 | Download
I use a PCMCIA Compact Flash card reader to download and copy the new
photos to my laptop. By using a card reader, there are benefits
over connecting your camera via the USB port for the following
reasons:
 | Speed: The card reader mounts the CF card as a
"drive" and is faster than a USB connection. |
| Convenience: A mounted drive is easy to use and
allows you to copy and paste files directly from and to the card
through Windows Explorer, or any of your favorite Windows file
access methods. |
| Saves Batteries: Popping out your card does not
require the camera to be on when downloading photos. This
can be quite time and battery consuming if you take photos and/or
videos at very high resolutions which take time to download and
sucks up battery juice when downloading via USB.
|
|
| Remove
With the power of digital photography, you are free and encouraged to
take as many photos as you'd like. With this flexibility comes a
bunch of crappy and duplicate shots. I browse through through
the duplicate shots to keep my favorite one. Then I go through
and gut out the remaining duplicates and bad shots.
|
| Adjust
Once I've decided which photos to keep, I'll re-crop any photos that
are badly composed (not many unless I was drunk or others took the
photo). Photos that are too light or dark can also be adjusted
but this step is a bit time-consuming and I usually skip it unless the
photos are bad but worth keeping. There are many other advanced
adjustment features that I do not have the time for.
|
| Rename
After cleaning up the keeper photos, I'll rename all of them to a
slightly more intelligible name. It would be ideal to name all
photos with the date and description but since I take so many, that
would be inefficient and way too time consuming. Instead, I give
all the photos I want to keep a unique name: YYYY_MMDD_##.jpg
The date along with a sequence number gives the file uniqueness along
with when the photo was taken. If I keep photos from friends,
I'll insert their initials before the ## to retain uniqueness of all
photos. ThumbsPlus has a nice Auto Rename feature that is easy
to set up and can rename all selected photos in seconds.
|
| Organize
I keep all photos at a Top Level Year directory and create subfolders
for Events in each particular year. Generally, if there are at
least 6 (arbitrary number I set for a row of thumbnails on my photo
web pages) good displayable photos for a particular event, I will
create a subfolder for it. If not, I toss the photo(s) into a
Miscellaneous directory for that year.
|
| Filter
Next I select the photos I want to include on the web pages.
This is completely at my discretion =) but I usually try to keep it in
increments of 6.
|
| Create
I generate the web page(s) using ThumbsPlus's Web Page Wizard.
It took some time to initially create and format the page templates
but once that is done, it pretty much does everything for you
automatically. I've chosen to include up to 18 photos per page
in a 6x3 grid of thumbnails that expand to the full photo when the
thumbnail or name is clicked.
|
| Upload
Finally, I update my main Homepage and PhotoPix
page with the new photo link and upload the photos, thumbnails and web
pages to the site. |
