My entire portfolio got corrupted right before a gallery review in Seattle

I was prepping for a big gallery review at the Olympic Sculpture Park last Thursday and my main hard drive just died. Lost about 80 finished pieces, including a 3-month project for a client. The backup I thought was automatic hadn't run in two weeks. Anyone ever recover from a massive data loss like this without losing their mind?

3 comments

3 Comments

lewis.charlie1mo ago

Wait, hold up. You had a 3-month client project on a drive that you weren't verifying the backups for? That's insane, man. Like, I'm genuinely shocked you didn't check even once during that whole time. A single hard drive for a client deliverable is already risky, but letting the backup sit for two weeks without looking at it is practically gambling with someone else's money. I get that life gets busy, but that level of trust in a machine is bonkers to me. I'd be pacing around my apartment for a week straight if I lost a client project that way. Hope you have some cloud copies or old versions hiding somewhere.

ninasanchez2mo ago

Man that backup situation is rough, but automatic doesn't always mean set and forget. I mean, you gotta check those things manually sometimes, maybe once a week. It's saved my butt before when a cloud sync just stopped working.

avery9212mo ago

Totally agree, you have to check in on them! I set a calendar reminder for the first Monday of every month to open my backup software and look at the logs. Found a failed drive that way before it became a real problem. It only takes five minutes but it gives you so much peace of mind. Letting it run on its own is just asking for a nasty surprise later.