Those duplicates/not so good shots

From every wedding I sort my images in bridge according to these ratings:
1) Out of focus, massively bad exposure (not too many of these luckily), and really boring photos. Lighting tests.
2) Duplicates, boring shots
3) Proofs
4) My picks for the album
5) Portfolio shots

Everyone in #1 gets deleted, everything else is current kept as RAW, backed up, etc. I just added up everything classed as #2, it comes to 28GB just for the past 12 months!

I can't bring myself to ditch them all, in case great aunt mildred dies and they want me to see if I have any images... but then again they've never seen them and probably wouldn't think to ask. I think i'll manually look them over, delete the really bad ones, and archive the rest as JPG - a space saving of around 80% or so, which is significant given i've enough space on my drives for about one more wedding before I have to buy more storage (this is a business remember, every $ counts).

What does everyone else do with these #2 type shots?

I actually only keep the cream of the crop. They cover your #3, 4 & 5. (I just don't divide them up) ...I do use DPP's rating system though - so, I guess I am dividing them in a way, except dumping the losers. (#1 & 2)

try not to take them

I started to think a bit more (film) if I can say so. My first wedding I took 800+ photos, a lot were duplicates, not so much boring though.

Now I've started to think to take better shots but fewer. ( I take my time more to make sure the pic is just right in all aspects.) I've got them down to about 500-600 per wedding. I ditch duplicates, keep the best one between them. Seeing that my biggest package are 220 photos, it's still plenty.

Just went through my wedding of 9 Dec. And must honestly say I think I managed in not getting to many duplicates. Have only ditched 2 so far for bad exposure.

I don't categorize mine the same way but I dump everything that I don't want to offer up for sale. If it's not on my site at the time of proofing, I don't have it anymore. I've sold at least one print of every shot that I put up, and that's how I want to keep it. I do have the ability to disable without deleting the ones I don't consider 'folio shots, so I do that a short time after the client purchases their prints. If I'm contacted because they want to order more, I simply enable the ones that were disabled and they can order the same as they did the first time around.

That said, I don't shoot much in the first place & most of my deletions happen the day of via chimping. I can pretty much tell right away what I don't want to keep.

I deliberately take duplicates, because you can never tell if people will blink. That's saved many photos for me. When things happen really quickly often it's just shoot away, obviously not like a madman, but still more than you'll show the customer. I also don't limit numbers, I just aim to show them around 300-350 max.

cdi-ink.com wrote in post #2383248
I don't categorize mine the same way but I dump everything that I don't want to offer up for sale. If it's not on my site at the time of proofing, I don't have it anymore. I've sold at least one print of every shot that I put up, and that's how I want to keep it. I do have the ability to disable without deleting the ones I don't consider 'folio shots, so I do that a short time after the client purchases their prints. If I'm contacted because they want to order more, I simply enable the ones that were disabled and they can order the same as they did the first time around.

That's my philosophy as well.

tim wrote in post #2383253
I deliberately take duplicates, because you can never tell if people will blink. That's saved many photos for me. When things happen really quickly often it's just shoot away, obviously not like a madman, but still more than you'll show the customer. I also don't limit numbers, I just aim to show them around 300-350 max.

Regarding dupe shots, I agree 100%. I just keep the best of the batch.

tim wrote in post #2383253
I deliberately take duplicates, because you can never tell if people will blink. That's saved many photos for me. When things happen really quickly often it's just shoot away, obviously not like a madman, but still more than you'll show the customer. I also don't limit numbers, I just aim to show them around 300-350 max.

For formals I do take dupes, and sometimes 2fors or 3fors in general shooting but I chimp right away and delete the duds if I have a sec.

Tim - I hear about the eyes, do take duplicates of all formals. But couple shoots I can tell if I've got a blink, and then take the shot again. Never had the - oh I wish I took this one again, damn the eyes are closed...

I've had a customer come back a couple of week after they saw the proofs with "i'm sure you took shot xyz, but I don't see it in the proofs". I managed to find it in the outcasts. It was a pretty average shot, but the person in it was what was important. If i'd ditched it then they'd have lost it.

I think i'll delete the obvious duplicates and convert the rest to JPG... just in case. Better than my current system of keeping them as huge RAW files!

tim wrote in post #2383438
I've had a customer come back a couple of week after they saw the proofs with "i'm sure you took shot xyz, but I don't see it in the proofs". I managed to find it in the outcasts. It was a pretty average shot, but the person in it was what was important. If i'd ditched it then they'd have lost it.

I think i'll delete the obvious duplicates and convert the rest to JPG... just in case. Better than my current system of keeping them as huge RAW files!

I have a clause in my contract that states I delete the duds. If they **** because they thought I took a shot or because they know I took it but delete it, I can point them to the statement. I'm not going to hang onto crappy ones on a "just in case" basis. While the chances of actually getting sued for not having a certain shot is slim to none, at least I can point to the paper to explain that they were basically told in advance not to expect me to have every shot that they think I took. I have a "special requests" section on my contract wherein they can specify persons they want to make sure I capture. Then I can know to get a good shot because I have to. If I don't know it's a shot they definitely want, I don't know to keep it.

What if you miss a shot in the "special requests" section?

tim wrote in post #2383466
What if you miss a shot in the "special requests" section?

I don't. But there's also a clause in there saying that I'm not liable for missed shots, period...just in case.

Soon as possible after the wedding we copy all RAW files onto computer and then burn DVD (2 copies) and file them ...usually these have been sorted into groups, and include everything we shot - even group 1.

Soon as that's done (and verified) we delete the original cards we used on the day (still have an additional backup of everything shot on our Jobo GigaONE - copied on the day as we go along).

We then retain most of the images on hard-disk while we're busy with pp and any album work ...once pp is finished we burn further DVD/CD copies of the 'delivered' images and any album page stuff. At some stage during this process we'll wipe the files from GigaONE soon as we're comfortable with doing so.

Have no hard and fast rules on when we delete from hard-disk
- but we tend to keep at least the delivered and album stuff available for a few months after the wedding (or other event) ...and, provided the DVDs and CDs remain readable, we still have everything somewhere even if we've wiped it from hard-disk.

We are looking at network-attached storage though, as a way of shifting stuff off the working computer's hard-disk but still retaining it online and in an easily accessible form (this would be in addition to offline DVD/CD copies).

So, short answer ... we file group 2 (and group 1) onto DVD and keep them - we never knowingly delete anything we bring back from the day. Past experience in life has taught me I always need something the day after I threw it away.

Rob

I'm like a squirrel, I collect/save everything. I really should just throw those shots that doesn't make the cut, but somehow I dont' have the heart to do it. I just buy larger harddisks (external) and store the stuff on those, put a new disk in the case for the next season (or whatever it takes before the whole disk is full).

I just ditched about 3GB of RAWs, and i'm batching a bunch more to JPG. I'll probably save 20GB of disk space by the time I discard/convert the whole lot. I'll need a new hard disk before long anyway, but at least this puts it off, and takes the stress off my backup disk so I don't need to replace that right away too.