I try to delete them, but honestly, I've got hundreds of gb with of images I'll never use. What's worse is that I'm a backup nazi so I've got 4 copies of all of those useless images. lol
Aren't you the guy who didn't backup the RC database at any point over the last 10 years and the reason why we no longer exist due to a server crash
Do you "archive" folders or image sets that are no longer "live" or cataloged live?
I find most of the photo management software still very cumbersome to use with respect to managing the image files and their status along with the "database" that is the gateway to the images. Not following the recent trends in image (or music) management, I still rely on folder structure to organize my media. Until there is a well organized database that works the way i work, I will rely on folders and meta data instead of a database to access the media.
In that way I can have "archive" folders that can be backup up in two places and then ignored unless needed. I would imagine this does not work for most folks in the "iTunes" era.
Not relevant to this thread, other than the fact that this "dilemma" and basic photo management has been an issue since the first photographs were taken...
My grandfather had thousands of images (both slide and print film) organized by ROLLS using an index card file. The back of each photo was numbered with a catalog number. Another set of drawers held index cards that listed each photograph and its hand recorded "meta tags" copied from and along with a page reference to a notebook page that contained the detailed "exif" data (as hand recorded when the photo was shot). The index card for each roll also lists the drawer and divider index for the negative sleeve and/or the slide carrier ID.
While the "index" is not searchable with respect to the modern definition, each photo is very clearly indexed and all of the relevant data is easily available. The rolls are indexed in chronological order and it is fairly easy to find anything he shot over 50 years of shooting photographs. The notebooks and/or index cards can be quickly scanned through to find particular subjects, etc.
The problem is that we have no idea what to do with these photographs. Scanning them to archive them is a daunting task. Even more daunting is doing so and recording the notes and other data on the index cards and in the notebooks AND still keeping that digital data tied to the physical property in a meaningful manner.
I digress, I have a bad habit of not throwing away bad digital images, as disk space is cheap. I was bad about throwing away bad prints as well, as I learned from my grandfather (though I was nowhere near as organized). In the end, the digital baggage is as bad as the physical bagage... what the hell am I or anybody going to do with it in the future? We have no idea what to do with several thousand physical prints, many of which are pointless, poor quality, or simply not of interest to anybody anymore. Imagine what your children or grandchildren are going to do with all of your hard work and tens (hundreds) of thousands of digital photos? Remember film cost money, so we were picky about pressing the shutter button. Digital is "free" with regard to the cost of clicking the shutter. I likely took 600 photos at a recent airshow, where in the past I would have taken 30-90 with film.
Have fun
