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Author Topic: Lightroom and DAM  (Read 28949 times)

Bob Rockefeller

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #40 on: August 09, 2014, 04:19:48 pm »

I guess I'm still confused.

Say I import a group of images taken over several days. During the import step I let Lightroom put each image in the correct folders-by-date folder. Good.

Now I'm ready to edit and adjust those images. As long as they're still in the recent import collection I'm good.

But what do you guys do if you haven't yet finished editing and adjusting that set of imported images and have another set to import? How do you get back to the first set of imported images so that you can finish editing and adjusting them? They're all over in various folders now.

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digitaldog

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #41 on: August 09, 2014, 04:22:40 pm »

A dog folder can get just as bad. You shoot a some dogs, they get added to dog folder. People like your dog shots you do some more and add them to dog folder then you get a name for being a dog photographer and that's your business. Can't keep all those doggie pics in one folder. Now if you organise location or dogs by smart collections this can grow/become more complex as you go along and images automatically get added to smart collections even if all you did was add a description such as Mumbles Castle/Labrador Puppy to the folder description. Do this with actual physical folders and you are simply digging a hole for yourself.
I think you're taking the folder structure idea too literally. There needs to be a balance between one folder where all images go as proposed by Kelby (and yes, I think that's what he proposes and the majority of his audience will read it that way) and hundreds or thousands of folders. And it doesn't matter as long as it makes sense to you. One could create hundreds of folders and subfolders to the point it would confuse them which means, too many folders. Let's take your example above in my usage of folders which is unique solely to me. I have thousands of photo's of dogs, most mine over the years. They are all keyworded with the dog's names. In fact I have a smart collection that does nothing more than to find images without keywords, that's important data to apply to the images. I have a folder called Santa Fe which is based on that location. I have dogs shot in Santa Fe but they don't go into that folder because IF I were looking for dog images outside the DAM, I know that's where I'd search for them (the Dog folder). It isn't necessary to have Dogs shot in Santa Fe in both folders even with an alias. I know that if I want to find dogs, they are in the dog folder. If you take the folder creation too literally such it confuses you where to look outside the DAM, the organization system is broken, it's too complex.

There is a reason we have keywords, pick flags, star ratings and all kinds of other metadata fields we can use to find images inside the DAM. The idea of using folders is to avoid the one folder for all images but at the same time, avoid so many folders it is a nightmare to understand. All one needs to do is come up with a system that makes sense to them. My folder structure makes perfect sense to me, I could have a Dog plus Santa Fe plus dog name keyword all in one image, I don't have to duplicate anything like that for the folder structure.

An organized folder structure isn't supposed to be a foolproof DAM  bypass. It's supposed to be a method whereby if you have to find images outside the DAM, it's easier than one big folder with all images. Or three (Person/Place/Thing). But it isn't a system for finding any and all images solely by virtue of the folder name. If you have 1000 dog images in the dog folder and get a cat, nothing stops you from either creating a Cat subfolder OR just renaming the folder Dog and Cat. But you'd be pretty sure the new cat images were not in the folder called Sydney or Epson Print Academy or even Santa Fe. And that alone is kind of useful. At least to me.

In the end, one folder, 59 folders, 5890 folders, it's up to you. If it makes sense, if you can find your images, doesn't matter.
« Last Edit: August 09, 2014, 04:47:42 pm by digitaldog »
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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #42 on: August 09, 2014, 04:49:27 pm »

So rather than just Swansea, folders may now be
Swansea
 -City Centre
    -Grand Theatre
      -Exteriors
      -Interiors 
    -Oxford Street
    -Swansea Market
- Docks
  -West Dock
  -King's Dock
 -Kilvay Hill
 -Mumbles
  -Mumbles Castle
  -Mumbles Seafront
Or just use those as keywords, stick with one folder called Swansea. Or both. Whatever works for you.
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Bob Rockefeller

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #43 on: August 09, 2014, 04:54:05 pm »

Or just use those as keywords, stick with one folder called Swansea. Or both. Whatever works for you.

