Where are my *&^$&^$ pictures?!?

All right, let's assume you have hooked your camera up to your computer,
either directly with a USB cable, or have set it in a docking station that
is attached to your computer via USB cable.

Is the camera on? Some cameras also have to be set to a display pictures
or read pictures mode before images can be accessed. If your camera and
computer are communicating, you should see the green
icon next to the arrow at the bottom right of your screen.
Or there may even be an icon for your camera displayed.

That means you are hooked up. Now you can specify that a certain program starts
every time the computer detects your camera, maybe the image editing program you
use to work on the images, or Microsoft Picture and Fax Viewer. If not, you can go
 to My Computer, and double click on it. My Computer should be on your desktop
somewhere on the left corner, or you can click the Start Button to find My Computer.
You should see something like the following:

First it listed your drives, probably
the C drive, maybe even D.

Below that will be a listing for Devices
With Removable Storage. That's where
your CD/CD-RW, DVD, and similar
drives are listed.
In the instance shown, the camera's
memory card is listed: LEXAR MEDIA,
which the computer is listing as drive
G. Double-clicking on that will either
take you straight to your pictures, or
to a list of folders, one of which will
contain your images.

When the pictures are
found XP systems and
some Windows 98
systems will give you
a preview of the images.
XP gives you options,
shown on the left under
Picture Tasks.
Right click on any
particular image and the
dialog box with Preview
at the top appears.
Selecting Open With
gives you options as to
which program you want
to use. In this case Corel
Photo-Paint, an image
editor has been chosen. Any other image editing or retouching software you have installed on
your computer should be listed; if not try the Choose Program entry and see if it is listed.

There are other ways to find your pictures. Users comfortable with Windows Explorer can
use that to locate the removable drive your camera is listed as. Using Windows Explorer has
one advantage. Not only will it display thumbnails (small versions of the pictures) but you can
review, rename, and even delete the pictures right on your camera from there.

If Windows Explorer
is not showing you previews,
click the arrow in the box
as shown to the left.
That will allow you to
see your pictures as
a Filmstrip (the images
displayed in a long line),
Thumbnails (the images
organized in a pile),
Tiles (useless to you)
Icons (not much more
useful), List (a listing
of the image names)
and Details. The Details
view will not show you
the pictures, but it will show you not only the name of the picture, but also the size of the file,
the date it was taken, the last date it was modified, and its size in pixels. This can be useful
information.

Now when saving pictures, you have choices. Your image editing software may have a place
where it stores pictures, or it may store it in the My Documents folder under My Pictures.
If you are not careful, it may save it right back to your camera's memory card. Generally
you want to save the picture to your computer BUT saving back to the card (with a descriptive
name) is very handy if you want to take your polished-up picture to a place where prints can
be made by a machine that reads your camera's memory card.

Good practice would be to make a folder for your pictures, maybe calling it Pictures. Inside that
folder can be sub-folders suitable for the different types of pictures you take. Maybe one for pictures
of your dog, one for the grandkids, one for wildlife, one for stuff you want to sell on e-Bay. If you
don't organize (and clearly name) your pictures you will end up with hundreds of pictures, and just
like the old snapshots in the shoebox, you will have to sort through them all every time to find the
one you are looking for.

Some people burn their pictures directly  to a CD, and then select the ones they want. In one way that
is good, it means no shot is ever discarded. But a lot of shots will have no reason to be kept; they are
too badly lit, too out of focus. At the very least you should save your best in an organized manner,
and if you mess with them, save the changed version under a new name so the original is left untouched.

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