FlickrTouchr doesn't support video uploads or grab any metadata about your photos (like tags, comments, favorites, etc). But it does arrange your backups by set name. In one command, you authorize FlickrTouchr to access our Flickr account, and it gets busy downloading your files. You'll need Python to run this and a folder to save your images. (Python comes in OS X, install it on Windows from here.) Here's what FlickrTouchr looks like in action.

Download FlickrTouchr and as per the README, invoke it using the commands:
$ mkdir FlickrBackupFolder
$ python flickrtouchr.py FlickrBackupFolder

FlickrTouchr will launch your browser and open a page asking you to authorize it to access your Flickr account.

When it starts going you'll see it grabbing your images. Wherever you get the error "Failed to get original", FlickrTouchr is trying to get a video. Currently the script does not back up video files.

Once the script gets running, you can see it create folders of images on your hard drive based on your Flickr set names as it goes. If a photo isn't in any set, it gets saved in a folder called "No Set."

If you schedule this script to run on a weekly basis as Dan suggests, it will simply update the photos that don't already exist in your backup. Just the other day I was complaining about how non Flickr Pro users lose access to photos beyond the latest 200; this is a good way to ensure the full-size image files don't get lost in the ether once they're past that number.

Backing up Flickr [Hivelogic]

When you search for photos by keyword on Flickr, you get a grid of thumbnails, each of which pops up full-sized versions in-page. (No more having to click to a new page to see what the image looks like close up and other stats.) You can set how big the thumbnails should be, and also sort results by Flickr's magical (and very useful) "Interestingness" rank.

To find Creative Commons-licensed photos only you still have to click on the "Advanced Search" link; but you can bypass that step with a little URL hacking. Append &l=cc to your search keyword shortcut to limit Flickr results to re-publishable images. Firefox keyword bookmark users: the full Flickr CC image search bookmark URL should be http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=%s&l=cc. (Use &l=commderiv for images licensed for commercial use and derivative works.)

When I need to find quality photos that are licensed for reuse in my own work, I hit up EveryStockPhoto (which includes Flickr photos) and Flickr itself--and almost always find what I need without even touching Google Images.

New Flickr Search [Flickr Blog]