THE TRUE COST OF DIGITALS
We live in a world very different to the way it was. Today we have so many pictures. They’re everywhere. On Insta, Pinterest, Facebook, our phones, computers. We’ve made selfies an art-form.
We have more pictures of ourselves now than we every had before.
It’s been estimated that in the last few years, more photos have been taken then the hundred years before combined.
However, very few of these pictures will ever last the rest of our lifetime. They will be lost in the digital ether.
Lost on usb sticks or dvds or cds or spinning computer hard drives or whatever todays technology happens to be.
Yet one day, as sure as night follows day, we will wake up and that technology will have been replaced. No longer will we be able to access our lovely digital pictures.
At the time we believed cassettes, 8 tracks, minidiscs, VHS, Betamax, open reel tape… all these technologies would last. Of course they didn’t. Neither will todays storage for our digital files.
One day, we will wake up and facebook will be gone too. No more instagram either. They will be the ‘My Space’ of the next generation.
Yet pictures represent our life and should be preserved as long as possible.
Professional photography studios will do their best to produce pictures on archival products which will last a hundred years but ultimately, it is the consumer that drives the need for ‘digitals’
If you really don’t much care for keeping pictures for years.
If the photoshoot you went to all that trouble choosing clothes for and being delighted at the results really doesn’t mean anything to you beyond a ‘picture for today’. You don’t want that feeling of delight when you view the pictures to last beyond the short term. Well then, digitals may suffice.
Years from now though, when you really really want to view the images that made you look and feel beautiful. Your children and grandchildren want pictures of you…. Years from now, when all the digitals become un-readable …. That’s when you’ll realise that living through the most ‘photographed generation in history’ can leave you without any photographs that you can actually see.
The true cost of digitals is more expensive than you might think.