Workshops on Organizing Photos and Scrapbooking Supplies

I have been reading a lot about organizing my photo collection and working on improving my photo processing workflow. I have read through materials from two courses: Finally Get Organized and Organizing Your Photographs, along with the materials from Library of Memories. Library of Memories has been revamped and starts again as Finding Photo Freedom June 1st. I have a system in place for uploading and star-rating my photos, but the keywording and editing process is very haphazard. Since an organizational system is very personal, these resources are helping me articulate and streamline my workflow. My goals are to get scrapping again. I want to share my photos in a systematic way and protect them. What I don't have to think about will make me happy. I have also discovered that I really enjoy the editing process.

A little about the two online workshops:

Finally Get Organized
This workshop will get you started thinking about why you keep what you keep. I found the content applies to both paper and digital, including organizing your supplies. Everything is organized around how you use the product and there are a series of questions and prompts to get you thinking about that process. This is very similar to Wendy Smedley and Aby Garvey's method found in The Organized and Inspired Scrapbooker. Having to think again about my stuff, I have come to the conclusion that I have too much. In my scrapbook room I have started moving things from shelves into bins and giveaway boxes to make room for the things I truly love. I don't think of myself as being emotionally attached to my stuff, but I am beginning to realize I am wrong. I am stuck on: "Oh this is a really cool project I wanted to try. I have great ideas." "I will use this or give this away some day." "I have spent so much money, time, energy, on this, I have to keep it." The last one is the biggest impediment to purging anything. The workshop is very basic, but it might be just the thing to get you started.

Organizing Your Photographs
Liz is presenting this as a comprehensive year-long project to honor the process involved in organizing 30+ years of photographs. This is a very realistic approach to this project. I did a bunch of print organizing many years ago when I started scrapping. I have most of my prints organized chronologically in acid-free cardboard storage bins. I kept albums together that were archival-quality. There are two areas of my print organization system that don't work-how to handle incoming prints (photos I am given, inherited, or the few I choose to print) and how to handle the non-4X6 photos (I don't have storage in other sizes for those photos.). I am concentrating on my digital collection, implementing LOM-style organization, but I want to start digitizing my paper photos and that will require a system in place before I start scanning. (I have blogged about LOM here.

The first lesson of Organizing Your Photographs is called "Grouping and Gathering." Liz provides worksheets that will get you thinking about how you use your photos and why you have them in the first place. This is a different way of approaching this task to me and I like it. She has put a lot of time and thought into the content and I am really liking it. She presents the content in video and in PDF form so you hear and read it. The hugest thing is that this is FREE! Liz is giving away this content. You have to sign up for her newsletter to get the series. That's it.

Next, my system.

LOM Progress 4/2/2011

I purged 458 photos, freeing up 1.36 G of disk space. I have now rated from present to Q2 2010.

Blogging Goals from Blogging for Scrapbookers(Shimelle.com)

I have so many gadgets to distract me from my real love: taking pictures and telling stories. I swear I would probably be better off with none of these things except my Nikon, of course!! (I am loving Windows Live Writer for helping me write my posts!)

Journaling on Page 2: When I decided to take this course I knew that I would be challenged to develop goals for my blogging and scrapbooking life. I have been trying to systematize my digital workflow for over a year now. I just seem to be missing the mark in terms of feeling content in my crafting life. I have taken courses at Big Picture and I am a Paperclipping Member. I have taken drawing and painting lessons at Willowing, but I just feel like I haven’t found a flow. I take so many pictures that I can’t keep up with creating anything half the time. I spend my time organizing, purging and organizing my pictures. Since getting my iPad last fall I have been trying out apps that will help me get more of my story told and more of my photos out there to share. After all that’s why I take them. They are for me, but also for the people I love to enjoy. My new blog will be another way to share the pictures and the stories that they help to tell in a way that is both meaningful and easy.

