Inventory Systems

[Renato Tonelli]

Which inventory system are you using to keep track of your equipment and negative files - Exel, FileMaker Pro...?

Things are getting out of hand, especially on the negative files front...

 

[Steve Smith]

Envelopes, shoe boxes, scribbled notes.


Steve.

 

[JBrunner]

Equipment: Large cameras are arranged as obstacles, to keep me limber. Storage cabinet for smaller items. Items are arranged by functionality and usage, and to exercise hand eye coordination and low light vision capability.

Negs: File cabinet. Negatives are arranged autobiographically.

 

[BrianShaw]

Envelopes, shoe boxes, scribbled notes.

Similar for me... except shoe boxes are supplemented with large Rubbermaid tubs and a file cabinet, and most of the scribbled notes are illegible.

 

[2F/2F]

memory

Problem is that my memory stinks.

I am very good with organizing digital pix. My archiving system is easy to navigate and very impressive to most digital photographers. The problem with film is that I often let it sit a very long time before developing it, so really have no idea exactly when the stuff was taken.

 

[mjs]

Equipment's easy -- it sits in a Rubbermaid cabinet and if I want to see what I've got, I open the front door.

Negatives: 35mm and 120 are in negative sleeves, in binders, sitting on a shelf. Earler negatives to the left, later to the right. When the shelf fills up I'll find another one. 4x5 are in sleeves in drawers in an old oak library card catalog box I bought at an estate auction. beautiful piece and I'll never shoot enough 4x5 negatives to fill it up. The 5x7 negatives I have left are in one of the drawers, too. 8x10 are in 8x10 page protectors from the office supply place, then stuck into binders like 35mm. I don't have a tracking system: every couple of years I go through a stack I haven't see lately and throw out the obviously really, really awful ones. I always find something or two which I want to print or reprint, and going through them occasionally reminds me of what I have and (approximately) where it's at.

Mike

 

[Nigel]

Negs: File cabinet. Negatives are arranged autobiographically.

I suppose that being negatives, they are arranged in descending order?

 

[jd callow]

negs and contacts are stored in 3 ring binders by subject or client. I use Jason's method of equipment storage along with a garage sale dresser. Back when in Detroit I used large rubbermaid or similar storage bins. Digital files are held on hdds that are mirrored and backed-up (quad redundancy). Current work is held on stripped/mirrored drive set (fast and redundant, labeled working), back-ups are to a mirrored drive (redundant only). Work which is not in development, but needs to be available is held on a mirrored drive set (redundant only labeled ongoing) and backed-up to another mirrored set. HDD are so cheap its silly not to have everything protected. As my back-up fills up I migrate the ongoing or working drives to the back-up blob of disks and replace them with new hdds. Or at least that is the plan, I've yet to run out of space since implementing it. The hole I have in my system is that old stuff resides only on back-up.

 

[David Brown]

Which inventory system are you using to keep track of your equipment and negative files - Exel, FileMaker Pro...?

If you meant Excel, yes, that.

 

[DWThomas]

I do make use of Excel. All new negatives go into pages in ring binders. Old negatives piled in a box are slo-o-o-owly migrating in that direction.

Physical equipment -- I'll have to get back to you.


DaveT, whose abode looks like a large walk-in closet!

 

[benjiboy]

All my negs go in ring binders in gasline file sheets opposite the contact sheet, so they are easy to identify quickly, my equipment is kept in two locked filing cabinets, the records are on Microsoft Excel.

 

[eddym]

Which inventory system are you using to keep track of your equipment and negative files - Exel, FileMaker Pro...?

Things are getting out of hand, especially on the negative files front...

Just a simple log book (MS Works database) in which I record the date, film, camera, lens, subject, and processing if B&W. I number the films according to month, date, and sequence number for the month. The first roll I shoot this month will be #1008-1.

I file the negatives in PrintFile sheets, with the corresponding contact sheet behind them, in an archival 3-ring box from Light Impressions.

I also keep another log book of "fine art" prints that I have made from each negative, so I can track the printing and sales records for each one. I don't do that for commercial clients' prints.

 

[Claire Senft]

FIFO