Phocus and back-up

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HiroshiS

I have recently upgraded to an H6D-100 which now requires major adjustments in my workflow.
Over the years, I have mainly used Apple Aperture, which stores all edit instructions internally leaving all externally stored raw files untouched (Lightroom does the same). It is then easy to regularly back-up the library, whereas raw files need to be backed up only once to various hard drives (I do this immediately after culling). However, Aperture doesn't support the H6D-100 raw files and I need to find a new solution. I like Phocus's raw conversion but the direct modification of the fff files in Phocus has become sort of a back-up nightmare since each time you touch/edit the raw file you need to synchronize the changes across all back-ups (if you don't want to loose the edits during a crash).
How do Phocus users deal with this?

I feel Hasselblad needs to offer some sort of back-up solution in Phocus. I understand they don't want to be Lightroom but at least some synchronization option of folders on different hard drives would be essential. Currently, I am using a unix command line cronjob to synchronize changes but that is not a straightforward solution. Any thoughts or tips on this? If anyone has a direct line to Hasselblad, I think this would be an essential feature upgrade that should come asap...

jerome_m

Phocus can edit non Hasselblad files on the Mac platform. In that case, the raw files are never touched and the edit are saved in a companion file with the ending .phos
Conceptually, all what you require necessitates is that they do the same with Hasselblad files as they do with third party files, right?

NickT

#2
If you have automated backup software this gets taken care of.

Every night my RAW images (and everything else) get's backed up to two on-site RAID drives plus to Google cloud. The software will scan the drives and if it sees a change (i.e. a modified FFF) it will update the backup.

I use Chronosync https://www.econtechnologies.com/chronosync/overview.html and there are plenty of other options out there.
Nick-T typing at you from Flexframe's secret location under a Volcano

davidthescot

Since I lost my entire online image library due to a RAID disk system failure (fortunately I had DVD backups of almost all) I am now super paranoid about this.

I use Phocus to import the raw files and then export selected 16 bit TIFF's. I then import the raw files and the TIFF's into Lightroom.  Phocus is a great capture and raw conversion programme but I prefer LR and PS for editing.  I used to copy the 3FR files to hard disk before importing in Phocus but I no longer bother as I have never needed to go beyond the FFF files.

My current setup is that I immediately take a DVD of the entire raw session before any edits.  All (well excluding most of the crap) my images are stored on a pair of 4TB RAID arrays which are synchronised with Intego Backup Pro. This works well.

When I have finished editing and updating I do another backup to a USB3 stick.  The DVD's of the raw files and the DVD sticks are stored in a separate building.


NickT

David I am running RAID 5 so 1 drive can go without losing any data. I keep spares to swap out if the RAID box shows any disk errors. I shoot direct to a RAID, back up to two more RAIDs (one of which is rotated off-site) and backup to the cloud. Paranoid? Moi?
Nick-T typing at you from Flexframe's secret location under a Volcano

jerome_m

Quote from: NickT on December 07, 2017, 09:51:17 AM
If you have automated backup software this gets taken care of.

Well... yes. Time machine on my mac takes snapshots every hour, so I could go back to a previous version if needed.

BUT, because the edits are saved in the .fff file directly, time machine needs to re-save the whole .fff file with each change. That file can be quite big. If Phocus would save the edits in a companion .phos file, as it already does with third-party raw data, only that small file would need to be incremented.

HiroshiS

Thanks for your suggestions. Yes, of course synchronization of various drives is a solution (and that's what I am currently doing as well) but I agree with Jerome that it is not a very good solution. First, it is not ideal to copy every day your raw files: the more you copy the larger the chances that at some point files get corrupted (and the error gets then mirrored/synchronized quickly with no chance for recovery; keeping history with time machine is not practical due to the file sizes). Second, I don't like the idea to synchronize the very large H6D-100 files to my remote site each time I make small adjustments (it takes a lot of band with and time). Also, it gets quickly complicated if you work on different computers and have files stored internally and on external hard drives.
Oh well, the bottom line is that I find it very problematic that Phocus modifies the raw files themselves but that's what Hasselblad has chosen to do...

davidthescot

If it is of any help I do not keep any of my raw or edited files on the internal HD of my Mac.  I have two thunderbolt RAID boxes which are synchronised daily.  This means that ONLY the files that have changed or been added are copied.  In addition I have two Time machine backups which EXCLUDE the thunderbolt RAID arrays and each other.

The software I use for the RAID file synchronisation is Intego Backup Manager Pro - works well at least for me.

If your internal HD is an electromechanical device rather than solid state it might be worth considering replacing it (if possible) or moving your startup disk to another Thunderbolt attached SSD.  I have done this in the past and it seems to work well.

Finally to cover the aspect of corrupted files being copied inadvertently I have a third backup to DVD's and 128GB USB3 sticks. 

Incidentally I recently moved my image editing from a Macpro (12 core 64GB) to an iMac (3.2gb proc, 32GB and no SSD) and it handles the files from my H6D-100 just fine although perhaps a little less quickly.

chimbos

In addition to any local backups, I use https://www.backblaze.com/ it only cost a few dollars a month and backs up both internal and external drives.  This is not like dropbox or other services, this is a true backup, to recovery you go online, select the files and they generate a link to them.  If it is a total lose you can either send them a drive big enough or they provide one at a cost for a complete backup.  Local backups are nice but if stolen it does not matter how many copies you have.  I have about 3.2TB backed up right now.

Matthew