That's what I do. One big Swansea folder with images having either keywords and/or the IPTC location field to differentiate them. If I shot a dog picture there, I'd have an image with a dog keyword.

Works for me.
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digitaldog

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #44 on: August 09, 2014, 04:59:28 pm »

That's what I do. One big Swansea folder with images having either keywords and/or the IPTC location field to differentiate them. If I shot a dog picture there, I'd have an image with a dog keyword.
Works for me.
Me too. I think you're on the right track. But hearing how others work is useful, much like reading Peter's book. Think about how you and others might organizes your paper files. Some might have one big folder called "Household" while other's may have folders called Utilities, while other's still would have Water, Electricity, Garbage collection and so on separated or in a larger folder called Household. There's no right answer for everyone. I'd be hard pressed to suggest every piece of paper you have to file goes into a single folder called Paperwork. But heck, you could do that. And I think having a separate folder for each month for the electric bill is overkill but heck, if it works for you, why not. 
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john beardsworth

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #45 on: August 09, 2014, 04:59:48 pm »

Now I'm ready to edit and adjust those images. As long as they're still in the recent import collection I'm good.

But what do you guys do if you haven't yet finished editing and adjusting that set of imported images and have another set to import? How do you get back to the first set of imported images so that you can finish editing and adjusting them? They're all over in various folders now.

The recent import collection is useless if you import more pictures, which happens. But these new pictures aren't scattered into various folders. They're in a few dated folders which would be neighbours, or they could be tracked by a smart collection listing images shot in the last x days or are in my current work collection.
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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #46 on: August 09, 2014, 05:03:18 pm »

Recent Import would be more useful if it had a history. But it isn't useless otherwise, I use it all the time.
If I have to import a lot of data, what I do is copy all images from all the cards to the folder I want and then conduct a single Import. It's faster, it keeps the Recent Import tacking all those images.
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Bob Rockefeller

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #47 on: August 09, 2014, 05:18:24 pm »

The recent import collection is useless if you import more pictures, which happens. But these new pictures aren't scattered into various folders. They're in a few dated folders which would be neighbours, or they could be tracked by a smart collection listing images shot in the last x days or are in my current work collection.

True enough, but they could be mixed in those adjacent folders with previously imported pictures that happen to have been taken on the same day.

A work collection is a good idea. Just drag from the recent import collection to the work collection before importing more images. But then you're stuck working in a collection for image editing; it's such a pain to delete a file from the disk when you're working in a collection.
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JeanMichel

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #48 on: August 09, 2014, 06:02:11 pm »

There is no need to complicate things. Lightroom keeps things easily organized, and the same structure can be used with a program such as Bridge. For example:
I keep my job and personal files separate, so when I import images made for a Job, they get imported (using a preset for ease of use) into a particular Drive and into a particular Client folder; within the Client folder there usually is a particular Job title folder, the import then creates a "yyyy_mm_dd" folder inside. Having created the structure inside LR, it can be used in Bridge or the Finder. I can also include non-image files (InDesign , Word, etc, that pertain to the 'ABC job' folder, those will not show up un LR but will in Bridge or Finder. the Best of all worlds. It looks something like this:
Job Drive
--Acme Co
----ABC job
-----2014-08-09

For my personal work, it goes:
Image Drive
--Leica downloads
----2014
-----2014-08-09

Should there be both job and personal images on a card, it simply means checking and importing one set, say to my Leica or Canon folders; and then importing the job images; LR can be set not to import images that were already imported.

Renaming files to something like: '2014_08_09_location_project_001' or such is also useful.

Keywording is really the key for retrieving all your "baby blue" 'chevy" images regardless of the multiple Drives or Folders they might be saved in.

As I mentioned in my earlier post, get a copy of the Where are my files tutorial; Seth Resnick's explanations are much more detailed and better than mine.

Jean-Michel

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jjj

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #49 on: August 09, 2014, 06:17:29 pm »

I guess I'm still confused.

Say I import a group of images taken over several days. During the import step I let Lightroom put each image in the correct folders-by-date folder. Good.

Now I'm ready to edit and adjust those images. As long as they're still in the recent import collection I'm good.

