image credit: Skills by Misa
Disclaimer: The following information are personal tips and procedures that I follow as an individual. It is only intended for sharing what I do, the way I do it, with my own individual results. I am in no way responsible for damages to any of your equipment caused by following my recommendations. The information provided is meant to change without notice. Read and apply it at your own risk.
PROPER STORAGE:
· Buy individual storage cases for each one of your memory cards (have spare ones for those that get lost or accidentally break).
· Buy at least 2 multiple memory card storage cases (one for formated memory cards, and one for the memory cards used as backup) to store them all together in the same place. Buy more as needed.
· Never leave your memory card (nor your battery) inside your camera! If you want to have your camera ready for the road, have a formated memory card (on its case), and a fully charged battery, inside your camera bag. Yes, you need to buy a camera bag! It will help your equipment against impact, dust, humidity, and equipment loss.
· NEVER insert on, or take the memory card off the camera while the camera is ON! NEVER take a memory card out of a PC without ejecting it via the PC system. This could not only result in the loss of all your images, but it can also corrupt your memory card, becoming unusable.
CREATE A NEW FOLDER
· A memory card is just another media storage type, meaning that you can create folders and add any files to it. I recommend pre-selecting the media file type you will store on it by the type of memory card.
· If you are about to start shooting a new set of photos, make sure you have a just-formated (by the camera, not the computer) memory card. If you don’t have more than one memory card and need to shoot different photography sessions, select the Create New Folder option from the camera menu.
· Do not shoot photo sesions on a memory card larger than 4GB. Instead of having a 32GB memory card, have eight 4GB memory cards!
Pros:
· If you have only one memory card and it becomes corrupt, you are done shooting for the day. If you have more memory cards, you just change your memory card and keep shooting!
· If you shot all your sessions on a single memory card, and became corrupt, you lost everything! If you shot your sessions on different memory cards, you just lost one session, but not the whole photo shoot.
BACKUP:
· Always double-backup your images! This applies to unedited and edited images. There are several ways you can back up your images. I use 3 types of backup: local, in the cloud, and physical.
· Local Backup: A local backup is when you download the images to the computer. You can do this by:
1) taking out the memory card from the camera and insert it in a card reader port in (or connected to) your computer.
2) connecting your camera to the computer via USB cable.
3) using a WiFi enabled memory card like an Eye-Fi card.
· Cloud Backup: A cloud based backup is when you upload the images to a website. I reccomend using a broadband internet connection because most of the time I shoot RAW and these files tend to occupy not less than 10mb. This will not affect the quality of the image, just the time it takes to upload your images. I also reccomend it to be a storage oriented website, rather than a social media oriented website. And if you are serious about your photography, open a paid account! You can do this by:
1) uploading the images from the backup folder you created in your computer (it will take longer if you try to do it directly from the folder in the media card)
2) use a WiFi enabled camera
The downside of the cloud backup is the time it consumes uploading your images, space limitations, and price.
· Physical Backup: A physical backup is when you copy your images from the backup folder in your computer to a different memory card for storage. Physical and cloud backups are very practical if your main computer is a laptop, because it can get stolen and you would loose all your images. I also recommend to store your multiple memory cards backup case in a fire and floodproof safe at home or at the office!
DELETING IMAGES:
· NEVER DELETE any image from the memory card while it is connected to the computer! Instead, with the camera OFF and disconnected from the computer, insert the memory card on the camera, turn ON the camera, and manually delete any undesired image.
· UNCHECK any options that allows the computer app to delete images:
“Delete if the file already exist in the computer”
“Delete all images after download”
· NEVER use the “Erase All Images” on the camera menu. Always use the FORMAT option on the camera, to prevent reading errors on the memory card. It will also provide a fresh folder heriarchy.
IMAGE LOSS
· If you accidentally deleted an image, or fornated a Lexar or Sandisk Professional-Level memory card, turn OFF the camera, connect the memory card to the computer and run its free image recovery app.
· If you were unabke to rescue any lost image on a Lexar memory card after using its recovery app, DON’T PANIC! Mail the memory card to Lexar, a technician will perform a professional data recovey procedure, any rescued image will be burnt onto a DVD, and you will receive the DVD and a NEW MEMORY CARD, all FOR FREE!!!!!
I really hope that the way I do things works for you as well! My best wishes! 
Misa López
Technology Advisor
email: skillsbymisa@live.com
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