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Adobe Sensei, automatically tags your photos

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Didi

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Hi, autotagging is a long awaited topic.
as help search in the mobile app its nice.
But where are these tags stored? and can they also be viewed in Lightrom Classic as keywords?

thx Didi
 
This is indeed a bit confusing. The images are tagged, but not in a visible way and you don't have an interface where you could check it and make corrections. There is a keyword field where you can add your own keywords, but the automatically assigned keywords from Sensei do not appear there.

And they do not sync to Classic at all.
 
It seems wrong, then, to even call this "tagging". It's really just some kind of intelligent search, isn't it?
 
Well, there are tags applied by the AI. It's just that Adobe can see them but you can't! The search is the less intelligent element.
 
Well, there are tags applied by the AI. It's just that Adobe can see them but you can't! The search is the less intelligent element.
And exactly how does it benefit a user who can't see the tags?
 
And exactly how does it benefit a user who can't see the tags?

The auto tags are used to power the search in some unknown combination with metadata that you've entered.

My general problem with this AI search is that one has a feeling of uncertainty. Has it listed all the photos which meet your criterion? With Google search we know it can't have found everything, but it's fine when the first few results are good. When we are looking through our own photos, is it as acceptable?

There is good chance the Tags aren't even human readable so may not be much use too you anyway.

This is an extract of the tags Sensei generated for this picture. I presume the numbers are percentages of certainty, so "autumn" is a miss while "picnic" was a surprise but understandable.

7db47c768a0b48efd01e91ffbb53ee51


"autumn":62,
"picnic":61,
"boy":58,
"young":63,
"nature":58,
"people":63,
"person":55,
"elderly":55,
"outdoor":55,
"smiling":58,
"man":74,
"adult":68,
"talking":55,
"female":62,
"couple":77,
"male":59,
"son":56,
"child":59,
"beautiful":55,
"woman":69,
"worker":55,
"friends":58,
"father":58,
"outdoors":57,
"park":62,
"family":61,
"computer":57,
"happy":62,
"men":57
 
It seems wrong, then, to even call this "tagging". It's really just some kind of intelligent search, isn't it?

Your images are definitely tagged, because an intelligent search 'on the fly' would take too much time. My guess is that they are analyzed and tagged immediately upon upload, but you don't see the tags.
 
just playing aroung with the tagging and checking the syncing between CC and classic.
So Sensei is only in CC without showing the tags - @ Johan: where or how did you extract the data?
Further entered Key Words in CC won't sync with classic and the other way round the same issue.

just other metadata like the title are synced.

overall this is not really practical right now. Especially as I will probably be using both CC and classic. With Classic clearly the tool to really work on your photos... (for me anyway)
 
Keywords do not sync between LR Classic (and LRCC2015 before it) and the Adobe cloud. Never did, and I suspect never will. Which makes a workflow built around both Classic and LRCC not very viable, IMO, so curious as to how you envisage working with them both (and why?).

OTOH, Keywords WILL now sync between the Adobe Cloud end-points of LRCC and LRmobile, though at present can only be viewed in LRWeb.
 
Keywords do not sync between LR Classic (and LRCC2015 before it) and the Adobe cloud. Never did, and I suspect never will.
This appears to be incorrect (as of today?).

I have just noticed that I can now see my keywords in LRWeb, keywords which were assigned in LR 2015.12 or earlier. (I haven't upgraded to any of the new software yet.)
 
Read the last sentence of the post you quoted.
 
Read the last sentence of the post you quoted.
I did. That last sentence refers to "Adobe Cloud end-points of LRCC and LRmobile", which is different from "LR Classic (and LRCC2015 before it)". Otherwise Jim's two statements would be contradictory, which they are not. Just that the first statement seems to be incorrect.
 
I hope this helps clarify the mess..... When photos are initially synced from "Classic", keywords are read by Adobe's cloud if they have already been written into the file's internal xmp (not sidecar).

So take one raw file and one DNG/TIF/JPEG and add keywords, then save the metadata back to the files. Sync both files and you'll find that the raw file's keywords haven't synced, the DNG's have.

This is a one off thing. Subsequent keyword changes fail to sync to / from "Classic".

John
 
I hope this helps clarify the mess..... When photos are initially synced from "Classic", keywords are read by Adobe's cloud if they have already been written into the file's internal xmp (not sidecar).

So take one raw file and one DNG/TIF/JPEG and add keywords, then save the metadata back to the files. Sync both files and you'll find that the raw file's keywords haven't synced, the DNG's have.

This is a one off thing. Subsequent keyword changes fail to sync to / from "Classic".

John
John, thanks for your input. If anything I am getting more confused. I have raw files (.arw files), dng files, and tif files, ALL of which are showing keywords on LRWeb. But it turns out I also have raw files, dng files, and tif files for which keywords are NOT displayed. I don't understand the difference. And, you are (I think) saying there should be no keywords shown for any raw files, but I clearly see them on at least some of my raw file photos.

At the minimum, have we disproved the oft-repeated claim that keywords don't sync from "Classic"? You are saying they will sync under certain conditions, correct? (Even though I don't understand yet what those conditions are ... I haven't had time to experiment with new images, so far I have only been looking back at my older, already uploaded, images.)
 