A Breath of New Life and Perhaps a Goal or Two

I am taking a class over at Shimelle.com called Blogging for Scrapbookers. I am so excited about it. I have already downloaded the materials from when she ran the course in 2009 and I have updated my blog and made a post. I look forward to meeting other bloggers who love photos and stories and scrapbooking. We'll see what new life this will breathe into my blog.

Can I blog directly from my iPad?

I have been at a crossroads or maybe I should say I have hit a wall. I have done so little scrapping this year, really hardly any since April. I started off the year with so much excitement about the classes I was taking through bigpictureclasses.com, especially Stacy Julian's "Library of Memories". I was excited about learning my new camera and had so much planned. I think I just stopped enjoying it. I loved listening to the podcasts at Paperclipping.com. I love learning about photography, but I am having trouble putting it all together. I figure I have this last bit of effort to do something with my pictures and the stories they document.

Idea #999: I am going to become an expert on using my iPad to digital scrapbook.

I am going to try to do this without using a scrap booking app like Escrap or ScraPad which I find reminiscent of the early days of scrap booking software. I have been researching a lot lately and I have found a few things to help me. But first I had to figure out how to share what I am learning on my blog.

Next time: How I made this layout and how I posted it to my blog!

Location:Here I am on my iPad

All Those Photo Projects Brainstorm List

Because I keep coming up with them and don't want to forget them I will post the ideas swimming around my head right now:

• Photobooks for Michelle, Michele, and Darby
• Photobook for Utah 2010 trip
• Calendars for Kathy, Jean, Mom and Dad, Vickie, Hillary, and Heather
• CD for Jessica of her birthday and sprinkle
• Photo Frames for Mom and Dad

I need to rate, keyword, and purge my 2010 photos.

I have converted Aug - November to Jpgs and stored the NEF and RAW files on both EHDs. The bulk has bugged me since converting and I have decided to shoot JPEG fine with my Nikon. JPEGs are just so much easier to work with.

Working In Raw is Frustrating Me!

The files are too big! I am constantly battling not having enough space. I have a 500G EHD for backups and I am just getting overwhelmed. . . Again!

Steps Again??

1. Upload to Photoshop Elements Organizer (label with date, then pic #)

2. Manually backup to EHD

3. Rate (use F11 to get to big screen view)

4. Delete 0-star ratings

5. Keyword in batch - Who, What, Where

6. Advanced Keyword for Category Drawers - Us, People, Things, Places

7.

When do I print? When do I scrapbook? When do I get to play with my photos because it seems like all I do is upload, purge, rate, and edit. It's too much. Just too much! I never get to just scrapbook with my photos.

Digital Workflow Part 2

I am listening and watching my Library of Memories videos from Kayla Lamoureaux again. I recently returned from a two-week road trip to Utah with almost 2000 photos in tow. My workflow HAS to get better. I found this program for cheap-cheap and decided to give it a try. I am tired of PSE Organizer being so SLOW. Here I am starting over again!

First I have been working on the file organization on my hard drive. I have a folder for each year and a subfolder for each month. I upload photos with their date and number into their month folder. I have to rename lots of files this way-not sure that is a good use of my time.

I moved my pictures from my desktop into My Pictures folder on my laptop and have created a little bit of a mess. I have not been consistent in how and where I saved photos that I had edited or used for projects so things are not tidy. This bugs me to no end. I am reorganizing the files now. I had subfolders by day and found this to be totally cumbersome. I already moved the pics out of those, but I need to delete those folders. This just seems so stupid to me, but I feel like I can't move forward without this basic structure in place and solid.

I realized something recently . . . If I rate my photos first, then keyword, I don't have to keyword so many. That's that photo haystack that Kayla/Stacy are talking about. I have to narrow down the choices. That does not mean I have to keyword EVERY SINGLE PHOTO, just the ones that I might use. I don't even have to delete the ones that I might not use. That is a concept.

