Storing Photos Safely
to Preserve Your Memories

For storing photos safely, it's important to have a place for your prints where they will be preserved and protected from damage in order to keep your memories intact.

Once you have digitized your photo prints, you will be storing photos in a photo-safe environment. For more information on digitizing photos, click here.

Photo prints and newspaper clippings will deteriorate more rapidly when they are exposed to:

• acidic photo albums, papers, adhesives, and plastics
• lignan fibers in certain types of papers like newspaper or inexpensive scrapbooking paper
• light
• air pollution
• dust
• moisture
• high temperatures
• skin oils from fingers handling the photos

The first important factor for storing photos is the environment and climate they will be stored in. Try to find a cool, dry place in your home, such as an upstairs closet.

Basements tend to be more humid, so they are probably not a good choice (unless the basement is dehumidified.) The optimum temperature for storing photos is 77 degrees Fahrenheit (25 degrees Celsius.) Photos should be stored in an area with optimally 20 to 50 percent relative humidity.

Now that you've scanned and digitized your prints and found a good place to store them, you need to find good quality physical photo storage containers. The most common types of photo storage include photo albums, photo boxes, or other containers (sleeves, folders, or envelopes.)

The Importance of Storing Photos Safely

According to the National Archives, "all plastic and paper materials used to house and store valuable and heirloom photographs should pass the Photographic Activity Test (PAT)." They go on to explain that "the PAT is a test that determines whether or not a storage material will cause fading or staining in photographs." The high-quality manufacturers that use the same safety test approved and utilized by the Library of Congress and National Archives usually advertise their products stating that they pass this test.

When you are shopping around for products to help store your photos, make sure you understand the different archival standards so you don't spend money on a product that doesn't really provide the protection you need.

Not sure the difference between "photo safe" and "archival quality"? Learn more with this Archival Terms Dictionary.

Photo Albums

Most people enjoy having prints in photo albums. The benefit is that you can organize them in the sequence you like, be able to access them quickly and easily without shuffling through boxes and piles, and protect them from dirty or greasy fingers. Try to only put the best photos that are worthy of telling tales about in your photo albums, and file away the rest of the not-so-good photos.

Choosing an album depends on the type of person you are. You may be a "just stuff them in an album" type of person or a scrapbooking and journaling fanatic.

Before you go out and buy the first album you find on sale, first understand why Archival Storage Protection is important.

There are many types of storage albums and boxes on the market to help you protect and organize photos and momentos. Unfortunately, some storage boxes and containers may damage or ruin your memorities instead of protecting them.

Of all the factors that can cause photographs to break down, acid is the worst. On a scale from 0 to 14, 0 means very acidic, while 14 means not acidic (basic). Any storage products that have been tested for a pH level of 7.0 or above are considered acid-free.

Choosing acid-free albums and containers for storing photos will help the originals last for future generations. Storage boxes can also be used to store your old negatives and slides, newspaper or magazine clippings, recipes, drawings and art projects, cards, and other office supplies.

Some of the best products for storing photos are available online from Amazon.com. After buying and using archival storage products for years, I have not seen any signs of deterioration of my photos. Many of the products available for storing photos are archival quality, strong and durable, and they have many attractive designs and colors to choose from.

Scrapbooking

If you are a scrapbooking nut, there are lots of great scrapbooking albums available. If you are in between like me, I like to use memo albums. They allow me to easily put my prints in protective plastic, and these albums leave me a space next to each photo if I feel like journaling.

Waiting to find time to organize and put your photos into an album? In the meantime, protect your photos by storing them in a good quality photo box or plastic storage sleeves.

Sorting Photos for Long-Term Storage:

Whether you're using photo boxes or plastic protector sheets in a 3-ring binder, the most common ways to sort your photos are the following: chronologically by year, and then by month (this is most people's preference), or by events or themes.

Many photo boxes also include envelopes and sleeves to further divide your photos by date, theme, or event, but make sure they are also acid-free.

Other Tips for Storing Photos:

For old Polaroid prints, it is best to scan the image to your computer, crop out the surrounding white area using a digital photo editor, and re-save the image. Then you can store the original in a plastic sleeve inside a storage box.

To store news clippings of important announcements like your child's school activities, births, marriages, obituaries, etc., it is best to scan the original as soon as possible and save it as a digital image. The paper used for news print has lignan which will turn yellow over time. If you store it in an album, it may also cause the underlying page to change color. If you want to put the news clipping into an album, print the digital image onto photo-safe paper and then put it into a photo-safe album.

Click here for more details on how to scan and digitize photos.

Storing Negatives and Slides

You most likely have some old negatives from when you had your film developed and possibly some slides from years ago. Storing negatives can be easily organized by putting them in plastic storage sleeves along with your photos in your album, or in a separate album dedicated to only storing negatives. Another option to avoid storing negatives and slides is to convert them into digital files with a Slide and Negative Converter.

Great Job!

I commend you on taking the time to learn about safe photo storage. As any family historian knows, it is important not only to have photo memories, but to preserve those memories for future generations. The investment you make today will be enjoyed by future generations.

Next...

For information on storing your digital photos, please read Photo Backup.