Hacking Photography - one Picture at a time
Storing and backing up efficiently and securely more than ten years of photography is a complicate technical task.
At the center of my setup I use a Synology DS1515+ NAS, with 8 disks configured in Raid 6 for a total of 14.54TB of available storage.
I wrote about this set up a year ago, but I recently updated it to be more streamlined and secure.
In this article we will review the pros and cons of Amazon S3 Glacier vs Synology C2 to backup data from a NAS directly to the cloud. While the focus is on Synology products, if you use another brand of NAS, the Amazon Glacier backup options may still be of interest to you.
Update: If you’ve missed this deal at B&H, then Amazon currently has the 10TB Western Digital Elements for $159.99.
B&H currently has the Western Digital 10TB My Book Desktop USB 3.0 external hard drive on massive discount until the end of today. With $100 off, they’ve been reduced from $279.99 to $179.99. That’s only $10 over the regular price of an 8TB drive.
Hard drives are something that all of us have. Some of us just have the one our computer came with, while others will have a whole mountain of them. I’m in the latter camp, although I do try to keep things to a minimum. Every few years I replace all my storage drives as faster, cheaper, larger capacity drives are released.
So, every few years I’m in the market for new drives. So, I look at large consumers of hard drives. Consumers like Backblaze, who just released their Q3 2018 report, showing their hard drive failure rates and they’re quite surprising. At least, they surprised me. It seems that those huge 8TB, 10TB and 12TB drives are actually far more reliable than smaller drives.
A few weeks ago I noticed that I had not received any new emails for a day or two. Odd I thought, but it’s summer and maybe people are just on holidays.
This was a day before I was leaving for a trip, so I was in the process of checking in my family for our flight, and making a number of last-minute AirBnB reservations…using my email – which I quickly realized was offline.
What was a minor inconvenience became a major problem – I thought maybe my account had expired or something had gotten disconnected in my email settings. OK, that shouldn’t be much of a problem, so I opened a support ticket with my website hosting service BluDomain…which is when I learned that not only was my email offline, my entire business website had been permanently deleted, and was unrecoverable.
This is now an emergency.
My family and I recently returned from a week-long early spring backcountry camping trip.
This trip involved canoeing in snow squalls and an extended portage where the lake was still frozen solid. Physically, it was a challenge, but it was also an amazing family bonding experience with my wife and our 9 and 12-year-old kids (the golden years when they are useful humans but not yet teenagers).
At the end of the trip I sat my trusty old Fuji X100 (the original model) on a post in the parking lot to snap one final family portrait in self-timer mode.
Then we drove home…
The GNARBOX (pronounced narbox) solved a major issue for many: How to work in the field with no laptop. A decent laptop that supports backing up, exporting short bits for social media, handle RAW files and similar tasks, cannot be a weak small laptop. But many times, you don’t actually need a laptop, you just want to backup some files, or post a short shot to social media, and a laptop is too much to carry for that. Not to mention the weight and extra care a laptop demands.
Now, the GNARBOX 2.0 SSD takes that concept and turns it into an eco-system. The new GNARBOX 2.0 SSD has more storage, is definitely sexier, and supports four apps or workflows to enable working in the field. The only caveat I have with the box is that it is launching on Kickstarter.
You already know how important it is to back up your files, and cloud storage should be a part of your backup system. If you’re a student or alumni, I’ve got great news for you: you can get unlimited Google Drive storage, for free. I know it sounds too good to be true, but it’s real.
There’s one simple fact about hard drives. They’re going to die. It’s not a question of if, but when. And when it does happen, because it will, there’s two things you can do. The first is that you could panic, research data recovery services and spend a small fortune trying to get the data back. Or, you can simply replace the dead drive and restore from backup.
Personally I prefer the latter option, which means having a good backup workflow in place. Photographers and filmmakers create a lot of data. So, you really do need a good backup solution in place if you don’t want to lose weeks, months or even years worth of work. In this video, Caleb Pike from DSLR Video Shooter talks us through his backup workflow.
After first trying out the WD My Passport Wireless Pro as a solution to backup photos and video while traveling (click here for the full review of the My Passport), I thought I would try the competition – the Seagate Wireless Plus.
The main issue that I had with the WD My Passport is that it could not effectively synchronize files with cloud storage (Dropbox, Google Drive) without the need for a laptop computer.
The Seagate Wireless Plus seems to have this issue solved with built-in synchronization apps for both Dropbox and Google Drive, but as you will see, it has its own issues…
You can find out more about John on his website and follow his adventures on YouTube and Facebook.
can change a lens mid-rappel, swap a memory card while treading water, or use a camel as a light stand.
To see more of his work please visit his studio website blurMEDIAphotography, or follow him on Twitter, 500px, Google Plus or YouTube.
JP’s photography is available for licensing at Stocksy United.
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