3 Newbie questions - Painter Tool, Keyword Hierachy, Smart Collections

[MDomino]

Hello everyone!

I'm new to Lightroom but quite excited about it since I started using it. I have a few questions though:

1.) The Painter Tool - Is there any way, whilst using the painter tool, to temporarily go into loupe view with just one keystroke? That would be really helpful if the thumbnails in the gridview are to small to see if a certain person is in the picture. At the moment the fastest way I see is right clicking and then "Open in Loupe", then pressing Esc. But it would be way faster if there is a key that you just press for a second or so and it goes into loupe view of the picture you're hovering your mouse over and once you let go, it automatically goes back to grid view and you keep on painting. Is there such a thing?

2.) Is there a way to use the painter tool in loupe view? I think it would be faster sometimes to jump from picture to picture in loupe view and with a click to assign a keyword. But whenever I go into loupe view I can't use the painter tool anymore.

3.) There is one thing with hierachical keywords that confuses me: I have a keyword tag "person". And within this keyword tag I have several sub-keyword tags with the names of certain persons, like "Andy", "Angela" and so on. Now if I tag a picture showing Andy with "Andy" I would expect it to also being tagged with "person". I mean if Andy is part of "person", he also must be a person, correct?
However this doesn't happen...
BUT: If I then go to the Library Filter tab and select "person" in the hierachical view then it shows me also automatically all pictures of Andy. Which is kind of what I want sorting wise.
So my question about this would be: How do other people do this? Would you tag Andy just with "Andy" and depend on the hierachical Library Filter or would you tag him "Andy" and "person"? What would be the advantages and disadvantages or even pitfalls of either method?

4.) I have a keyword "Several People" which I would like to use for pictures that show more than one person on them. Is there a way to create a smart collection that checks if there is more than one keyword from my person keywords assigned to it. For example if it discovers the keywords "Andy" and "Angela" both on the picture it will add it, if it only discovers "Andy", it will not add it. And of course this needs to work with all different persons, not just with Andy and Angela. I believe it's not possible, but maybe someone has an idea how to solve this.

Would be great if someone could help me.
Thank you very much!

MD

 

[Gene McCullagh]

Hi MD! Welcome to the forums!

When using the painter tool you can switch out to loupe view by pressing E switch back to grid by pressing G. It's not one keystroke but it's pretty close. The painter tool will be active in grid mode but not loupe mode. Unfortunately it won't be a loupe view of the image you are hovering over. My suggestion for your first two questions is to go into grid view and increase the size of the thumbnails so you can see what's going on in order to apply the painter tool.

If you change your view in the Keywording panel to Keywords & Containing Keywords then you will see "person" on your "Andy" tagged images. Personally, I would just tag with "Andy" and let the hierarchy do its work. But that's a workflow decision you need to make. One pitfall to this is that "person" might not get written out to your image depending on your settings and what operation you are doing (save metadata, export, etc.)

I don't have an immediate answer to #4 and will need to think about it some more.

 

[MDomino]

Hi Gene! Thank you for your answers!

The E/G workaround wouldn't work for me since it - as you already said - doesn't work with the image that you are hovering over. I think for the moment I will have to live with the right clicking method.
But I find it strange, it seems like such an obvious workflow to me that I would expect it being a function in Lightroom. I think I will write a feature request to Adobe.

[quote author=Gene McCullagh link=topic=7627.msg522'8#msg522'8 date=1251198'41]If you change your view in the Keywording panel to Keywords & Containing Keywords then you will see "person" on your "Andy" tagged images.[/quote]

Ah, nice. Didn't know that. I think I will just tag it "Andy" then. If I ever need to tag it with "person", too, it will be easy enough.

So, thank you again for your answers, looks like I'm going to write a feature request. And if anybody knows an answer to #4, please let me know.

MD

 

[erro]

When you tag the image with "Andy" it automatically also gets tagget with "people". Wheter you actually see "people" depends on how the keywording panel is set up as Gene said.

Child-keywords always get their parent keywords as well (at least that's my understanding).

You can also edit the different keywords (in different levels of hierarchy) and specify wheter they will be exported or not. But whatever you specify, all keywords associated with an image will always be there, inside Lightroom.

 

[erro]

By the way, #4 is something I'd really like also. Smart collections could be made so much smarter with some additional logic and functionality.

