{"id":9836,"date":"2019-02-15T17:20:31","date_gmt":"2019-02-16T01:20:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sidecarphoto.co\/?p=9836"},"modified":"2019-02-15T17:20:31","modified_gmt":"2019-02-16T01:20:31","slug":"best-online-backup-photographers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sidecarphoto.co\/blog\/posts\/best-online-backup-photographers\/","title":{"rendered":"Best Online Backup For Photographers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Online backup is one of those things that everyone knows they need but no-one wants to set up.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0last ransomware incident finally lit a fire under my butt to figure out the best cloud backup for photographers.<\/p>\n

If you don’t know what ransomware is, you should, but it’s only one of many reasons why a\u00a0cloud backup is crucial.<\/p>\n

Many people just rely on an external drive. In fact, that’s all I had as well.<\/p>\n

Just a copy of my photos on\u00a0an external drive that’s plugged into my computer. But that’s not good enough with the threat of ransomware, fire or theft.<\/p>\n

So I set to work trying to figure out the best online backup for photographers in 2019.<\/p>\n

\"Backblaze<\/a>[toc label=”Let’s Get Started” heading=3]<\/p>\n

This post has affiliate links. If you use the link, you don\u2019t pay anything extra but Sidecar Photo gets money for another glass of wine!<\/em><\/p>\n

What’s ransomware?<\/h2>\n

Before we get started, let me explain what ransomware is.<\/p>\n

Ransomware is like a virus controlled by a hacker that takes over your computer and encrypts every file in or connected to your computer. Except you<\/strong> don’t know the encryption password, the nefarious hacker\u00a0does.<\/p>\n

In other words, all the data in your computer is encrypted and locked away from you, including your backup drive. Then the hackers demand a ransom to give you your files back.<\/p>\n

If you had kept your local backup drive unplugged, it’s possible the files are fine. But then you fall into the likely trap of not having a recent update, because your backup drive was always unplugged.<\/p>\n

(To learn more about ransomware, here’s NYT’s take<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

The only way around this (and long standing threats like fire and theft) is real cloud backup, and preferably you want that encrypted (with a password you do know) so no-one can hack the cloud storage.<\/p>\n

I know, I know, sounds\u00a0super expensive, right? But it’s not! Because I just did the research and figured out the best two solutions for you.<\/p>\n

The solution I went with is Backblaze<\/a> and I’m going to explain the simple version and the advanced version to you in a second.<\/p>\n

But before we do that, let’s talk about which features are important for photographers.<\/p>\n

Best Online Backup for Photographers<\/h2>\n

So why are photographers’ needs different than anyone else’s? Well, mostly because the storage capacity needed by photographers is a lot greater than your average user.<\/p>\n

Most average users’ needs are met, more or less, by Apple, Google and Dropbox’s solutions.<\/p>\n

You can store < 15GB of your music, photos and some documents in iCloud<\/a>, Google Drive<\/a> or Dropbox<\/a> for cheap or free.<\/p>\n

Once you get in the realm of thousands of files and 100GB+ of photos, you start needing a better solution.<\/p>\n

You can get a lot more space for a monthly price, but there’s one other factor that’s important to understand. Those are all “syncing” services, not backup services.<\/p>\n

What’s the difference? Well, with syncing services, if you delete a file from one location, it gets deleted from all locations. Which is sort of the opposite of what you want from a backup service.<\/p>\n

On top of that, many of these services limit what kinds of files you can sync.<\/p>\n

Of course there are caveats, Dropbox<\/a>, for example, will store 30 days of history.\u00a0So that might be good enough for some.<\/p>\n

Every service is different and every user is different. But, at least we can hope that we photogs want some of the same things.<\/p>\n

Lots of space for an affordable price and true backup is what I needed for my solution.<\/p>\n

The Perfect Photographer’s Backup Workflow<\/h2>\n

I hate tedious workflows so my dream backup\u00a0workflow goes\u00a0something like this –<\/p>\n

I bring my camera home and import into lightroom. That’s it.<\/p>\n

Yep, that’s right. No more work. Something at some point makes sure there’s a backup of that file. And I don’t have to do anything regularly to make sure that happens.<\/p>\n

Then, some day when my drive dies, I calmly<\/em> restore from my backup.<\/p>\n

When my house burns down, I buy a new computer, and calmly<\/em> restore from my backup.<\/p>\n

When Russian hackers take my computer hostage, I make a cup of tea, calmly<\/em> reformat the whole thing, and restore from my backup.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Are you starting to see a pattern here? Isn’t that much better than the feeling of panic you get when someone asks you – “Your house is burning down! What do you do?” And you imagine yourself lugging your computer and external drives through the flames like a crazy person because you forgot to backup?<\/p>\n

I want simplicity, reliability, encryption and an offsite location at a good price.<\/p>\n

Backblaze Backup for Photographers<\/h2>\n

So my solution was to pick the online service Backblaze<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If you do any research on this, you’ll see CrashPlan is the other popular option.<\/p>\n

So why didn’t I pick CrashPlan? Well, I’ll be honest. I did pick CrashPlan at first, except I thought<\/em> I set it up and it was backing up.\u00a0But after a few months I realized some sort of trial period had expired and it was not backing up anywhere.<\/p>\n

Stupid me? Maybe. But the software was running and not telling me about the failure.<\/p>\n

With a backup service, the backups could fail at any time for any reason. Your card on file expired and your online storage is no longer working or whatever.<\/p>\n

And it should tell you, it should scream at you – I’M NOT BACKING SHIT UP, LADY! DO SOMETHING!<\/p>\n

It didn’t warn me adequately and so I uninstalled.<\/p>\n

The most important aspect of a good online backup workflow is the ability to set-it-and-forget-it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I’m not IT – it’s not my job to check weekly that backup systems are working. I want a solution I can rely on to work, and to let me know when it doesn’t.<\/p>\n

I can barely get myself to work in one piece, I’m not babysitting a backup service.<\/p>\n

So Backblaze Backup<\/a>\u00a0was the next software I tried. And I can recommend Backblaze for photographers.<\/p>\n

I’m going to give you the easy way and the advanced way to set up your backup.<\/p>\n

I went with the advanced way, and I’ll explain why. But the simpler setup might work fine for you, so I’ll cover both.<\/p>\n

Best External Hard Drives for Photographers<\/h2>\n

Okay before we explore online backup services, you ARE also doing a local backup right?<\/p>\n

The best overall backup strategy is always 3-2-1.<\/p>\n