First of all, click refresh. You should see an color update to my website. It’s grey. And overlapping super-skinny rings. Two of my favorite classic things in design. In fact, that grey is really close to the neutral paint on our walls at home. It’s only appropriate that it’s my website background too, right? I love, love, love grey with just about any color.
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Okay, the real reason you’re here today — Inspiration.
I wanted to share with you something that I do when we travel. It’s the organizer in me. It’s the photographer in me. It’s the documenter in me. I don’t care which part of me it is … I just do this because it makes sense to me and helps with my digital photo organization. Maybe it’ll help you too.
I call this { VIRTUAL BOOKMARKS }.
Here’s what I do: When we travel for multiple days, I simply take a picture of the date** first thing in the morning, before I take any pictures that day. You know how, on longer trips, the days sometimes run together or you get them mixed up? Especially as time goes on and your memory gets a little fuzzy? I realize I’m talking to the chronologically-minded crowd here. The rest of you won’t care.
The result of doing this? When you import all your pictures on your computer, and you see them all there, you’ll also see those VIRTUAL BOOKMARKS that help separate your days/events. This may not really matter years later, but it can really help you keep it all straight when you are preparing to add some photos to a scrapbook or if you’re organizing a slide show or … you get the idea.
**By taking a picture of the date, I mean taking a picture of anything that indicates what day it is. A calendar page, your cell phone, iPad, hand-written on paper or post-it note … anything at all.
I know you’re visual. I am too. Here’s a look at some VIRTUAL BOOKMARKS from our trip to Alaska last week.
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From our recent trip to Maryland/D.C./Pennsylvania:
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You get the idea. See? So simple.
I’ve been doing this for the past couple of years and there’s a reason I keep doing it on our trips. Oh! If you can, add a note about what you’re planning to do or where you’re planning to be, with the corresponding date. Even just a general idea. Helps with the whole organizing thing. I’m going to be better about that from now on.
For example, I wrote the port for each day, and that really helped with our cruise picture organization. It’s amazing how quickly you can forget some things.
One more thing: You’ve noticed my handy dandy notebook a lot. It goes everywhere with me. I like my technology but some things just have to be pen-to-paper for me.
I love this idea and wished I had it last year on our week long trip. From now on this is what I will do for our trips. Thanks so much for sharing it with us. I’m thinking Ali E would like this idea too for all her traveling and for her WITL album this year, lots of numbers she said.
I love this tip – so much easier than hovering over a pic to see the details and date
LOVE it.
I will also do it when I start a new month
Oh wow. So simple, yet so clever!! Thanks for sharing!!!
That is a great tip! Another thing that I like to do while traveling especially is take a picture of a sign to help remind us where we were. (For example, on a recent day trip to Boston, I took pictures of the signs for the Old State House and Fanueil Hall so that I wouldn’t forget what the landmarks were when I downloaded the hundres of photos I took. They may or may not end up in my scrapbook, but they definitely help me remember what was what.) Happy traveling and scrapbooking!
I do the same thing Haley. I also photograph information plaques and signs especially when visiting outdoor sites such as canyons. This helps with information like height, depth, altitude, geological features and so on. Not always needed but can save trying to google details when I just want to be making pages.
me too – especially as I love the architectural details, so a lot of my shots are zoomed in. It’s always useful to take shots of plaques/signs to be able to refer back to.
Ok…random question. Do you have a favorite pen and notebook that you use? Thanks for sharing the idea!
Thanks for sharing! You inspire and help others become better! Job well done!
[...] I am back with another Travel tip that I have found during my wanderings of the world wide web (click here to check out my last Travel Tip). This tip comes from one of my favourite bloggers, Becky Higgins. She is an awesome recorder of her family memories & history. And I am so envious of her skills with a camera too. Her tip is all about what Becky calls {Virtual Bookmarks}. [...]
OmG!! So simple but so brilliant! Thanks so much! Glad I found this website!
Every month I download my photos to my computer and rename them starting with the date and what they are. Then I refresh and all my photos are in order of date and a description of what is happening in them. I can then easily group photos together to scrapbook. I also save my photos into the month folders. I am very anal about chronologically doing things.
Genuius!!
I like this idea. I have the date printing on my pics but don’t always like that. I guess I could take the first one of the day with that and then remove it but would I remember to do that???? Probably not, so think I will give this a try. I do like the chronological pictures when I travel. Thanks Becky for all your advice and ideas.
