How can I backup my photos while travelling?

Question

I'm going travelling around the world for a year in September and am already panicking about how best to send my photos home while in various countries.

Requirements:

• I only need to backup JPEG files (I don't shoot RAW but that's another thread ;) )
• I need to be able to upload in a web-based manner (I will be using Internet cafes and so can't assume I can use FTP etc)
• I need plenty of space, preferably unlimited (I racked up about 200GB last year)
• I need to store the full image (no lossy compression is acceptable!)

Options I can think of:

• Burning and posting DVDs (can I trust these in the post and not to get corrupt? It may be better than waiting for upload speed though...)
• Flickr (I have a pro account but not sure how hard it'll be to get the photos back down again. Will I even be able to get the original snaps?)
• Setting up a server at a friend's house and hosting some kind of file server with a web-app front end

What have other people done? Or does anyone else have a better idea?

Answer 1

Depends on how much you value your shots. Last year my wife and I took a 5 month photographic trip and we took:

• 1 Laptop: We had Lightroom to download and do a basic selection every night (out of focus pictures don't need to take any disk space!). Photoshop to do some basic retouches if we wanted to publish them on Flickr, etc. And a large enough HD to store the whole trip.

• 6 4GB memory cards: we numbered them and made sure to rotate them correctly so we kept the pictures in there the longest possible time as backup. We rather use more cards with less GB to diversify risk. If you are in the middle of nowhere and your only 16 GB card breaks you are SOL.

• 2 300GB USB HD: once the pictures were classified on the laptop we backed them up to one drive and mirrored on the other.

Online storage is not practical when you are travelling because of the time it takes to upload the amount of data you will generate. This way we felt very confident that we weren't going to lose any data, at any given time pictures were stored in up to 4 different places at the same time.

And to send home, select up to 5 pictures of each escapade and post them on Flickr. Selection is key.

Answer 2

Burning DVD is your best option and even if you use another means, you should still burn DVDs. The main advantages are:

• Burned DVDs have no value, they won't gets stollen by themselves.
• It is easy to replicate and distribute. Meaning you don't have to keep all copies in the same place.

When I travel for photography I always burn everything twice. One copy stays with me and the other is mailed to myself. Never lost one this way. Mailing something like this is really safe just because it has no value but to yourself.

Internet access generally won't cut it because of speed issues. Depending on how much you shoot, it may take more time than you have to upload all those files. Watch out also as some services PicasaWeb don't store your full-resolution image... They scale it or compress it to save space.

There are 3 options to burn DVDs on the road:

• Laptop with a burner, either integrated or not. This is the bulky and costly option but it is reliable.
• Stand-alone burning device. I use an Addonics MFR. Put the card a blank disk in. Press the backup button, wait 7 minutes. This one runs on AC or batteries. From battery, you can burn about 10 disks.
• Internet cafes: Many of them will burn a DVD for you for a small fee. Bring your own disks if you want to use quality ones. It may not be always available, so look each time you see an Internet Cafe or Business center, don't wait until you're out of space.

Answer 3

Fast internet access can be a problem in many remote locations (esp. Africa, Asia and South America). I'd suggest buying a bunch of 16 GB SD cards and copying each file on two cards. Then you keep one copy with you and send another home via mail.

Answer 4

It all depends on the risks that you're backing up against but one option you'd missed is the dedicated devices for backing up memory cards (Jobo and the like) - we had one of these circulating at our wedding, so that all the guests didn't have to worry about memory card space.

Answer 5

I use Epson P-5000 Multimedia Storage Viewer - it has 80 GB Hard Drive.

Answer 6

Google Picasaweb. It has a web-based interface and a "Private albums" feature. For 200GB of storage it's $50/year, which isn't too bad. (You can purchase more, up to 16TB, should you need it.) You can also bulk upload from it's desktop client.

Answer 7

Some cameras, like the Nikon D7000, allow copying from memory card to memory card. That would allow backups in the field without further equipment.

Answer 8

You could use dropbox but it's a bit expensive
You could also take a Virtual Private Servers, some providers provide low performance server but with very big storage capacity for a cheap price (around 5$ by month). It will be cheaper than dropbox but it's your work to manage a web front end to upload files

If you have money, taking an SSD drive to keep with you a copy of photo is also a good idea.
Posting DVDs/SSD can be a solution but depending of country you visit I would not trust this solution but you can use more reliable service like UPS in some countries.

Answer 9

You picked a very good answer by @Rezlaj but I'd like to add one point. KEEP YOUR STORAGE MEDIA ON YOUR PERSON IF YOU FLY!!! I've had lots of friends lose their photos because their cameras get stolen. DO NOT put your media cards or external hard drive backups in checked bagage. If a bagage screener steals your gear, you can get the airline to replace it, but you can never get your photos back.

