This is something I have never heard anyone doing!

[Chris Summers]

I'm in a local photography club, most of us are retired folks with a passion for photography. Anyway, 3 of us were talking about how we archive our images and keep backups. One of the guys said he never ever reuses a memory card! He said he saves every memory card after downloading the images to h is computer, slipped into a small zip lock bag, labeled and put into a fireproof safe in his home.

Now I know memory cards have come down in price over the years but that could be a lot of money spent on cards. I average shooting 10,000 or more images a year!

Anyone else ever heard of this approach?

 

[PKM-UK]

I'm in a local photography club, most of us are retired folks with a passion for photography. Anyway, 3 of us were talking about how we archive our images and keep backups. One of the guys said he never ever reuses a memory card! He said he saves every memory card after downloading the images to h is computer, slipped into a small zip lock bag, labeled and put into a fireproof safe in his home.

Now I know memory cards have come down in price over the years but that could be a lot of money spent on cards. I average shooting 10,000 or more images a year!

Anyone else ever heard of this approach?

Hi Chris,

I met a guy on a tour once, who kept all his holidays on 1 SD card - he had quite a number on there - and he was happy with this. Having said that, he let his unattached lens roll around on the floor of the coach with no lens caps on it...

(His theory was he could show all his holiday images to people using the camera's rear display screen from that 1 card).

Our back-up drives (we have several) are at least 2TB, with the largest being 15TB. That's a LOT of memory cards...

Phil

 

[VanDyck]

I have heard of folks keeping photos on memory cards while on vacation. Once home and photos have been backed up to a hard drive, then the memory card can be reformatted (contents erased).

What little I know is that USB flash drives and memory cards are not designed for long term storage.

How long will data stay valid for on a memory card or USB Flash Drive ? - Integral Memory

Memory cards and USB drives are NOT designed for long term storage. You should always backup your data on to another device. The data will normally stay valid for a period of up to 10 years if stored under normal…Read more How long will data stay valid for on a memory card or USB Flash Drive ? ›

www.integralmemory.com

 

[Kwazy]

Never reusing a card and storing all vacations on one card are perfect examples of the two extremes of madness.
I guess everyone has their methods based on preferences, habits, and budget.

Personally, I end up with 2k+ images after a few hours of roaming around looking for bugs (a lot of focus bracketing sequences), so reusing cards is a must. For now I'm keeping the non-trash images on the computer hard drive, with a backup to an external drive that also sits on my desk. The final stacked/edited images get uploaded to my phone. I'm also starting to think about "investing" in a NAS (network-attached storage) solution that keeps all data doubled in case a drive fails. Those cost about $1k for ~15TB.

Regarding fireproof safes, at least the one I use for storing documents (more of a case than a safe) stipulated in the manual that its purpose is to keep the paper inside from combusting for up to half an hour in direct flame. That implies that it still gets pretty hot in there, so I don't think it'd keep memory cards from degrading and corrupting the data. Perhaps some safes are more insulated than others. If you have critical data that you can't lose, cloud services and multiple backups on devices that are not located on the same premises is probably a safer way to go.

 

[JustUs7]

I read things like “not intended for long term storage” and think, “How long before it fails on me?”

A 256k card lasts about a years worth of photos for me. I can get all the performance I need from a UHS-I v30 card. Costs around $25. Compared to film, it’s practically free per picture.

So why not just keep it in a storage case and get a new one that’s less likely to fail vs one that’s on its umpteenth reformatting and could be on its last legs?

I still move them to our NAS and a back up hard drive.

As an added bonus, I have an SD card with all my 2022 raw files on it that’s only been written to once. Actually worked in a pinch when we had a hard drive fail.

 

[MikeZ]

The concept seemed a bit odd to me, but after reading all of the responses the idea of keeping/using your memory cards for long term storage may have its advantages. As many have noted, copy the files to an external drive and then keep the memory cards as a form of secondary storage. Doing so forces you to continously buy new cards and thus avoids any memory card failures due to age/use. Sadly, CF Express cards get a a tad pricey (I have an R5) so this approach probably needs a thorough cost-benefit analysis before I'm ready to use it.

 

[PKM-UK]

Just to clarify, if we’re away from home on a tour we use a mix of memory cards (card to card copies) and a portable SSD to try to provide some kind of back-up/ loss cover. (Thankfully not yet needed, so we just return with two copies of everything).

Once home we revert to our standard data management strategy, where the main risk is my innate talent for misplacing stuff…

Phil

(Our back-up regime is detailed Here).

 

[dmanthree]

I've heard of it, but no. I reuse them. Not a cost-effective solution and too risky.

 

[JustUs7]

I've heard of it, but no. I reuse them. Not a cost-effective solution and too risky.

What’s risky? For people that do this, it’s not their only backup and they’re still moving the images to their computer for editing. They just aren’t deleting them from the old cards. And they’re avoiding the risk of wearing out an SD card and having it fail on them.

Not the cheapest choice, but compared to what people spend at Starbucks, it’s pretty cheap.

 

[Only RF]

That's not for me. CCC backs one powered ED to another. Every few months I back everything to Portable ED's and they are stored at my banks safety deposit box. I just came back from a long trip and transferred my files to a portable ED every day and reused my cards.

 

[dmanthree]

What’s risky? For people that do this, it’s not their only backup and they’re still moving the images to their computer for editing. They just aren’t deleting them from the old cards. And they’re avoiding the risk of wearing out an SD card and having it fail on them.

Not the cheapest choice, but compared to what people spend at Starbucks, it’s pretty cheap.

Risky because the cards are something you can lose? And how many cards would you have to save? Hundreds? Just seems hard to manage and very expensive. There's so many good options to safeguard the files it just seems to defeat the whole purpose of the cards.