Summer Vacation is over…What to Do with All Those Photos – Candid New York Family Photographer

Last year (or maybe the year before), around this time, I believe I posted about ways in which we can actually display our summer or vacation photos. Oh wait, that post is HERE! I maintain for forever and ever that we should always be printing our photos or making them visible in some fashion. Otherwise, what on earth is the point of making photos if we’re not going to make the time to enjoy them. Photos are memories…and memories are meant to be relived and loved. So, get them off your hard drives and USBs and CDs…and put them somewhere that you can see them in your daily life.

Before I get to the big stuff, if printing isn’t really on your scope right this moment, consider making a slideshow that you can use as your screensaver on your computer. That way, even if you’re not printing them out, you still get to enjoy them!

I was tired of looking at the same old fake galaxy pictures on my Mac and followed my own advice. Being able to walk by and see my favorite images of my family running across the otherwise sleepy screen? It makes me smile every. single. time.

How to Create a Screensaver Slideshow from Gina Cooperman on Vimeo.

It’s really not hard…
On a Mac:
Create a new folder on your desktop and label it whatever you choose (ex. screensaver).
Place the images that you’d like to use in the folder.
Open the “System Preferences” menu.
Select “Desktop & Screensaver”.
Select the “Screensaver” option.
Select the + button found toward the bottom of the list (or the “Source” for more recent OS X versions).
Choose “Add Folder of Pictures”.
Locate the image folder you created earlier and that’s it!

On a PC:
All Programs–>Control Panel–>Display–>Personalization–>Screen Saver–>Photos

Then locate your image folder and select them.
Select “Shuffle”

You’re done. Easy, right???

Now. If you’re like me, and enjoy seeing memories from specific time periods or vacations or family events, then listen up. I know wall space is limited in our homes. And, we don’t always want to remove those older photos because, hey, those are important memories too. So, how do we incorporate all these new moments? It’s the obvious choice: a photo book.
But, if we’re going to record these pictures as true memories, then our thoughts must go right along with them. So, take a gander at the video below for a brief introduction to my creative why’s and how’s for making photo books for my own family.

If you want to learn how to create truly compelling image stories in your own photo books, and want something more in depth than what I’ve shown here…you might be interested in Stacey Wiseman’s Intro Photo Book Design class. Stacey is a photo book guru and hand holds her students thru the design process, with information on specific and helpful software to make the design more enjoyable and more beautiful.

Happy memory making!

Honest & Candid New York Family Photographer

Gina specializes in natural & emotive storytelling images. By focusing on the relationships of parents and their children, she is able to go beyond the standard pose and capture the true emotion of her clients’ relationships in a fun-filled session atmosphere. Visit the Details Page for more session info.