Display and Organise your Photos
Use archival non-PVC refills that have pockets in them. Arrowfile refills are made of acid-free materials and are free from chemicals and softeners. Our original refills are made from archival polypropylene, an inert, photo-safe substance, and we also now have a range of polyester refills which are recommended by conservators everywhere. These refills come in many different pocket sizes to accommodate almost all sizes and go into 4 ring Binder Albums that you can easily update.
One of the easiest ways to organise your original family photographs is to group them by size, however with Arrowfile refills you can mix and match refills which hold different sizes to organise your photos in any way you want.
For instance you may want to organise them by date. Use the same type of archival non-PVC refills but categorise using archival Index pages. So, in one category you can have one page holding 6x4 and another page holding 8x10. If you have any slides or negatives, use non PVC archival refills.
To avoid any further damage to the images because of humidity and light, place the Arrowfile album into an Arrowfile Slip Case. Most photographs that you get today are either 3½ x 5" or 4x6" or 4.5x6" (new Digital Size) – Arrowfile not only offers all these sizes and more, but also provides the continuity of a neat, matching yet expandable system.
Use our indexing system, including caption inserts, where you can record the event, people and places photographed. Do this for future generations, so they won’t have the same problems you are encountering.
PVC vs. Non-PVC
The traditional way of storing photographs in albums has severe shortcomings because most albums are made with PVC (PVC is a plastic that has very poor storage qualities and accelerates deterioration) and harmful glues that tend to destroy photos over a very short time.
If you want to save old photographs (as well as new), it's important to take them out of their current albums and re-organise them using a method with safe materials such as Arrowfile's Archival Storage System which uses non-PVC acid-free polypropylene .
Our tips on how to protect and organise your photos:
- Take more pictures than you need – this way you are bound to get some very good ones that you should select.
- Get a digital camera - free to take as many photos as you wish without additional costs, you can delete unwanted shots later, and only print the very best pictures. The rest can be stored on CDs, DVDs or other external media . Don't forget to print thumbnail sizes of all the images on the CD, so you can easily see which images are stored on the disc.
- After printing pictures, put the photos into an album as soon as possible. This keeps the photos in chronological order in their appropriate sections kept together with other photos from the same event.
- Buy photo albums with loose-leaf pages so if photos are sent to you from other people, they can be inserted in chronological or event order. Choose the Photo Album Supplier with continual supply like Arrowfile so that you do not need to worry about running out of stock.
- Label your photos as you put them into the albums with Arrowfile’s memo titles . Do not forget to date them. Write who-what-where-why if possible. Your children will be thankful when they can identify everyone in the pictures. Do not write directly on photographs or on the back as it can damage them. Instead, use Arrowfile’s memo titles which go into spaces next to the photo, depending which Refill you have chosen. If there is a story to tell, jot down a few notes and tuck it in behind the photograph.
- It can be very difficult to find negatives to reprint pictures. Put your negatives in chronological order using Arrowfile’s archival negative refill pages into the same Binder Album or have one album just for Negatives and CDs. If you can get Negatives or CD’s printed into thumb-prints, put these into Arrowfile’s Refill page to place this next to Negatives. Although you can make Prints from Prints these days, the costs can be high. For the Professionals and hobbyists this is very important. Do not forget to label the page and the Binder.
- For digital users, store your CDs/Memory Cards in a binder with CD-Refill/Memory-Card Refill pages. Label each CD or Memory Card with who-what-when-where-why. Write on Arrowfile’s Caption Memo Titles next to the CDs. Make back-up copies. One scratch and the information could be lost. An extra backup option would be to upload the digital photos to a cloud storage provider such as DropBox or Microsoft SkyDrive, where they can be stored and out-of-town friends and family can view them as well.
- Store photos in a cool, dry environment, such as archival storage boxes. Attics, garages and basements can do terrible damage to photos that you intend to enjoy for years or pass on to the next generation.
- And for those “iffy” photos that you can’t bear to part with, put them in a “photo-shoebox”. In a year or so, look back and see if you still want them. Revisit this box yearly and weed out. Why not make a Photo Album of all the worst pictures?