Oh man..that is a GREAT tip!! I wish I would have known these last year when I went to Chicago..LOL! Still haven’t scrapped those pictures and even looking at them a few weeks after I got back it seemed like everything ran together and I couldn’t ‘separate’ the events we did. Thanks for a wonderful tip. LOVE IT!!
I do this, too. It’s a sanity saver, for sure! And I also jot down my notes/journaling/blog entry at the end of the day after we put the kids to bed. For action-packed vacations, it’s the only way to preserve those fabulous, but fleeting, moments.
Thank goodness for digital cameras!
I LOVE this tip! I’m notorious for taking pictures of text and signs whenever I’m traveling, and I use the photos either to help jog my memory when journaling or actually as titles and embellishments on my scrapbook layouts, but it never occurred to be to write out the date or snap the date on my phone with a cute landmark in the background.
I’m almost MORE excited about the potential to use this tip in my 365 project for Project Life, though. Even though the date is all through the album in the stamps and journaling, I love the idea of inserting a little extra nod to it once in a while. Seems like it would be especially appropriate both on days where not much else it going on to mark the mundane OR on really important days to celebrate that importance.
So many inspiring ideas!
I do this with trail head signs when we go hiking. After a while all the trees look the same, but if I take a picture of the sign with the distance and trail name I won’t forget later.
great idea!! when I import my photos to my computer they are sorted into folders by date..but I have found it’s not always correct and at times I have a difficult time keeping things organized esp when I’m taking a tone of pictures over a long vacation. Love this!! I’m going to add it to my things to do list!! Thank you!!
This makes so much since….i kind of do this here and there,,,, but really the date this makes the most since….in Yearbook class in HS we had to take the first picture on the roll (no digital back then) of us or something with our name on it. SO the teacher once develped the pictures would know whos they were so we could then work on our page. Love this idea
OHHH I just got an idea!
Love this.
Awesome idea!! Must snagg that one on camping trips and vacations.
I love the photos you took with the date and children in the background!
Great idea Becky!!
Love this idea! I like that you take pics. Of your notes in your hand writing.
I saved our ship’s log which is helping me as I’m creating a digital storyBook of our cruise last March
Very clever! I also take a photo of the signs of places that we visit. I try to take it when we first stop somewhere, so I know the photos that are being taken are of that place.
For instance – when we went to Yellowstone, we headed to Old Faithful. I had my daughter and parents pose with the Old Faithful sign. Then I knew all the photos after that were Old Faithful. Then on our next stop of the Mud Pots, I took a photo of the mud pots sign. Then I knew all the photos after that were of the mud pots. Makes things so much easier!
Coleen, this is a great tip too, thanks!
Love this idea! I eat up organizational tips. Thank you for sharing. For those of us in which organizing does NOT come naturally, these tips really help.
I do this intermittently but mostly rely on metadata for the date details. Will have to try to incorporate this into my routine more.
One other thing I’ve heard is that you should take a photo of your contact information (preferably the first photo on your memory card). Heaven forbid, you should lose your camera… but at least then there would be contact information in your digital photos.
Oh my gosh-so simple, why didn’t I think of it? Thank you for a fabulous tip. I’m good at taking pictures of signs/labels of places/buildings to help me remember what I’ve taken a photo of, but this idea is just brilliant.
Luv it!!!
Becky, this is just a fantastic idea. We are lucky to be going on a 4 week trip to Australia soon and I always get so mixed up with photos when I get home from a long trip. Such great timing, thank you so much. I can feel a challenge coming on to get creative with a date photo each day. Oh and this would be a fun idea to put at the beginning of the week in PL too!
I love this idea! Thanks for sharing!
Very cool idea! Last Summer, my family and I went on a 2 week vacation to California. I wish I would have had this idea then!!! I’m definetly going to use that! Thanks!
I love that idea. I tend to use two cameras on trips. One bigger digital and one little camera that is always in my purse. So I probably should do that with both cameras because if I download a whole vacation’s worth of pictures to my pc in one day, they all end up in the same folder. I will have to see how they sort themselves out with your method.
GOOD IDEA FOR PL WHILE ON EXTENDED VACATIONS:
We will be going to Hawaii for a month in Sept. I am taking my laptop so I can keep up with PL while there – at least the journaling part. I probably won’t deal with the pics till I get home but it will be so easy to record my notes, feelings, etc. directly into my digital version of PL every couple days or so. This is my first year for digital but wish I’d just taken my journaling cards the last two years while on vacations. In the past I’ve kept handwritten notes and then had to come home and edit them down to re-write it all on the cards. What a time saver to just write them out directly.
