I’ve been asked a few times by different people on the subject of how I store my images and what hardware I use to keep everything safe – well, below is a quick article of what I do, and how I do it.

What you have to keep in mind is this – the solutions I have setup at home works perfectly for my needs, and only my needs. This article is here to hopefully spark an idea to help you build your own solution to meet your own needs.

1 – Vosonic VP8870 250GB
When I’m out in the “field” I always make sure I have my trusty 250GB Vosonic media harddrive to back up to during and after the shoot. This little beauty will hold up to 250GB worth of images. Obviously, if you’re using a DSLR of high quality and you’re shooting RAW, then you may want to look at buying the 320GB version for a little extra space.

The unit is incredibly easy to use; you just slot in the memory card, transfer the images from the card to the device and hey presto! Job done! The images are safe and you can clear the memory card and start all over again.

2 – G-Tech G-RAID mini 400GB Hard Drive
Once at home, I will transfer the images from the Vosonic to 3 G-Tech G-RAID mini 400GB Hard Drive in a RAID1 setup.
What RAID1 basically means is that the same information, in this case pictures, are copied to all 3 drives. The information is exactly the same across all 3 drives, so should anything happen to the other two, I still have one backup left.
Once the images are safely copied across all 3 drives, the images are left there – they are the master images. They don’t get edited, changed or mess around with at all.

3 – LaCie 2big Network 2 4TB Hard Drive
At this point, the images saved onto the G-Tech drives will be copied across to the NAS (Network Attached Storage) drive – these are the images I work from, they get all the attention!
This particular drive allows you to split the 4GB space (2 x 2GB harddrives) into RAID1 for mirroring, or can be used as RAID0 (no mirroring (total capacity: 4GB)). Now the great thing about this little piece of kit is that it’s network attached, so I can access the images from any computer in my house, or anywhere in the world for that matter.

Well folks, that’s my current setup and it works perfectly.
Memory card -> Vosonic -> G-Tech -> LaCie -> And beyond!

Remember folks – BACKUP, BACKUP and BACKUP some more! I have lost a lot of pictures in the past through not backing up properly but since I implemented this solution – I haven’t lost a single image!

If you need any help setting up your own storage solution, or you have any questions then please feel free to email me, or comment on this article.