JUST PRINT IT!!!!! Long Island Photographer - Hello Olivia Photography

I have at this EXACT moment on my external hard drive about 43, 500 images (there may be a few client sessions in there too). 

Of those images, about 1000 made it into my 365. 

What to do with all these images when the 365 is finished?!  I just keep them on my external hard drive and pray it doesn't crash. 

Wait.... No!!!!

I PRINT THEM!

So, when I was a little kid living in my childhood home in glorious Brentwood,  NY - my parents had almost every single square inch of our living areas filled with photo collages, picture frames and albums.  No joke, the first thing I'm doing when I go to visit my mother in Florida next week is to pull out all the old albums and look through them with Olivia. 

Back in those good old days (uh... the 90's) before digital photography, most everybody had their film developed into prints. Remember the Photomat???   Prints would then go into really ugly albums that hung together with scotch tape and we would proceed to pull them out and laugh when boyfriends would come over for the first time. 

Fast forward to today.  What do we do with all our images now?  They collect dust on a hard drive, hang out on facebook or stay on your phone.  Will you be able to retrieve them years from now?

I can't imagine 50 years from now when Olivia comes to visit me in my assisted living facility, that she will be excited to scour though hundreds of thousands of images on external hard drives. 

Can you? 

So, what to do? 

PRINT YOUR SHIT.   

(Sorry for the cursing, but it rhymes and I'm going for it). 

Put them on your walls.  

Stick them in an album. 

Or even be an overachiever like me and make a photobook or two!

The point is, even if you're just printing them and dumping them in a photo box, you still have something tangible.  Something that exists.   

I read an article that of course I can no longer find that states that children who grow up in homes with photos of themselves on the wall have a better sense of self worth. It's it true? Who knows... but it sounds pretty legit to me.  I just know that I loved growing up with photos everywhere and love walking into other peoples homes who have photos.  I love looking at their memories - and love looking at typically happy moments in friends and loved ones lives.

People that don't have photos hanging in their homes = serial killers.  

You're not going to get any warm and fuzzies staring at the EHD gathering dust some place.  Especially when it gets lost, stollen or accidentally thrown away.   If you haven't made any resolutions for 2018 yet - let one of them be to print your pix.   You'll thank yourself later when you have embarassing photos on hand to show guests.  

Just some food for thought on this freezing Wednesday night.