PhotoWise Calgary

Tag: calgary photo organizing

  • Cherishing The Memory Of Loved Ones You’ve Lost

    Cherishing The Memory Of Loved Ones You’ve Lost

    Throughout my life, I have cherished my cameras…

    I’d be willing to say that the camera is one of – if not the greatest – technological invention. Upon its creation, the camera began capturing our life moments, allowing us to hold on to our memories and learn about our ancestors in ways we never could before. They say “a picture is worth a thousand words” and that “the camera never lies” (Photoshop however….. 😉 ). These aren’t just whimsical idioms. They are true statements.

    In fact, I think it’s safe to say that they may even be understatements. Pictures, I’d submit, are worth a lot more than a thousand words. They preserve memories that enable us to recall stories and time periods of our lives that can last for hours. This is especially true when those stories are about our lost loved ones.

    Nothing feels worse that coping with the loss of a loved one.

    Although each and every one of us is guaranteed a life that will end at some point, this in itself does not lessen the pain. It hurts. We miss our grandparents, parents, friends, pets, and the many other relationships that effectively end when those individuals pass away. Naturally, we’ll always miss them and recall the happier times when they were here.

    However, it’s the pictures that contain their images that help us to truly hold on to their memories. Yes, they can initiate a bout with tears. But what would we do without those pictures? I truly cherish the photographs I’ve taken of the people and pets I’ve lost in my life. The pictures mean so much to me, as they represent various times in my life when I experienced such joy with the people I loved. Those moments are important. They deserve to be cherished forever.

    Cherish the memories of your lost loved ones with a professional photo book

    I feel that there’s no better way to cherish the memories of our lost loved ones than to construct Photo Books with their pictures.

    You may be wondering what makes a Photo Book any different than a photo album.  Let me begin by mentioning that a Photo Book can be compared to a coffee table book in that its pages are made up of the photographs themselves. They are high-quality, high-resolution printed pages of your photos that otherwise would experience a lot of wear and tear and other forms of deterioration throughout the years.  As opposed to heavy photo albums, people quite enjoy picking up a photobook and reminiscing over the photographs as they flip through the beautiful pages one by one.

    Photo albums don’t exactly help to prevent such deterioration.  In fact, in many cases, photo albums add to the diminishing quality of old photographs. When kept in dark and dusty places like closets and humid basements and garages, the pictures can endure degradation due to the environmental elements. Not to mention, when the photographs are handled, everything from finger smudges to the adhesive or plastic used in the photo albums can reduce their quality and increase the speed of their deterioration.

    Professional Photo Books help to preserve the quality of your precious photos for the long haul. Not to mention, they can be uniquely designed with text to tell a special version of your lost loved one’s life story. Photos are often arranged chronologically, but you always have the option of telling the story that you think best suits the person you’re commemorating.

    Please don’t hesitate to contact me today so that we can get started on a professional PhotoBook that perfectly preserves your cherished memories!

  • The Importance of Organizing Your Digital Photos

    The Importance of Organizing Your Digital Photos

    The Importance Of Organizing Your Digital Photos

    We are truly living in a digital world, aren’t we? Every day I’m reminded about how much things have changed since I was a little kid. For example, when I needed to research information – especially for a school project – I headed over to the library to locate the appropriate books. Today, our kids can find whatever it is they need to know by pulling out their smartphones and/or tablets and doing a quick Google search.

    Yes, times have changed. But one thing has definitely stood the test of time. Photos are still very much in style and I don’t see their popularity wavering at any time. With iPhones in hand and social media platforms like Instagram all the rage, pretty much everyone is a photographer these days. What that also means is that the vast majority of us have a whole whack of digital photos stored on numerous devices.

    When it comes to photo organization, what is old is new again.

    Organizing all of those digital photos on all those devices can be just as difficult as trying to arrange old pictures that have been tucked away in shoeboxes for years. One of the main reasons for this is that digital photos usually have obscure file names that are a random mix of letters and numbers. They certainly don’t serve as ways to remember which photo is which the way a “Grandma’s 80th Birthday Celebration” file name would.

    “Downloading photos to your computer without organizing them is the digital equivalent of stuffing printed photos into shoeboxes,” agrees Barb Gonzalez on Techlicious.com, “When you want to find a particular photo, you’ll have to sift through dozens, hundreds or (if you’re like me) thousands of photos. But if you’ll spend a few minutes organizing your photos when you download them to your computer, you won’t find yourself doomed to hours trying to find them later.”

    What’s the best way to go about organizing your digital photos?

    Checking the date and time on your digital camera to ensure it is correct before taking pictures is very important. I also suggest that you go through your photos and remove the duplicates, delete outtakes and the ones you don’t really need or want to keep. It’s also very important to add proper file names and store them in an organized folder/album system so that you can find them easily when you want them. Naturally, the process can be quite time consuming and require knowledge of a variety of computer applications.

    That’s where PhotoWise comes in! Our Digital Photo Management services do for your digital photos what our Printed Photo Organization services do for your printed photos. Long story short: we organize everything for you! Even if you have multiple photos on multiple devices (as most people do), we can take care of the overwhelming process of trying to sift through and organize your seemingly countless files and folders.

    Why is it so important to organize your digital photos?

