best photo management practices?

[ian_dunross]

<p>I have a very large photo library (about 42,000 photos). Here is how I currently manage it:<br>

First, there are the top level folders by year:<br>

2001<br />2002<br />2003<br />…<br />…<br>

Then, there are events folders. The device used is indicated in the (brackets):<br>

2012:<br /> 2012-05-16 Hawaii (Camera)<br /> 2012-08-17 BBQ (iPhone)<br /> 2012-11-29 Birthday Party (Camcorder)<br>

The problem thatI'm getting too many events in a year: I can have upwards of 20 events folders in a year. This is making getting to my pictures very difficult. The photos feel isolated and balkanized.<br>

I want to find a way to manage my photos so that they naturally flow from one to the other. I want to be able to easy find an event, but also to be able to view photos around that event easily.<br>

What is the best way to organize my photos? Should I use some kind of software?</p>

 

[JosvanEekelen]

<p>Tagging is the keyword here. Your way of organising files is about the same as mine. I don't know of a better way of organising your files in order to keep track.<br>

Adobe Lightroom ($) and Google Picasa (free) will do the job. The not so good news is that you will have to tag 42k pictures.<br>

<a href="/beginner-photography-questions-forum/00bd42?unified_p=1">http://www.photo.net/beginner-photography-questions-forum/00bd42?unified_p=1</a> is a recent thread with a few more suggestions.</p>

[marc_rochkind]

<p>There are two basic ways to organize photos (or any other digital assets):<br /> 1. Physical, which is what you are doing. The actual location is also the primary organization.<br /> 2. Logical. The physical location can be anything you like, but you access photos via a database that is managed by an application. Lightroom and Aperture work this way. The photos themselves don't go into the database; they can stay where they are.<br /> The logical approach is much more flexible, offering keywords, collections (the same photo can be in multiple collections), virtual collecitions (membership based on criteria you set), as well as access to the physical layout.<br /> Lightroom and Aperture have other features, too, such as the ability to process photos, print them, export them to web sites, etc., etc.<br /> My recommendation: Do it the logical way.<br /> "The DAM Book" by Peter Krogh is an excellent treatment of this subject.</p>

[digitaldog]

<blockquote>

<p>"The DAM Book" by Peter Krogh is an excellent treatment of this subject.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Agreed! Get Peter's book, read it and pick the bits that make sense to you in terms of an organizing strategy. Cherry pick those parts that work as would work. </p>

[ellis_vener_photography]

Agree completely with Marc and Andrew in their recommendation of "The DAM Book."

[Ian Taylor]

<p>I just use Aperture to organize my last eight years of digital images. I use filename close to what you are doing YYMMDD, and a project name. That way they all line up neatly by date. <br /> I keep them all in the database, rather than remotely. I have one Aperture library per year.<br /> I shoot 100-150 freelance jobs per year and find this the easiest method for me.<br /> I should also probably read that book, it gets mentioned a lot.</p>

[carbon_dragon]

<p>I'm just an amateur but have a lot of pictures. I evaluated Lightroom (as a long time Photoshop user) and Aperture (as a long time Mac user) and selected Aperture for price and thought the features were similar.</p>

<p>In retrospect, with Adobe's latest move into the cloud leaving all of us upgraders of Photoshop in the lurch, I'm glad I went with Aperture. I do it much as shown above. I organize it by year and by event. I like the idea of the tags though. So far I'm OK, but the number of shots I have tells me I need to reconsider the organization.</p>

[keith reeder]

<blockquote>

<p>In retrospect, with Adobe's latest move into the cloud leaving all of us upgraders of Photoshop in the lurch, I'm glad I went with Aperture.</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>Why? Lr isn't going to Creative Cloud. </p>

[GBarrington]

<p>ACDSee Pro 6 has an interesting calendar feature. It can show you a calendar and highlight those days on which you have photos that were take. Clicking on that day in the calendar displays the photos taken on that day. It can also handle geo tagging as well, showing you photos that were taken in a given location.</p>