As this years holidays approach, I just realized that I have a camera full of this summers vacation snapshots and a few from last winter. Clearly, I could use a better system for staying on top of my digital photos. Any ideas?

The beauty of digital photography is that you arent afraid to waste any film so you theoretically wont ever miss a great moment. On the flip side, that means you probably have a lot more photos to catalog and print now than you did with old fashioned cameras. We bet that between Halloween, Thanksgiving, and the Holidays, your digital camera and photo files will be bursting at the seams. Instead of letting them stack up willy nilly on your camera and computer, get them together so you can do what you wanted to do in the first place: show them off! Unlike old-fashioned film, doing so is easy, fast and often free.

• Pick a Program. Whether its iPhoto or Kodak Picture Viewer, test a few different photo viewing programs until you find one that you really like. Then stick with it. Its much easier to keep track of all of your photos if they are in one place. Youre also much more likely to keep them up to date and organized if you find the program to be intuitive and easy to use.

   

• Edit. Todd Smith, the professional photographer who shoots all of the new products for Buttoned Up, uses a digital camera. Sometimes in the course of an engagement, he will shoot over 3000 frames. The rule of thumb he uses in his work is: delete at least 50% of the shots immediately. Its a rule that makes sense for non-professionals too. After all, you dont want to waste time cataloging and then later, scrolling through lots of duds to try to get to the good shots.

   

• Share the Fun. Sending photos via email attachments can be can be a major time waster, and larger photo files are often stopped by email filters anyway. So store them online instead. Most photo sites such as Flickr.com, KodakGallery.com and Sony.com let you store and create online albums for free. When youre ready to share them with friends and family, simply email the link and they will have easy access to without ever having to sit through a never ending download.