But what do you guys do if you haven't yet finished editing and adjusting that set of imported images and have another set to import? How do you get back to the first set of imported images so that you can finish editing and adjusting them? They're all over in various folders now.
No they are in tidy, dated folders. Which can be easily found as they are....dated.  :) Look in your Folder panel [left hand side in Library module] where all your folders that have been imported can be found. Any hard drives greyed out are not currently connected, but if you have generated 'smart previews' you will still be able to work on them even though they are offline.

Each year in Finder or Explorer I make a new folder for say 2014 and then add the 12 month folders for that year.
On import I get LR to import to the current month, currently 2014-08-August see 'Destination' screengrab from import dialogue. This screengrab is an import from iPhone so covers several days of the last week whilst I was off visiting my Mum back home, the imported shots are in the folders with no description and the tick mark/numbers.
In the second screengrab from within LR's Library module you can see those imported folders, which now have a description in their name.
All the shots from 2014-08-07 folder were added to the '2014-08-07 Road Laying' folder as they were also of that subject.
« Last Edit: August 09, 2014, 06:21:42 pm by jjj »
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jjj

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #50 on: August 09, 2014, 06:49:50 pm »

Or just use those as keywords, stick with one folder called Swansea. Or both. Whatever works for you.
I think you are missing the point with regard to what I'm saying where physical folders that are organised by subject where circumstance change and thus outgrow your original organising idea.
Photos of your own dogs is quite manageable by your system, but if you became a pro shooter of dogs then suddenly all dog photos in one place would be a bit like the Kelby suggestion you do not like. Having your primary organisation done in a way where you would never need to redo it such as dates is better than one such as subject where it could become unwieldy. Metadata is much better for organising subjects. As illustrated by this reply.

One big Swansea folder with images having either keywords and/or the IPTC location field to differentiate them. If I shot a dog picture there, I'd have an image with a dog keyword.Works for me.
But if you have a physical folder dedicated to dogs as well as one dedicated to places then where do you put the dog photo? Organise physical folders by dates and then use metadata to do the subject organising as a lot of images can be of many subjects. For example - a photo of your pet dog with your girlfriend in Swansea, so is the picture in the Swansea folder, a dog folder or girlfriend folder? Dated folders make for less work and no need to worry where things go when importing. Add keywords at your leisure which can then feed into smart collections.

I originally used to do folders by subject myself, but realised how terribly limiting and time consuming it was and moved to date folders+metadata. I do however still have subject folders for one set of images. Ones in my 'information' folder which are photos to remind me of something to buy or an idea for the house renovation. These are mostly disposable images that only need to be in that one place, kind of like a pin board. There are a bunch of subfolders so I can quickly look at a subject or add to a folder. I think of them as visual notes rather than photos.
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Bob Rockefeller

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #51 on: August 09, 2014, 06:56:57 pm »

For example - a photo of your pet dog with your girlfriend in Swansea, so is the picture in the Swansea folder, a dog folder or girlfriend folder?

I've explained this. My folder system is by location; not by subject.

So the example picture goes in the Swansea folder. It gets the appropriate IPTC location data. And it gets the keywords dog, perhaps breed of dog, name of dog (if I know it), girlfriend's name and maybe others. Simple. Works for me.

If folders-by-date works for you, use that.
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jjj

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #52 on: August 09, 2014, 06:57:44 pm »

True enough, but they could be mixed in those adjacent folders with previously imported pictures that happen to have been taken on the same day.
Not if you've added a description to folder name.   ;D

Quote
A work collection is a good idea. Just drag from the recent import collection to the work collection before importing more images. But then you're stuck working in a collection for image editing; it's such a pain to delete a file from the disk when you're working in a collection.
Use folders then, much easier.
Otherwise 'Alt click/Go to folder in Library' and delete from there or use the shortcut/method mentioned here
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jjj

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #53 on: August 09, 2014, 06:59:48 pm »

I've explained this. My folder system is by location; not by subject.
Location is subject organising. It does not just mean person or creature in photo.
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Bob Rockefeller

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #54 on: August 09, 2014, 07:02:50 pm »

Not if you've added a description to folder name.   ;D
Use folders then, much easier.
Otherwise 'Alt click/Go to folder in Library' and delete from there or use the shortcut/method mentioned here

I get the date part; I don't get the description part. What is the description? Location, subject, or what?
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Bob Rockefeller

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #55 on: August 09, 2014, 07:05:28 pm »

Location is subject organising. It does not just mean person or creature in photo.

