keeping images....

[danchez]

OK, just trying to get a feel of what most photogs do. Let's say you shoot 100 images. Out of those 100, you come up with 10 keepers. What do you do with the other 90 images? Do you keep them, taking up valuable hard drive space? or do you delete them and never think twice about it??

[ST77]

well since HD space isnt that expensive anymore I tend to not delete anything, except those are are just totally unusable, ie; blurry, out of focus, flash didnt fire

[SCone]

Agreed... only delete the files that are unusable........ I've went back and found some great shots later on that I overlooked before... sometimes all they need is a crop or convert to B&W to bring out their best......

[dryicerx]

Originally Posted by ST77

well since HD space isnt that expensive anymore I tend to not delete anything, except those are are just totally unusable, ie; blurry, out of focus, flash didnt fire

My thoughts exactly.

[Dobick]

Originally Posted by danchez

OK, just trying to get a feel of what most photogs do. Let's say you shoot 100 images. Out of those 100, you come up with 10 keepers. What do you do with the other 90 images? Do you keep them, taking up valuable hard drive space? or do you delete them and never think twice about it??

depends on what you mean by keepers -- I go through (for example a football game) and I will immediately delete out of focus shots, repetetive shots (if it a series of 17 shots all 1 after the other, then I may keep 3 or 4 semi unique ones) and then I will also delete the ones that are framed poorly (especially if another alternative exists). Depending on the number that I have left and how far into the season it is, I will also delete those unspectacular shots where there is no real action occuring.

After that is done, I have usually trimmed the 800-1000 image night down to 250-300 "keepers" although the number of technically ok images was probably 2 times that.

So I just throw those away.

Now if it is a personal shoot, and I had no real idea of what I was wanting to do or accomplish, I will usually keep a higher percentage of the technically ok shots in case they grow on me later.

[jfoureyes]

I may keep 2 out of 100.

[TxPhotoShooter]

It's according to what I am shooting. If it is an event, then I tend to keep most of the good shots because you can't replicate the exact shoot. If it is something like nature, then I may keep a few knowing/hoping to get better shots at another time.

[kimberley]

10 out of 100?

I delete the un-used images

[danchez]

Originally Posted by kimberley

10 out of 100?

I delete the un-used images

Just throwing numbers out there, but you have piqued my curiosity. One of your senior shoots, how many do you take, and how many do you process?

[Some Idiot]

I have bridge save all my images to 2 places, my main hard drive (c:) and a 1TB dump drive.. The images on the Main drive are my working files, they get ranked and marked as keepers and the rest go in the garbage...after photoshop and upload to the web the processed images get archived by client onto another drive, keeps my main HD down on GB's

[doctahjones]

Originally Posted by SCone

Agreed... only delete the files that are unusable........ I've went back and found some great shots later on that I overlooked before... sometimes all they need is a crop or convert to B&W to bring out their best......

+1

hd space is cheap these days. i also like to go back and try to salvage shots that i haven't been able to duplicate yet. it's amazing what a difference a year makes in post processing experience.

[groovyone]

If they are out of focus unintentionally I now delete them. Otherwise, I have the bad habit where I'll try and save all of them. If I shoot 100, I'll delete the 10 or so OOF ones, then process the other 90.

At the workshop I just did I shot maybe 700 photos total and worked 10-11 through CS5. Eventually I used DxO and processed maybe 500 or so, but I intend to only put the major effort into the few I may print. I know I am not dselective enough now and need to work on that.

[ChristopherCoy]

I delete the ones that clearly wouldn't make it - OOF, flash misfire etc. I keep the rest 'just in case' for about a year. I usually try to go back about once every six months and clean off HD space by deleting anything that I haven't looked at or needed since it was uploaded. That usually means that if it wasn't edited to begin with, or there hasn't been any potential for it to be edited, then it goes.

The exception is stuff for clients. I back those up to a DVD and store them in a box, whether they were edited or not. If its client stuff, its stored on DVD... haven't figured out my retention period just yet though.

[brad]

Depends on the situation... if it is a portrait client, I will rarely keep the outtakes. Headshot clients, I often will because agents sometimes like to see the rest of the shoot later (sometimes a LOT later).

Personal stuff... I will keep everything in the first edit pass that looks usable... then after I'm done processing my favorites, the RAWs that are left get archived.

[silversixx]

I find the more I go and shoot, the less garbage I come back with...

a better ratio perhaps