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It was a long process for me to figure out a useful way to organize my scrap kits. I tried several image organizing programs but found them tedious frustrating or inadequate. Finally I read on a forum somewhere about just using folders in Windows to organize your elements. Here is how I organize mine now.
In the My Documents folder I have created a folder called DigiScrap where I keep all my scrapping stuff. Within that folder I have made some general categories:
Most of them are self-explanatory. Templates is for overlays, quick pages, and commercial use stuff. Zips is where I put all the zip/rar files after I extract them. Themes is where I sort my kits into categories like Halloween, girly, boyish, love, or nature.
Doing this helps me keep all my kits together with their TOU’s which is very important so you can get permission and give credit to the designers if you use their material. I also copy all of my kits into a folder called Supplies. This does double the hard drive space I use but so far it hasn’t been an issue. In the Supplies folder I take all the elements out of the kits and sort them into categories. Then if I am making a page and I need an eyelet or a certain color bow I can find it quickly. Here is part of my supplies folder.
You’ll also notice that each of my folders has a picture on the front that lets me know what’s inside. To do this copy and paste an element file into its category folder, then rename it to “folder.jpg”. Windows will now recognize that file as the default thumbnail for the folder.
When you organize this way it is important to check the file names! Most designers name their file something like this: DesignerInitials_Kitname_element.png. For example: DS_MyFavoriteGuy_Clip.png instead of Clip.png. If you put this file into a folder with a bunch of clips it won’t overwrite all the other files named Clip.png. Check your file names before you copy because if they are too generic you will overwrite files and not be able to identify the designer or kit they are from!
Another important thing I do with my scrapbook stuff and photos is back them up. I cannot emphasize the importance of this enough! This year I got an external hard drive for Christmas. I regularly copy the My Pictures and DigiScrap folders onto it so that I won’t lose my stuff. The best part is if I have a computer meltdown and have to reformat I can load everything back on and my supplies are still organized.
It may seem like a daunting task but it is better if you start sooner than later. I currently have 65 GB of scrap stuff and around 650 kits so I am glad I began organizing early!
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