I've also heard of people backing up to DVDs and mailing them home. Since international shipping is so expensive, you can leave burned DVDs with the hotel and if you end up needing them [a reasonable time] later have the hotel ship them to you, otherwise discard them.

Answer 10

Since you are a software engineer I would recommend . Amazon Simple Storage Service S3
Their pricing structure is probably the most reasonable one available.
It is intended to work with front end clients that you write. However Amazon provide numerous, fully functional examples. See the developer site for some good examples you could use.

It occurred to me that you really have two requirements in mind
1) backup - the Amazon S3 service would fulfill this requirement admirably
2) sharing selected photos with family and friends during your travels - here I would recommend Picasa on a netbook uploading to Picasaweb on the Internet. This is a good way to perform multiple or batch uploads. Ubuntu runs rather well on a netbook.

Answer 11

Have you looked into using Microsoft Live Sync? Live Sync is a PC-to-PC sync system that allows you to sync files between multiple computers over the internet. You can sync hundreds of thousands of files, and they can be up to 40Gb each in size. It also supports up to 2Gb of online storage in Microsoft SkyDrive.

The nice thing about Live Sync is that you are syncing your data to your own computers. You could, for example, set up a NAS device at home, map the drive to our main computer, and install Live Sync on that computer. Set up a shared folder on the mapped NAS drive, and you can sync files from a laptop in the field to your home NAS over the internet via a secured channel.

Its my favorite way to keep data protected when I am abroad, and the beauty of it all is that I don't have to copy any of it again when I get home...its already there. The one drawback, as with any online service, is the performance of syncing large volumes of data. Gigs of data don't sync quickly, so either you have to just spend the time doing it, or involve a third form of backup as an intermediary (i.e. get a 500Gb portable drive, and sync at night while you sleep.)

Answer 12

On my last major trip I picked up a small spindle of DVDs for photo backups, keeping one copy there and another on my laptop hard drive. The 25 disc ones seem a bit more stable than the large ones, the space available fit the trip, they're write-once (no worry about erasing/overwrite) and reasonably durable. I had my own computer along, but you may also be able to find internet cafes or other computers with DVD burners. Compared with a hard drive it's less dense, but the discs can handle more shock and you wouldn't have to worry about some other system corrupting any more than your current batch.

If you think you can get reasonably fast Internet access, Smugmug allows unlimited photos and they have an API that would allow bulk downloading them when you return home. You mention you have Flickr, and while I'm not familiar with their API I'd be surprised if they didn't have something similar.

Answer 13

I've been traveling with a backpack for quite a while and my Strategy was using a combination of local backup and online backup.

First of all, you have to keep in mind, that internet connections can be quite slow in many points in the world. Internet Cafes are not made for bulk up and downloading and the providers of those places know why.

But still, some countries have a higher broadband availability, some haven't. Consider that uploading might take lots of time. I spend many days in those places to upload, in fact wasting time.

Use some external software to upload and edit meta data software, as the web based uploaders are lame to use and are more likely to fail hence revoke all your changes. Especially metadatas will be lost like title, description, tags and so on.

A ok good tool for Flickr is the official uploadr But of course there is a whole bunch of them If you are on Windows and just want to synchronize your pictures with Flickr, have a look at Flickr Sync

A great option here is to have a look for hotels/hostels that offer free internet access. So you can upload while you spend your time doing more useful things.

Knowing that, you will come to a point where you can't upload as fast as you will make new pictures, hence we need a secondary backup strategy.

Use a locally available backup medium. I'd strongly suggest you using USB Sticks for this task rather than DVDs.

Look at the pro's and cons:

Pros:

• Memory Sticks are smaller than DVDs. Yes they need less space. You need proper protection for the Disks if you travel with them.
• They provide more space for storage. 16gb+
• The are less likely to break. Store your DVD in your Backpack at the wrong place and you will have two half discs. Scratching is another issue.
• Reusable. Once you have uploaded your pictures, you COULD delete them from your stick if you wanted to.
• Memory Sticks are a workbench. You can store your unedited pictures and integrate them into your processing workflow, because you can store your edits on the sticks as you go. Therefore storing becomes an iterative process, rather than a one-off action. -> higher flexibility.
• Each USB Stick is Waterproof :-)
• Flexibility: If you are traveling with a netbook, you are most likely not to have a DVD Burner with you. USB is always available. You can have your USB Stick on your keyring and have your pictures with you wherever you go.