At the minimum, have we disproved the oft-repeated claim that keywords don't sync from "Classic"? You are saying they will sync under certain conditions, correct? (Even though I don't understand yet what those conditions are ... I haven't had time to experiment with new images, so far I have only been looking back at my older, already uploaded, images.)
Let's clarify what we mean by "syncing". In this context I am talking about changes made in one app being applied to the same image held in a different app, and vice versa. So if an image is held in the sync ecosystem, and a change is made at one point (e.g. LRmobile), does that change then get applied to the same image as reflected in another point (e.g. LR Classic if it's sync-enabled)? Changes to Edits do, Titles do, Captions do, Keywords don't in this particular case, because keywords do not sync between the ecosystem and LR Classic. Keywords will, however, sync between e.g. LRmobile and the new LRCC, and at the moment they will appear also in LRWeb, but I don't think you can yet make keyword changes in LRWeb.

So, now that we're clear about what we mean by syncing, let's talk about the specific issue you raised, which isn't a sync issue rather an initial upload issue. I know that metadata held in XMP (either directly in DNG, Tiff, etc.) or indirectly in XMP sidecars for proprietary raws is initially read and uploaded into the ecosystem, and can be seen in any of the synced apps that can display it. Like John, I had thought this only applied (when uploading from Classic) if the XMP was embedded in the file, though I think maybe we're wrong about that. So either by design or loophole, XMP sidecar data is also read and uploaded as well. Useful to know, but also potentially useless as without the ongoing syncing of changes things could easily get out of alignment.
 
Notice that I said "are read by Adobe's cloud" and didn't use the word "sync" in that part of my sentence.

My presumption is that when "Classic" generates the smart previews for the initial upload to the cloud, it processes the original file and sends the resulting image plus any syncing metadata such as title and caption drawn from the catalogue. So when the original does contains embedded keyword data, Adobe's cloud reads it from the smart preview. But in the case of a raw file, LR never saves keywords directly inside the file. I think Adobe just forgot that smart previews inherit all (?) the metadata embedded in the original.

I agree with Jim about this loophole being potentially useless, though maybe it's worse because some people will waste time entering keywords in Mobile. It's very disappointing and I expected Adobe would have done a better job of this.

John
 
OK, slowly becoming more clear :) - thanks Jim and John. If I get any time to experiment, no doubt it will become even clearer (maybe?).
 
I hope this helps clarify the mess..... When photos are initially synced from "Classic", keywords are read by Adobe's cloud if they have already been written into the file's internal xmp (not sidecar).

So take one raw file and one DNG/TIF/JPEG and add keywords, then save the metadata back to the files. Sync both files and you'll find that the raw file's keywords haven't synced, the DNG's have.

This is a one off thing. Subsequent keyword changes fail to sync to / from "Classic".

John
I have always treated my NEFs as effectively "read only," and used sidecars (I believe invented by Adobe) to capture metadata, edit changes etc. I have never seen the need to convert the NEFs to DNGs. I know Adobe is championing the DNG format, but that does mean that they deliberately ignore the needs of people who still use NEFs and CR2s?

And a one-off sync only?

These details are very user-hostile and unintuitive. For me the list of reasons to stay with Classic just keeps getting bigger and bigger.
 
I have always treated my NEFs as effectively "read only," and used sidecars (I believe invented by Adobe) to capture metadata, edit changes etc. I have never seen the need to convert the NEFs to DNGs. I know Adobe is championing the DNG format, but that does mean that they deliberately ignore the needs of people who still use NEFs and CR2s?

And a one-off sync only?

These details are very user-hostile and unintuitive. For me the list of reasons to stay with Classic just keeps getting bigger and bigger.

This has nothing to do with DNG versus proprietary raw files. Lightroom Classic does not sync metadata like keywords. The initial upload of some metadata is a glitch, but there is no synching after that initial upload.
 
I know Adobe is championing the DNG format, but that does mean that they deliberately ignore the needs of people who still use NEFs and CR2s?

And a one-off sync only?

As I wrote before, I think it's accidental, Phil, and remember it applies to any type of file with embedded xmp - TIFs, PSDs, JPEGs. It's a case of Adobe's cloud reading the keywords which happen to be in the image, not syncing. So one-off. Practically useless.

John
 
@Johan and @johnbeardy, Thanks for correcting my misunderstanding.

But I will say this. Properly done, we should not have to be concerned about such detailed rules. As someone said in another thread, what about those non-IT background people. Shouldn't these products be "intuitive," so we can use them without consulting thick user manuals?
 
@Johan and @johnbeardy, Thanks for correcting my misunderstanding.

But I will say this. Properly done, we should not have to be concerned about such detailed rules. As someone said in another thread, what about those non-IT background people. Shouldn't these products be "intuitive," so we can use them without consulting thick user manuals?
All of this applies only if you want to attempt a combined Classic and LRCC workflow, which frankly I'd advise most people against at this stage (or at least proceed with caution). With an LRCC-only workflow (which is probably how it was intended/designed to be used), even total IT novices will be able to cope...it really is not that complicated.
 
It's more than Classic plus LRCC, Jim, because keywords are shown in LRM where they are editable, and also now in LRW. or are you meaning LRCC to include those too? Anything with a rounded icon?
 
Properly done, we should not have to be concerned about such detailed rules.
They never really intended for people to have "a foot in both camps". Used the way it was designed, it's simple.
 
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