Tips about keywording wanted

  • Thread starter Thread starter svenh
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
S

svenh

Guest
As a happy new owner of lightroom, I am now facing the task of incorporating my photo collection (a couple of thousands) into the LR catalog. Since this may take some time, I would like a good strategy before I start.

I will not reprocess my existing photos, but I would like to assign keywords to be able to find certain photos easier in the future.

* Do you have any general tips? What do I want to know before starting?
* Are there any online tutorials about keywording?
* Ways to build a keyword list?
* What keywords to pick?
* How to get an efficient workflow in LR for tagging lots of photos?
* And maybe the most important question of them all, how flexible/reconfigureable is it? If I have built a hierarchy of keywords and applied keywords to lots of photos, what if I change my mind in any way? E.g. changing a keyword from "Landscape" to "Landscapes" or moving the keyword "Trees" from the parent category "Landscapes" to another parent category "Objects" - I guess I can do this for all photos batchwise, or will I have to revisit every single photo?

Best regards,
/Sven
 
Sort by date Sort by votes
svenh said:
...
* And maybe the most important question of them all, how flexible/reconfigureable is it? If I have built a hierarchy of keywords and applied keywords to lots of photos, what if I change my mind in any way? E.g. changing a keyword from "Landscape" to "Landscapes" or moving the keyword "Trees" from the parent category "Landscapes" to another parent category "Objects" - I guess I can do this for all photos batchwise, or will I have to revisit every single photo?

Best regards,
/Sven
Click to expand...
I will let your previous points for others to comment but I can tell you that those changes are quite easy in Lightroom!

For "Landscapes", just rename the keyword to "Landscape" and it will be renamed on all photos containing "Landscapes" even if you do not see those on screen at the moment.

To move "Trees", no need for a chainsaw ;), just drag it in another branch of your keyword structure and all concerned images will act accordingly.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
When I have a large batch to keyword, I rarely get to do it all in one go. Instead, I mark them with a @Working keyword. I could use the 'not keyworded' smart collection, but that would only show up ones that I haven't done anything - not ones I'm part way through doing.

Next I tend to use the Painter tool set to 'Mother' and skim through looking for all of the pictures of Mother and a quick click (or click and drag for multiple) applies that keyword. Then I'll repeat with 'Father', 'William' etc. Once I'm done with the most frequent keywords, then I'll skip through and add any extras to individual images. Personally I find that quicker than keywording individually.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Victoria Bampton;467'1 said:
When I have a large batch to keyword, I rarely get to do it all in one go. Instead, I mark them with a @Working keyword. I could use the 'not keyworded' smart collection, but that would only show up ones that I haven't done anything - not ones I'm part way through doing.
Click to expand...
Nice tip! I like it :D

Next I tend to use the Painter tool set to 'Mother' and skim through looking for all of the pictures of Mother and a quick click (or click and drag for multiple) applies that keyword. Then I'll repeat with 'Father', 'William' etc. Once I'm done with the most frequent keywords, then I'll skip through and add any extras to individual images. Personally I find that quicker than keywording individually.
Click to expand...
That is my way too! And if all images are about the same topic as "Wedding" or "Football", I add those in the "Import" dialog box at its bottom...
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top