinely. If you do not have a laptop, at least invest in a rugged external hard drive.
Using a USB Flash Drive could also be an option if you do not shoot too many photos.
Use Dropbox and the Cloud
Another option you can exercise is to use a cloud base solution such as Dropbox.
You can easily sign up via that link and move photos from your phone onto the cloud. It is secure and you will not share it with anyone by default.
The Dropbox phone app can instantly upload any photos you take onto the cloud, or defer the upload to when you have a WiFi connection, to avoid potentially costly data charges.
(You can use this link to get an extra 500MB of space!)
You can also easily sign in from a hostel computer to upload your photos to Dropbox for safe keeping.
Use Google Drive
For those of you with more photos, you might want to consider Google Drive instead of Dropbox. For only $9.99 a month for 1TB of storage on Google’s cloud option, it’s a great deal for those us who want to travel light!
Like the Dropbox phone app, the Google+ app allows you to upload photos that you take from your phone instantly onto the cloud, or through a WiFi connection.
Uploading your files to Google Drive is as easy as dragging and dropping your pictures onto the browser window.
Recovering lost photos
If you have a corrupted memory card or accidentally formatted it, there is a chance you could recover your data.
Stop using the memory card immediately
If you did not do a low-level format, it is possible that just the area of your card memory that points to where the actual file is, was destroyed. You may be able to use recovery software to retrieve your precious pictures.
The same goes with a corrupted memory card. It depends on which part of your card or file system is corrupted.
Make backing up data a habit!
Regardless of whether you are travelling, or even shooting casually at home, backing up your photos is a great habit to form!
Cheers to lasting memories!
Please share your answer in the comments belowDo you back up your memories and other data when travelling? If so, how?