backing up iphoto library

first of all, i'm sorry if this is the wrong place to ask this.

anyway, i just bought myself an external harddrive today. i plan on buying leopard at some point this evening (i have a 17 inch macbook pro that i purchased last august) and i just wanted to do the smart thing and back everything up before i installed it. i have also heard that installing leopard can wipe everything off your harddrive.
i started backing up my iphoto library and it said it would take over 11 hours to put on the external harddrive. i'm a photographer so i have A LOT of pictures..about 30+ gigs worth. but i can't wait around 11 hours.
is there a faster way to back up my photos? i was thinking of putting each event in one folder, archiving it, and putting it on my external hard-drive that way. but that would probably take just as long.
so is there an easier way to do this? i have a 6 year old g4 power mac (the wind tunnel) would it be faster to do that firewire thing and hook up my laptop to that comp and back up my pics that way? OR should i just cross my fingers and install leopard and back up my pics after?

thanks in advance, and one again i apologize if this is the wrong place to post this question.

It's being estimated at 11 hours......odds are it will take less. Sometimes you just have to suck it up and be patient. Start it backing up before you go to bed and in the morning it should be done.

Definitely backup your information before doing an OS install.