Cons:

• Price. Yes they are more expensive. But if you are reusing them, they will last much longer, of course.
• Carry them in bulky amounts and the Airport Security is your friend. Of course, if you have 20 USB Sticks with you, that might look suspicious, fair enough.
• Vulnerable to Internet "STDs". The chances of catching a virus when using an USB sticks in internet cafes around the world is more dangerous than running naked through your local mens cruise club. Look for proper read/write protection before you plug your stick into an unknown socket. (See Star Wars Episode V: "R2D2, you know better than to trust a strange computer!" -C3P0)

One of the best software tools out there every traveler should have is the Portable Apps "Toucan"

That tool let you backup, synchronize and encrypt all your files in one solution. This tool will help you sorting out that data mess. But please keep in mind, that this tool is for advanced users, that are willing to think before they act, so it is not a one click solution. Being an portable app means, you don't need to install it. Therefore it can be run from any computer in the world, right off your USB Stick.

Answer 14

Depending on where you're going, and what you have access to (netbooks, internet cafes, or secure computers), whatever solution you settle on, PLEASE be careful not to get viruses. I actually got viruses on my compact flash cards, and it ruined a large part of my experience (as well as actually hardware). I might actually suggest buying many large memory cards and not backing up at all, given my experiences.

Where I got these infections varied, though I think it started in a most random and unlikely place--a mountain tribal village with only 5 computers and rare internet. Because I was on a friend's computer, I never thought a virus would be able to attach itself to a compact flash card and damage related material. While uploading photos, I then accidentally brought the viruses to another country and messed up two more computers, four thumb drives, an iPod, and one hard drive. In the end, after months of shooting photos in remote locations, I only ended up with about 1,700 photos out of at least 5,000. The viruses (from Asia) rendered so many machines out of wack and dangerous to future users that it still upsets me to this day. I lost precious memories, cost everyone a lot of money, and don't have some of my favorite photos.

I used what I thought were secure computers to upload photos to an online server (I mostly used Photoshop Express at the time, which ended up condensing large files), but only some of those photos made it through in full size, and it was awfully hard to find internet that was strong enough to upload hundreds of photos.

In an effort to keep viruses off my cards and devices during future travel, I thought an external card reader/storage device would be my only solution, but at a huge expense and bulk, I was recently recommended a rather simple solution: Just buy a good many compact flash cards and don't upload them until you're positive you're on a home secure server. I'd rather chance no backup then go through the loss of so many photos of mine. Viruses can sneak into the least likely places when abroad--they can attach to your copied DVDs, your external drives, and your camera memory cards themselves. I'd avoid using internet cafes and be just as careful when using a friend's computer. Good luck and be aware!

Answer 15

Along the lines of the netbook solution, I used my iPad last time I travelled. If you're already definitely taking a laptop, then forget it, but the iPad is a nice light travel computer — and if you already have one, it can actually be a very useful backup tool.

The Camera Connection Kit (works with iPads, but sadly not iPhones) allows you to import photos from most cameras (via USB) or directly from an SD card.

You're very limited by the space on your iPad, and unfortunately you can't write back out to an SD card for a more generic backup or giving you more space (unless you've hacked your iPad/iPhone), so you won't get 200 GB without transferring them OFF the iPad via the internet or a computer. It's essentially letting you duplicate photos on your memory cards before they're backed up by a more serious means.

Judging by your 200GB/year estimate, you'd get a "buffer" of about 3 weeks with a 16GB iPad, 6 weeks with 32GB and 12 weeks with a 64GB — this saves you having to get net access for a few weeks at a time, to send backups home, for example.

You can transfer directly to DropBox, FTP, WebDAV and a few other methods using apps like the DropBox app or GoodReader (supports heaps of protocols), or you might be planning on dumping memory cards to CD at a net cafe or the like once a month (at which point you could wipe the photos off the iPad).

Other advantages are that its a good way of showing photos to people along the way (either by keeping some favourites to show people you meet on the iPad itself, or using it to upload to flickr/etc for people back home). And there's a lot of utility in having a basic computer while travelling of course (e.g. taking a decent stash of books for reading in transit).

Compared to the netbook, it's more expensive for less space (you can probably get a netbook with a 250GB hdd for the same price), so it's really only useful if you're aiming to backup "off-site" anyway, and want something with perhaps a bit more utility than a netbook (a nice screen for photos without taking up much luggage space/weight).

And of course if you hack it, then you could use it to copy photos to SD cards to keep a copy or mail them home. Some people have reportedly got external hard drives working with hacked iPads and the Camera Connection Kit as well, using the USB charger to power the device if it has a double-USB plug adaptor.

Answer 16

Nathan Myhrvold writes in his Safari Tips about sharing back-up equipment with other photographers travelling with you as a cheap, relatively hassle-free way secured by having multiple separate copies.

In this setup, each photographer brings and carries a portable HDD for backups, where everyone makes a copy of their pictures, so even if one of the devices breaks or is stolen, there are still other copies left behind. You could also use non-photographing friends or family members travelling with you for a similar packing arrangement.