    Just as our precious printed photos can become lost or damaged, your digital photos can end up disappearing as well. So often, we accidentally delete photos from our devices because they haven’t been labelled properly. This generally happens when we change devices or upgrade our computers. As well, computers aren’t exactly the equivalents of bank safes when it comes to protecting what is most important to you.

    We all know that computers crash and usb external hard drives can become corrupt or damaged. If your computer is the only place where your digital photos are saved, you may end up losing them forever!

    Don’t let that happen. Please don’t hesitate to contact me today to find out how PhotoWise can help to organize your digital photos and preserve your precious memories forever!

  • How to Protect Your Photos from Loss, Theft or Damage

    How to Protect Your Photos from Loss, Theft or Damage

    Protecting Printed Photos From Loss, Theft Or Damage

    First and foremost, I’d like to send my warmest wishes for a speedy return to safety and comfort for everyone who has been affected by the recent hurricanes and earthquakes. I can only imagine how terrifying it must have been to have to hunker down and ride out severe storms that took lives and destroyed homes.

    I’m proud that Canada is stepping up to aid in the relief efforts. You can do your part to help by donating to the Canadian Red Cross online. It’s hard to tell, of course, how long it will take for normalcy to be restored, but I do know that the more we help, the easier the transition will be.

    The importance of saving your memories.

    Keeping safe during a natural disaster is always of paramount importance. However, I can’t help but think about how many memories storms like Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma have robbed from people. Naturally, in the midst of the many possessions we keep in our homes are our photos.  Photos, of course, capture moments in our lives that are meant to be cherished forever.  Our memories can only hold on to so much information without photos to help us recall those special times.

    Recent events serve as a reminder to digitize your photos in case of an unforeseen event that could destroy them forever. Once your photos are scanned, they can be both saved and backed up as digital files as well as reprinted. Essentially, scanning your old photos gives them renewed and longer lives – and helps protect them against being lost forever in the event of loss, theft or damage.photo albums to be scanned

    PhotoWise can help you protect your photos.

    Here at the PhotoWise studio we offer top-of-the-line photo scanning services.  Our equipment includes a variety of professional high-resolution and high-speed scanning machines and custom software applications. Each photo is checked for quality and scanned by hand. We want you to enjoy your photos for generations to come!

    Turn your old photos into canvas prints, put them in published photo books or print enlargements as gifts for your family members and friends. You have many options!

    Of course, a natural disaster isn’t particularly necessary in order for your old photos to be destroyed. In many cases, pictures that have been tucked away in shoeboxes or sticky albums for years deteriorate due to acidic environments, dust, mould and even insect infestations.  Don’t allow your precious memories to fade due to the passing of time and/or unforeseen circumstances…

    Please don’t hesitate to contact me today to find out how we can help organize, digitize and restore your family photos to bring new life to them and preserve your precious memories forever!

  • A Yearbook To Celebrate Your Family

    A Yearbook To Celebrate Your Family

    Year-In-Review: One Of The Best Ways To Celebrate Your Family

    Happy New Year everyone! I would like to offer you my best wishes and hopes that it will be a year that will provide you with many wonderful new memories!

    Here at PhotoWise, we’re big on preserving memories, and that’s why we offer a number of unique and special custom services that enable you to beautifully preserve your family photos and stories. (Including the family yearbook photo book!)

    We’ve just come off another wonderful holiday season and I’m willing to bet that you posed for family and friends to take photographs – as well as took a bunch of shots yourself.  After all, the holiday seasons are the biggest “photo taking” times of the year. (Those mobile phone cameras are so darn handy aren’t they?!)

    But what happens to all of those holiday photos after they’re taken?

    In years of past, the photos would usually end up in sticky photo albums, cut and glued into scrapbooks, or stored in shoeboxes. Today, they are mainly stored digitally on computers or mobile devices – spread throughout the many smartphones of the people who took the pictures. In some cases, a few of them end up on Facebook and social media but there’s never really any tangible account of the celebrations you enjoyed in each holiday season. All too often, the memories of those happy faces, activities and traditions become hazy as the photos get lost in their respective social media timelines or dropped into a miscellaneous (and eventually misplaced) folder on your computer.

    How can we help you to preserve your cherished holiday memories?

    We recommend the creation of an annual Family Yearbook!  Each year, around this time, we help our clients to collect their favourite photos from the previous year so that they can be edited, organized and exquisitely displayed in a one-of-a-kind hardcover custom photobook.  The family ‘year-in-review’ photobook is a big favourite in our family – everyone wants to turn the pages and reminisce about ‘that time when ….’ and laugh about the ‘out-take’ page that we add at the back for laughs.

    These professionally-designed yearbooks take away the frustration that often accompanies the thought of having to find the time and energy to preserve and organize your treasured photos all by yourself. In addition, the Family Yearbooks we create for our clients are excellent ways to establish priceless family heirlooms that can be passed down from generation to generation.

    Family Yearbooks are excellent ways to preserve your family traditions!  family yearbook photobook

    With our help, you can publish a professionally-bound family heirloom on a yearly basis. Our Family Yearbooks are custom-made to showcase your families traditions and celebrations.

    At PhotoWise, we pride ourselves on relieving our clients of the stress that comes with locating, sorting and organizing all of the photos that you have collected over the years. Allow us to offer you one of the greatest ways to celebrate your family, year in and year out!