Your church likely has multiple happenings each and every week, along with seasonal activities several times a year. Capturing pictures of these activities and using them, both as a ministry and promotional tool, is a great way to improve communication and strengthen the community that is your congregation. Maybe you are a communications ministry servant, or maybe you are just a lay person who likes taking pictures. In either case, here's the "must do" list for building a photo library for your church:

You must use a digital camera. If possible, use a good quality digital SLR--around $400 for a basic model. Get a few extra memory cards for it as well as an extra battery. Always keep it charged and ready. Have several volunteers trained to use it and have it accessible if possible to multiple people.

You must take lots of pictures. A digital camera makes it possible to take the number of pictures you really want to and need to be taking. For an average church event you might shoot 300-400 digital pictures. You can shoot liberally because they don't cost anything to take--just space on a memory chip and 50¢ to later burn them to a CD-ROM for safekeeping.

So take pictures of everything--setup, the event, teardown. Take pictures of people and places. Take pictures of friendships and service. Take pictures of ministries and activities. Don't just "get a few for posterity."  Document with photos. Let them be your visual memory for your planning and execution. Shoot pictures of how you set things up--tables and such. Shoot pictures of your planning and volunteer teams. Especially shoot pictures of people, all the time, whenever possible.

How many pictures is enough?  Start with this--about 10 pictures for every church member per year.  So 200 members is 2,000 photos in your library each year.  Sound crazy? When you start thinking about the life of your church and the individual lives of your people, a few thousand pictures doesn't even come close to documenting and capturing moments in the stream of life.  Think big--and take pictures of it!

You must store the photos safely.  Warning--your computer's hard disk is not a safe place for the only copy of your digital photos to reside.  It can crash, and you can lose your pictures. I know this from personal (and painful) experience. Back them up to safe media, like CD-ROM or DVD-ROM, online to Flickr or Snapfish, or to your server or third-party backup service if you have one. A photo is something you want to last not days or week or years, but decades. Approach photo storage with this thought in mind--where can I put these where they will be safe for 50 years? 

You know history in part because of images others have saved for you. In the digital age, the images of today are more fleeting than ever.  The ability to safely recall your photos down the road doesn't mean much today, but it will mean the world to you a few kids and gray hairs from now.

You must organize your photos. What good are photos if you can't find them? Most computer photo repositories are no better than the shoeboxes of the film age.  Use a good photo organizing tool, like Adobe Photoshop Elements, Apple iPhoto or an online tool like Flickr or Snapfish. Name your photos something logical instead of the camera's default "DCS_1019.jpg." Name the folders the photos are stored in. Spend time looking through pictures on occasion and culling out "the pick of the litter." Keep this "best of the best" selection at the ready for use in church promotional materials, slide shows or other public viewings. Know where your photos are and how to find the ones you took a few years ago.

You must use your photos.  What's worse than taking a great photo that nobody ever sees? Do you know what makes a great photographer? It's simple: You've seen his or her pictures and they're interesting. You yourself might be a great photographer, but nobody's ever seen your pictures. Share the photos, people!

Don't wait for a venue in which to share pictures--create them!  Your church's website is a great place to start.  Upload digital photos to the site regularly--weekly, or even daily.  Do you have video screens in your worship room?  Why not run slide shows occasionally before, between or after services?  Got blank walls in your buildings?  Take photos to Kinko's and have them blown up to hang as a "mini-gallery" for all to see.

About the Author. Eugene L. Mason has more than two decades of experience in ministry communications and technologies. More...