Owning Mistakes Can Pay Off

We all make mistakes. To error is human right?

Most times mistakes come from not having thought through an action. Or from acting without full knowledge of the outcomes. If we knew the outcome we’d not make the mistake right?

The Utility of My Cloud Drive

One of the tools I have attached to my home network is a cloud drive. I’ve had one for years. The drive is connected to my router and has allowed me access to files when I’m away from home using software to log into it.

There is an app on my iPads which gives me direct access to the drive. I’ve loved being able to use my drive to transfer files on and off of my iPad. This has become especially important since I started using the app Procreate for most of my graphics work.

My Love of Procreate

The app cost me less than twenty bucks and has amazed me with the amount of power it has. The latest version of it allows me to do 3D modelling and animation should I feel so inclined. My readers occasionally have seen time-lapse video of projects I’ve done using it. It has a built in feature to automatically record each project.

Thinking About Saving My Projects

The other day I was looking at the number of projects I had stored in the app and thought maybe I should take the time to export each of them in procreate’s format to my cloud drive and then delete the ones I’ve completed. This would conserve space on my tablet as I do more projects and create a backup.

Seems like a pretty smart move to make. You’d have thought I’d have got right on that.

I didn’t.

I thought about it and moved on to working my way through a tutorial and left the idea for another day. While I was in the tutorial, Procreate didn’t respond to some of the steps as it should have. I thought I’d missed some detail and was doing it wrong.

Then Procreate Acted Up

When I opened Procreate the next morning, I set my pencil down on a new image and moved it across the screen to find instead of a line appearing, the size of the image was changing. I played with it for a while trying to turn off what ever this was turned on.

I played with the settings, restarted the app a few times and even restarted the iPad. The same thing was happening every time. It wasn’t that particular image, I tried some others and the same thing was happening.

Finally I decided that the smartest move to make would be to delete the app and do a clean install. So, with nary a second thought to my projects sitting in the app, I hit delete and reinstalled Procreate. Of course, I opened it and there was a blank gallery staring at me.

After the Clean Install of Procreate

There it was in all its glory, staring at me, waiting for me to create new content.

It was ignoring my gut wrenching realization that all my projects were gone. Including new ones I was just getting ready to publish. I didn’t mind having to reinstall my brushes, colour swatches and fonts. They needed a cleanup anyways.

But, my images, I moaned.

After I put a strain on my knees kicking my butt for not having paid attention to my own advice, I sighed and got on with gathering together the copies of brushes, colour swatches and fonts to organize and start reloading back into the app.

I’d have to recreate what I could of the projects. It was my own fault I’d lost them. I logged into my cloud drive and created a dedicated space for all my Procreate material including future projects. At least I’d learned a lesson.

A Chat With My Young Friend

Just before I settled into bed a young friend messaged me wanting to talk. We chatted for a while and in the course of the conversation I mentioned to her about my boneheaded screwup earlier in the day.

She casually responded, “Just do a backup. Export them and then delete it”. I was pretty sure she didn’t see the part where I said I’d deleted the app. I replied that it would have been a smart move, that I didn’t do.

No, she tells me, you can still do it. Now she has my attention. I’d forgotten she had worked for a telecom in their tech support for Apple.

She guided me where to find when the last backup to the cloud that happened the day before. She then showed me how to reset my iPad to factory default which would erase everything on my tablet. As I setup my ‘new’ tablet up popped an option to restore from backup.

Redemption Is Underway

What a relief. Needless to say I could not thank you my young friend enough. My projects were going to be safe. I left my iPad working through the restore process overnight. As I write this, the apps are still reloading from the backup. Procreate hasn’t fully reloaded yet but last time I looked it was using about 5Gb so it may take a while.

I’ll be spending most of today exporting projects, THEN, I’ll delete the app and reinstall it. I’ll have to put my brushes, fonts and swatches back in but that’s okay. My projects will be safely on the cloud drive.

Had I not been willing to admit my mistake to my young friend, I’d be without my projects. I was expecting her to laugh and tease me for having thought of the solution beforehand and still screwing it up. Instead she supplied me with a solution.

Thank you Misss Teen.