[...] http://www.beckyhiggins.com/blog/2011/07/travel-photography-tip/ Posted in Families, My Family, Photography, Together, Uncategorized Tags: Families, Kids, My Family, Photography [...]
what a GENIUS idea! can’t wait to implement that!
i just barely discovered you and LOVE your products. It shows your kits are sold out… when will more be available?
thank you,
amelia
This is genius! Just what I needed. I can’t update my Project Life everyday and sometimes weeks (maybe months) will go by before I can update. When I finally get to it sometimes I am scratching my head trying to remember…
Thanks so much!
OH SHANNON I hear you
I was doing that last night.. great picture of hubby, but darnedif I can figure out what day I took it 
Becky’s idea makes so much sense …
LOVE. Greatest idea ever. Well, maybe not ever…but today for sure! Maybe even this month.
Thanks for the tip Becky! To go along with that, I have another suggestion:
Take pictures of signs/menus from the places you go. Sometimes we automatically do that (the sign in front of an amusement park for example) but we may want to record the name of that “great little restaurant”.. I have been known to take pics of the menu, or even a business card!
that is a great idea too Courtney
Thanks for the great tip! We leave for vacation in a week so now I am totally prepared to make some memories that I can actually date correctly!
Hi Becky!! I would love to know how YOU will be scrapbooking or documenting this vacation. Is Project Life the only way you scrapbook now?? Just curious!! Thank you for any input!
Wow – what a great idea! We just got back from a trip to Vanuatu and I’m about to do my digital project life for the week and I’ll need to sit down and work out what we did on what day…wish I’d known this tip last week!!
I generally use two cameras (& sometimes three) whenever I’m travelling and always ensure the date & time is set the same on all off them. Like others I also take photos, usually just for reference, of places/things I am photographing. By doing this, when I download my photos I am able to sort by date & easily date & label all my photos.
Sorry, meant
Like others I also take photos, usually just for reference, of signs/lables of things I am photographing.
What an awesome idea!!!!!!! Thanks for sharing…now I just hope I remember to do that
My goodness, I do the exact same thing Becky just in a different way. On our cruise in June, each night before bed I would upload my pics of the day to my laptop. Each day/port had their own folder with the name of the port or sea day 1 or 2 (whichever it was) & the date. Glad to know that it is the “organizer” in me & not OCD. LOL!
Okay I’ve searched your blog for too long now!! I am trying to find out the color of your walls. I thought you’d posted it before but I can’t seem to find it. Do you mind sharing?!! BTW: thanks for all the great posts!!
Seriously? That’s just COOL. My handwriting is not as cool as yours but I’m still going to do this! And I love how each date picture captures something about that day in the background. Seriously cool idea, I can’t wait to go on a trip to do this!
So it *was* you in the Inner Harbour in Victoria! I saw you with your family the eve your husband rode the tiny bicycle under the flame juggler. Thanks for your blog and your ideas… I was too shy to say it in person. Hope you had fun in our city!
That’s an easy, wonderful idea! Thanks!!
May I suggest to add the YEAR, too? I know you don’t believe you won’t be able to remember the year, but believe me, they all get blurred together as you get older.
That is cool, esp. as I love your font when you right!! Cute.
My camera, which is a Cannon SX20, has a setting that saves photos by date, so when I upload them online, they automatically go into what day they were taken. IDK if that is common tho… just thought I’d throw it out there.
This is brilliant! I love it! I get the opportunity to travel internationally for work several times a year and plan at least one weekend for personal travel. It’s always difficult reconsiling the photos in the end with the time zone differences, and I don’t change the date/time on my camera as that messes me up when I return home (and forget to change it back). Thanks for sharing!
[...] was a mix of laziness and toting around a 16 month old. Maybe next time I’ll actually put this great tip by Becky Higgins into motion and stay a bit more organized with my vacation photos. I read it before leaving, [...]
Love that idea… just got back from our summer family vacation.. wish I would’ve done this then! I will definately do it during my anniversary trip in October! Thanks for the inspiration!
Ok, I LOVE this idea! I will be doing that on all the rest of my trips…this will also help because we tend to have multiple cameras so even if our dates on our cameras don’t match this will get them to the right place!! Thanks so much Becky!
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Having read this I thought it was extremely informative.
I appreciate you finding the time and effort to put this short article together.
I once again find myself personally spending a significant amount of time both reading and posting comments.
But so what, it was still worth it!