Today’s technology allows us to add many more photos to our family history records, memoirs, and genealogy research than would have been possible for our grandmothers or even our mothers. With modern digital cameras, we can know in an instant if the photo turned out—and immediately take another if it didn’t. We can crop and maneuver brightness, contrast, and color to our desired likeness, and we can immediately share these photos via our phones, computers, and social networking sites. What is sad, though, is that the majority of our photos end up on a disc or in a computer file never to be seen again.
Ask yourself: How often do you sit in front of a monitor and actually review and talk about your photos? When was the last time you sat with your children or snuggled with your grandchildren reminiscing over old photos? If the photos are just digital images, it’s likely the answer is, “never.”
My daughter, Miranda Gumtow, and granddaughter, Kelly Jones, love looking at old photos and hearing the stories. I love when they ask questions and want to know more about the people in the photos.
I have found that sitting on the sofa with my grandchild in my lap and daughter by my side looking at printed photos conjures up many more memories, discussions, and feelings of love and togetherness than would happen if we were viewing digital images, such as all the photos sitting on a CD in my office waiting for me to add captions.
I strongly encourage everyone is to continue to create the old-fashioned, physical photo album. Store the digital originals in a safe manner (so you can make new copies if ever necessary) but pick your favorite photos, old and new, and make prints, arrange them in albums (using archive quality paper and adhesives, of course), and add captions—and then spend time sitting with your family poring over the albums. Let the pages become ragged and worn with use—as The Velveteen Rabbit learned, that’s a sign of real love!
So what do you think? Can digital albums ever replace the real thing? Should they?
About today’s contributor: Vickie Chupurdia lives in northeastern Minnesota. She has been doing extensive genealogy research and personal histories for herself and others for more than 30 years. She has conducted classes at the collegiate level and is available for speaking engagements and seminars.
Digital photos on your computer or tablet are great for individual viewing. But I agree, who sits around a computer screen looking at photos with family? My kids loved thumbing through photo albums and remembering. In fact they still do now that they are grown. Oh that was the time when Emily fell in the creek. Oh that was the time when Michael used the alias “Jonathan Brooks” for the whole week. Oh that was the time our car broke down on the road and we played Superman fighting in the junkyard.” Physical albums help build and strengthen family ties in ways that I don’t think online photos can.
Whenever my 36-year-old son comes home for a visit, the first thing he does is go to the photograph drawer to browse. I agree that the physical photos are most accessible, most engaging and most fun to discuss. You can pass them around and you can look on the back to see if anything is written there.
Last week I took my 10 year old granddaughter to a Sushi-making class. I snapped photos all during the class and could have just emailed them to her. Instead, before I left for my home in Wisconsin (they are in New York City), I made her an album showing her patting down the rice, forming the sushi rolls with the mat, choosing the slivers of vegetables and fish, cutting, drinking her complimentary soda during the break, etc. She loved the class and was very excited to get the album documenting her birthday present on her first “double digit” birthday.
Great post, Vickie. There’s something to be said for having to edit down our photos to make an album or book that focuses us on some key memories and images.
I totally agree with your message Vickie. There is something to be said for the tangible element and the visceral experience- the touch, the smell, the weight of the album on one’s lap. I surprisingly had to convince a colleague that people still want that shared exchange. If I’m having to convince a 45+ person, imagine what we’re facing with the digital generation…
I worry about the people who just upload their photos as small files to Facebook without even saving a digital file that’s large enough to print. Another concern: since we all have so many photos today, do they mean as much? I remember going on a trip as a child and taking one 36-shot roll of film over several days. Now I may take 360 photos (or more) in a single day. Does that diminish the importance of each photo?
My kids love their photo albums! I keep a family album, too. One problem is the kids take iPhone photos of themselves and friends and upload to FB and the quality is not good. I do snoop, grab and print some for their albums and though the quality isn’t tops, they are okay.
Also I have one of those digital photo frames that is a show-stopper. Photos rotate through and grab our attention. Our guests enjoy watching, too.
This is a terrific post. I agree wholeheartedly. I am far more apt to share an actual photo album/scrapbook with people than I am to gather them all around my computer to scroll down through thousands of images. It’s great to store photos on the computer, but I’m with you on thinking that we, also, ought to print some out and put them in albums or scrapbooks.
Commenter Leah talked about making an album for her granddaughter’s sushi-making class. Not sure if it was an album with the “real” photo, or if it was a digital album, but I think both are valid. The digital album (Mix book) may not have the “real thing” photo, but it still is done in a way which can be perused with a child on your lap, then passed from hand to hand.
I can go both ways on this discussion. I have made physical books for grandchildren that they love… BUT the books are better because I have scanned so many photos, organized them, etc. For each grandchild, I’ve made an alphabet book when they were 3. Each page featured a photo of the child and the appropriate letter (Red Dress etc). The physical book is perfect for this. Also for each 8 year old, I’ve made a “You and Me” photobook. So the physical books are BETTER when you use the technologies to tell a personalized story.