 

[Sean McCormack]

I'm actually kind of upset with #1 because there is a menu item 'Toggle Loupe View'. And I seem to remember that it had a shortcut too: ~ Alas it no longer works, so I'm mildly annoyed at its disappearance.

 

[MDomino]

[quote author=erro link=topic=7627.msg52219#msg52219 date=12512194'5]Child-keywords always get their parent keywords as well (at least that's my understanding).[/quote]

I'm not quite sure if they "get" them, since in the keyword lists the main keywords have no checkmark when you tag the photo with their sub-keyword. But you can specifically check them and only then they appear in the keyword filter if it's set to flat.

But it doesn't really matter to me now, since they always appear in the keyword filter when it's set to hierarchical and also if you select "Keywords & Containing Keywords". That's good enough for me.

I just sent two feature requests to Adobe, for #1 and #4.

Thank you again everybody for your thoughts!

MD

 

[Gene McCullagh]

Hey MD!

In thinking about this I have a suggestion that might be more practical for you. The painter tool is really meant to "spray on" settings or keywords. While it can be used image by image it works better on multiple images.

So, anyway, you can set up your keyword shortcut (under the Metadata menu or by pressing Option-Shift-Command-K or Alt-Shift-Ctrl-K. Set up your keywords there (andy, family, vacation, etc.). You can enter more than one keyword (the same way you would load up the painter tool). Select the first image in the grid and switch to loupe view. Now, whenever the image needs those keywords press Shift-K and those keywords will be applied. Move to the next image with the right arrow.

Now you can work your way through pressing right arrow, shift-K, right arrow, shift-K, and so on. If the image doesn't get the keywords just press right arrow to skip it.

That should give you loupe view and relatively easy keyboard control to do what you want. I hope that helps!

 

[Gene McCullagh]

Oh, one more thing. If the keywords have been applied by mistake pressing Shift-K a second time removes them. In the same way the painter tool becomes an eraser when the setting has already been applied.

 

[Victoria Bampton]

[quote author=MDomino link=topic=7627.msg522'2#msg522'2 date=1251192344]
1.) The Painter Tool - Is there any way, whilst using the painter tool, to temporarily go into loupe view with just one keystroke? That would be really helpful if the thumbnails in the gridview are to small to see if a certain person is in the picture. At the moment the fastest way I see is right clicking and then "Open in Loupe", then pressing Esc. But it would be way faster if there is a key that you just press for a second or so and it goes into loupe view of the picture you're hovering your mouse over and once you let go, it automatically goes back to grid view and you keep on painting. Is there such a thing?
[/quote]

Welcome aboard!

I'd take a slightly different tack on this - I'd open the second window either on the same screen or on a second screen, and set it to Live Loupe - that way any image you float over will show a large view in the second window without having to press anything.

 

[Denis Pagé]

[quote author=Gene McCullagh link=topic=7627.msg52239#msg52239 date=1251246143]
...That should give you loupe view and relatively easy keyboard control to do what you want. I hope that helps!
[/quote]
Gene! You should really turn these two posts into a Tip & Trick entry!
-> "Keywording in loupe view on single monitor"

 

[MDomino]

[quote author=Victoria Bampton link=topic=7627.msg52283#msg52283 date=12512879'8]Welcome aboard!
I'd take a slightly different tack on this - I'd open the second window either on the same screen or on a second screen, and set it to Live Loupe - that way any image you float over will show a large view in the second window without having to press anything.
[/quote]

Cool, I didn't know that. At the moment I am still working on a 15" screen, so that doesn't really work at all, but my brand new 24" screen should arrive any day now.
I will test it then.

Thank you, Victoria.

MD

Edit: It just arrived... WOW! It's huge.
So the workflow you suggested works like a charm. I will stick with this then. Thank you again.

 

[Gene McCullagh]

[quote author=Denis Pagé link=topic=7627.msg52293#msg52293 date=1251294753]

Gene! You should really turn these two posts into a Tip & Trick entry!
-> "Keywording in loupe view on single monitor"

[/quote]

Good idea, Denis! It's now a Tips and Tricks post!

 

[Denis Pagé]

Nice Gene! Thanks. This is all those little things that makes the T&T a great place to visit...