Procreate Organisation: How to Back Up Your Procreate Files

1. Welcome: Attention fellow creatives. It's time to back up your procreate files. Consider this your public service announcement. Hi, I'm Chelsea. In this quick class, I'm going to show you the simple method that I use to manually back up my procreate files. If you haven't seen my previous class, procreate organization tips, three steps to organize your files. I highly recommend that you watch that one first, as it will help you to organize and prepare your Procreate gallery, to make the backing up process as easy as possible. And you can find the link in the class description below. Alright, let's get into backing up our files. 2. Procreate Backup Process: Before you get started, the first thing you need to do is decide where you're going to store your backups. There are a number of different options such as an external hard drive or various Cloud storage providers. So you should do your own research to decide which option is best for you. Once you've got your storage location, set up on your iPad, you're going to go to the Files app on your iPad, navigate to your storage. I'm personally going to be using ICloudDrive and create a folder for your backups. I'm going to name mine Procreate backups. Next, open Procreate and select the files that you want to backup. You can back up a single file or multiple files at once, or you can even back up stacks. So click Select, select the stack, and then click Share. For the image format, I like to use the Procreate format because that keeps all of your layers and time laps and everything intact. So click on Procreate. That will export. Once that's loaded, you'll see your options, and we're going to select Save to files. Navigate to your Procreate backups folder that you just created. And then once you're in there, it's up to you how you want to organize your files. I like to keep my backups organized the same way as I have my Procreate gallery. So I'm going to make a new folder and call it Easter 2025 to match my stack, and that has dropped me into that folder. And now I'll just click Save and I get the message that the export was successful. Now, while I still have my stack selected, I'm going to click Share again, and this time, I'm going to export a preview image. I like to use JPEG, but you could also use the PNG format if you prefer. Click on Save to Files, and that should take you straight back into the right folder. So just click Save. Then you can close out of that selection in Procreate and come back to the files up just to double check that all your files are there. Which mine are, and that's it. These files are now backed up. Now, you might wonder why I bothered to export the preview image as well as the procreate file. And the main reason is that although these are showing up correctly at the time of filming this class, I have found in the past that sometimes the procreate file format doesn't always show a preview image. So while you're backing up your files, it might also be a good idea to think about backing up your brushes and color palettes, too. To back up your brushes, you just open up any Canvas, navigate to your brush library, and you can either swipe to the left on an individual brush and click Share. Or if you have created or downloaded your own brush sets, you can click on the set to bring out the flyout menu and then select to share. Then you just follow the same process as before. Click Save to files, create a new folder or navigate to the one that you want to use, and click Save. To back up a color palette, you just click the three dots, click Share, and then follow that exact same process again. If you want to bring any of the files back into Procreate, you can simply click on Import, navigate to your backup folder and click on the Procreate Canvas or the brush or color palette, and it will import right back into Procreate. The final step to keep organized with backups is to create a marker canvas to help you keep track of where you're up to with your backups. Now that I have backed up my Easter stack, I'm just going to click and drag it below my own marker Canvas here. 3. Final Thoughts and Class Project: So that's it. The simple process to manually back up your procreate files. I know it's not exactly fun, but it's really worth the time and effort if you want to make sure that your files are safe if and when technology fails. Now, there's no point in learning this method if you don't take action on it. So for your class project, I would love for you to complete your first Canvas backup. Create your own backup marker Canvas, and then upload a screenshot of your Procreate gallery showing that your first backup file is now below your marker Canvas. I'd love to help celebrate your first steps towards keeping your files safe. Please keep in mind that I am not a tech expert, and while this is the method that works well for me, we all have different setups and technology can be unpredictable. So I may not be able to help if this process doesn't work properly for you. If you do run into issues, the best place to check would be online forums and Google searches or to reach out directly to Procreate Apple or your storage provider. Thanks so much for joining me. Now, go on back up those files, and I'll see you in the next class.