Protecting your digital content is easy as 3-2-1

June 16, 2020 0 Comments read Blog, Shop Talk, Tools

rocket man — *Superhero series # 3, ©Brian Fitzgerald*

The past three months of constraint and restraint have underscored how important it is to a have a deep content library. My clients have been unable to commission new shoots due to the pandemic, but for those with a deep image library it isn’t a problem. We’ve gone back over their images and realized that many are still usable and relevant.

That brings up another issue: storage and archiving of your image library and other digital assets. If you had to access images and videos taken months or years ago, would you be able to find them easily….or at all?

I’ve written before about how important it is to archive your images and other digital assets. For most brands, their image and video libraries–compiled through time-consuming and costly shoots, purchases of stock assets, and contributions by staff–represents a huge value and investment in time and money.

Yet, they don’t have a central area where these images are stored. Their assets are spread out over multiple local computers and perhaps online, making them far less useful. If they are in one place, that one place is often a single computer or drive with no backup, no redundancy and no options in case of drive failure.

As certain as the sun rising tomorrow, your computer drives will fail. I recommend all of my clients have at least one extra copy of their digital assets that everyone in their organization has access to.

Several times a year, clients email me with requests to locate images taken in the past—some more than a decade ago—that they’ve misplaced or lost. No problem, I tell them. I’ve got it.

Our simple policy is the 3-2-1 backup rule evangelized by Peter Krough, digital asset management “DAM” guru to protect against any failure scenario: Store at least three copies of your data using at least two different types of storage media with one of them located ‘offsite’, or off premises.

We store a minimum of 3 copies of all digital files, whether it’s the original, raw, unprocessed images taken with the camera or the final ‘derivative’ versions delivered to our clients and pressed into use. One is stored on local external drives. Another is backed up to external drives located offsite. The third is stored on the cloud (which has its own redundant backup). For the ‘final’ delivered images, I also store these in a fourth location: an online digital archive that I can give clients direct access to as needed. Some of my clients depend on this digital archive as one of their copies.

So if you work with a professional photographer, ask them about their archiving procedures and standards. They should be able to clearly explain what happens to your images, how they are backed up and protected, and if you ever need to retrieve images you’ve lost, they will be able to quickly provide you with copies of the originals.

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Working Together in the Time of COVID-19

June 8, 2020 0 Comments read Blog, News, Shop Talk, Studio

Over the past month, we’ve been busy here at the studio preparing for a safe and responsible return to business. I can’t predict what’s going to happen in the foreseeable future, but it’s clear that COVID-19 will continue to impact our families, our clients and our daily life in ways small and large.

As Maine enters the second phase of business reopenings, we’ve posted our COVID plan along with a Q&A section on our website. In the plan we detail the efforts we’re taking per state and federal guidelines to mitigate any spread of the Coronavirus as we take on limited shoots here at the studio and on location.

We’re also working with clients in other ways, from utilizing their existing imagery where possible, to scheduling shoots outdoors and even doing planning, production and image review sessions virtually. I will expand in future blog posts on how some of these new processes and workflows work for us and how they could be adapted for use by our clients and others.

Please read more about our COVID-19 plan here. Continue to stay safe.

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Everything I Know I Learned From ASMP (and Spiderman)

April 5, 2017 0 Comments read Blog

This week I was honored to have my work and an interview published by the ASMP (American Society of Media Photographers) on their blog, Strictly Business.

I’ve been a member of the ASMP since 2007. That was a big year of transition for me, as I built my commercial and editorial business in a part of the country in which I was a relative newcomer. I had decided to quit my job as Assistant Managing Editor at the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram, ending a 13-year career in newspapers. One month later, I did just that. I had been a freelancer, a “stringer”, a staff photojournalist, a chief photographer and photo editor. I’d covered stories in places as varied as Hong Kong, Russia and Sedona, Arizona. I’d been embedded with troops in Iraq. I’d won lots of national and regional awards.

It was a complete and total blast.

Then, it was over.

Ultimately, I left newspapers because I wanted to photograph and create content again. I felt that doing so as an independent professional would give me greater flexibility, control and creative freedom to tell the types of visual stories that I wanted to tell.

Of course, with greater freedom comes greater responsibility, or so says Spider-Man.

As I contemplated building my new career, I knew I’d need help. Help to understand how businesses talk and what they need. Help to navigate the contracts and licensing that would keep me in business and my clients protected and happy. After a career in newspaper photojournalism, I knew two things about business: jack and squat. While I still have much to learn, I have a successful business working with brands I love–and it’s due in no small part to the tutelage and assistance of the ASMP and the help of many talented photographers.

Behind the Curtain with Maine Freemasons

March 15, 2017 3 Comments read Blog, Recent Work, Showcase

Maine Freemasons

Having a camera is like having a Golden Ticket into the lives of others. It’s opened doors on people, experiences and places that otherwise I’d have never met, done or seen.

It’s an honor to be allowed into peoples’ lives, and it’s a trust that I hold very sacred. That’s why I was so excited that my camera recently opened another door: one that led to the Freemasons of Maine. I was chosen to produce an initial set of images for a website redesign the Grand Lodge of Maine has been planning for some time.

I should note that my sum of knowledge of fraternal organizations stems from brief visits to my father’s Elk Lodge as a kid and a long-ago viewing of the movie National Treasure. I’m pretty sure neither qualify as research. I was eager to meet real Masons and photograph some of the actual ceremonies in Portland’s gorgeous Masonic Temple.

Freemasonry has a long and storied history in Maine, with roots going back to the first lodge, chartered in Falmouth in 1762. Portland’s Triangle Lodge 1 still has their original charter, signed by Paul Revere in 1796 (yes, that Paul Revere).

The Masons still attract men—young and old—drawn by the many traditions and looking for camaraderie, connection and brotherhood.

You might not have suspected as much, looking at the Maine Masons website, which was in need of a redesign and new visuals. Most images they had showed members in tuxedos, wearing Masonic aprons in a formal lodge setting. Although I did photograph some of these same things, one important part of the project I’ve done so far with them is a portrait series of Masons in Maine, both in and outside of the lodge setting. Work is ongoing, but I’ve had a great time so far meeting with the members and learning about the organization–a peek behind the velvet curtain, so to speak.

What I found was a thriving group of individuals of all ages who are devoted to each other and to their community. I plan to be able to add additional images soon.

Maine Freemasons