Not true. Location is not the location necessarily shown in the picture (subject), it's where I was when I took the picture. It's unique and objective. It's not a picture of Swansea, it's a picture taken while I was in Swansea.
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jjj

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #56 on: August 09, 2014, 07:11:55 pm »

I get the date part; I don't get the description part. What is the description? Location, subject, or what?
The description is whatever makes sense to describe the photos in that folder to you.
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Bob Rockefeller

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #57 on: August 09, 2014, 07:19:14 pm »

The description is whatever makes sense to describe the photos in that folder to you.

OK, I'm with you. Mechanically, how do you do that? Lightroom's import function will create the folders-by-date arrangement "automatically" and that would seem to be a good reason to consider using such a structure. But you must have to create the folders and then direct the imports into those folders?
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Tony Jay

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #58 on: August 09, 2014, 07:25:33 pm »

This thread continues to throw up interesting issues.

Ultimately, no matter how good we are using the Develop module and the various output modules, it is the Library module, and by extension the import dialog that really determines how usable Lightroom is to us.
Unfortunately, as our image collections become larger so any flaws in our workflow become more acute.
So, having a really efficient, usable, and relevant workflow to suit the brand of photography we do is really important.

A good way to experiment with workflow ideas is to create a test catalog where various import presets, file renaming presets, and even develop presets can get a run in a non-demand scenario where getting it wrong does not matter. Keywording hierarchies and keywording strategies can also be developed
Even experimenting with small numbers of images (10) can be very valuable.

So, if you do need to alter your workflow, doing this in your main catalog is a daunting exercise - don't do it.
Instead, experiment in your test catalog, fine tune your workflow, and when you are confident in what needs to be done only then start implementing the changes in your main catalog.

Lightroom, despite some weaknesses, is actually a very well designed application that can be integrated into the DAM strategies of a wide variety of photographic enterprise.

Tony Jay
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jjj

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Re: Lightroom and DAM
« Reply #59 on: August 09, 2014, 07:35:25 pm »

OK, I'm with you. Mechanically, how do you do that? Lightroom's import function will create the folders-by-date arrangement "automatically" and that would seem to be a good reason to consider using such a structure. But you must have to create the folders and then direct the imports into those folders?
Let LR import the automatically dated folders and then right click and rename them once in Library module.
Or you can select a subset of images you want to be in a different folder and make a new folder by clicking on whichever folder you want images to be in  and name them with Same Date-different description.
As I mentioned above at beginning of year I create a year folder and folders for each of the 12 months to go in that. Then import images to the appropriate month as the year progresses. Also worth noting is that you can manually drag folders or images around in LR and they will move on the hard drive(s) to reflect that - that's when moving in 'Folder' panel not in collections as they are virtual. Move a folder from Hard Drive 1 to Hard Drive 2 will copy off HD1 and then LR will delete from HD1 when all files are moved.


Not true. Location is not the location necessarily shown in the picture (subject), it's where I was when I took the picture. It's unique and objective. It's not a picture of Swansea, it's a picture taken while I was in Swansea.
But where in Swansea? It covers a big area, so not that unique. Were you in the Mumbles, Townhill, Waunarlwydd  or maybe the city centre or a particular place in the Mumbles. Also does The Gower count as Swansea or even the Mumbles come to that? Mumbles has a Swansea postcode but is the other side of the bay from the city itself and is most certainly a physically separate entity.
Plus if you go there a lot you may end up with tens of thousands of photos in one folder.
Pic below is a snap from iPhone taken in part of Mumbles called Southend but looking towards Swansea across the bay, so a single folder location to sort it by isn't that unique or obvious to me and that's where I grew up.  :o
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