The Safe and Secure Backup

First, I must start by confessing that I am currently a film shooter and plan to remain so for at least two more years, perhaps longer. However, one area of digital imaging that appeals to me is the ability to make perfect backup copies of an image and store it off-site. Off-site storage is VERY important to me because a fire, theft or other event that destroys the primary image would probably also destroy a backup stored in the same facility. My question for you digital shooters is this: How many of you make digital backups of your images and store them off-site? If you do this can you share the procedures and technolgy you use to achieve this goal? Thanks.

Paul,

You hit the nail onthe head. The first ruile is to "make the backup". The second is to put it some place safe. As for media, it is your choice. Some viable options are: CD, DVD, External Hard drive and last but not least Tape.

Obviously thee are capacity issues as well as costs to be considered. The final decision is certainly yours.

Paul wrote: My question for you digital shooters is this: How many of you make digital backups of your images and store them off-site? If you do this can you share the procedures and technolgy you use to achieve this goal? Thanks.

I fairly regularly back up my critical data, and any new images since my last set of backups, onto DVD-R media, and store it at the office.

I use an external RAID drive. This automatically makes a duplicate of all files as I'm working so if I have a hard drive problem (which is rare but not unkown) the system will detect it, alarm, but continue working from the good drive. I can then replace the faulty drive at my leisure. The real strength is that my unit actually comes with 3 drive drawers - two are in use at any one time. Once a month I swap out one of the two in-use drives with my backup. The system detects the "new" drive, reimages into it and meanwhile I take the new backup/spare drive and store it in my office. One month later I repeat the process. When the system rebuilds it gives you the option of which drive you want to rebuild from so if you had had a calamity you can rebuild from the backup and you only lose the data since your last backup.

The beauty of this system, to me, is that my image files are always protected while I'm working plus I have a rotating remote backup. Mind you, once I go past 120G I'll have to go buy another unit as it is limited to 120G drives.

My daughter tells me I'm a bit anal about backing things up. I make two copies on CD. One gets stored at home and one gets stored at my sister's. Simple and relatively low-tech.

Rich