Does Anyone Backup Nef (unprocessed) Files?

[Peter Blake]

I found out that I had a huge wad of disk space allocated to NEF files, which appear to be unprocessed RAW files? so I promptly deleted them.
I am wondering if I should perhaps have saved them though; what would be the circumstances requiring this?

 

[Beth Carter]

i save all of my raw files unless they're completely worthless. they're saved on external hard drives with a backup set that i keep at work. there have been many times where i've shot a series of photos, processed my favorites and ignored the rest. a few months later i might go back and find one that i overlooked. or i may be in a b&w mood now and in a few months redo a couple of those shots completely different. it's not much different than keeping all of the film strips you've developed but only printed one or two from a strip.

 

[Pete Askew]

I do. I know some people use a strategy of covering to DNG with the original file embedded but keep both the NEF, and any output TIFF that I make from it.

 

[Julian de'Courcy]

Yes Peter, I also keep all the Raws other than anything obviously of no use are deleted. I recently went over an old hard drive and picked out various images that were worth keeping.

 

[Paul Lange]

I use LR so the raw files have to be kept. I back up all photos I import on to an external drive on which I also keep an incremental back up. I also have a Time Machine back up on another external drive. Any raws I really don't like I delete from the computers hard drive but keep the archived original. Sometimes I look at an old photo and decide that it is actually rather good. Sometimes it can be years for this to happen.