Importing: Upload to Monthly Folder
Backing Up
Paring Down Purge pics with no potential
Rating
Do not rate: Duplicates, Not special but don't want to trash

1. Maybe/Details/Overview of Story 
2. Main Idea/Theme/Got to Scrapbook/Focal Point Photo/Represent People, Places, Things, Us, School
3. The Best of the Best

Batch BASIC Keywords to ALL PHOTOS: Who, What, and Where when you download
Who is in this picture?
What are we doing? i.e. Whitney's Birthday, Norwich Fair
Where are we? (This can be a tag that has the gps data attached to it)

ADVANCED Keywords are only applied to 2 and 3 stars. Category Drawer Keywords are also applied to these images.

BACKUP One off site for star-rated photos only!

Paperclipping.com September Monthly Challenge

I haven't submitted anything for a while because I seem to want to spend more time editing and sorting my photos than making layouts! I can always count on the Paperclipping challenges to help me find my mojo. I created this layout with the topic of wide angle photos and my natural surroundings in mind. I am experimenting with layouts that have less "stuff" on them and more photos and words. I love the idea of a big photo used as a background to draw the viewer immediately into the action of this story. It seems to say, "Let's go explore!" As we entered the field that evening the sun was just starting to set and the light was waning fast. I loved the texture of the mushrooms and saw my daughter walking out of the frame as I crouched down to capture its remarkable texture. Again, the photo says, "Hey, wait for me!"

My second goal with this layout was to make it look like I printed the photos on canvas, then laid it out on some cardstock, added the butterfly and took a picture of it. I played a lot with the placement of objects and the painting on the edges of the background photo to create a frame. Although I was trying to keep it simple, I couldn't help but try to see how a visual triangle would fit in. As I added the finishing touches to the title I realized that the buttons, the butterfly, and the scripted text in the title create a visual triangle, directing the viewer into the story. ( I just love this design stuff!! (Hee-hee)) This was so much fun! I think I might have woken my muse!!!

{Melissa Bennett buttons and background papers from "Autumn Memories" (TDF21; thedailydigi.com)}

Summary of PDS011-Lots of Rabbit Holes

There were so many designer names and resources mentioned in this week's Paperclipping Digi Show that I wanted to make a summary of them all. I hope others will find this useful to. If you have listened to the show and I have an error here please post a comment so I can fix it! Thanks, Angie

Show Notes

Digi Tips for Beginners Summarized

•     Get a good feel for the software
•     Undo is your best friend
•     Print out your first few pages
•     Start with Templates
•     Join a community
•     Possible: attend live events
•     Favorite Tools
•     Find Good Resources
•     Ask Questions on the forums

Meetup- Izzy talks about this website for trying to find other digi scrappers in your area.
   
Indispensible Products
Karen:
        Shadow Actions
            Jenn Barrette at ScrapMatters.com (can't find)
            Kristin Rice "Shadows Perfected" 2 kits at CatScrap
            Traci Murphy (can't find - shop at ScrapArtist)
            Flergalicious 
        Kraft Paper
            Ann deJong "ChromaPhobia" (ScrapArtist.com - unavailable when I looked)
            Robin Carlton (can't find)
        Font
            Steph's Printing Primer
        Stitches
            Anna Aspnes
            Lauren Reid
            Syrin         

Aaron:
        Shadow Actions
            Jenn Barrette (see above)
            Krystal Hartley - free, great for light background
            SimplyScraps (Laura Banasiak)
            From Aaron's Blog: Five Resources for Awesome Drop Shadows and Drop Shadows Revisited
        Font
            Gimme Space by Laura Reid
        Stitches
            Tracy Ried's Bad Stitches                  
       His Kit for the bright colors and stitching mentioned by Steph
            Boy Oh Boy

Forums (non-shop related)
    DigiScrapAddicts
    DigiShopTalk
    MyScrapbookArt
    Scrapbook.com