Lightroom 3 organzing question

RebeccaAPhotography · Feb 15, 2012

So I just wanna start out with................. MY LAPTOP IS FINALLY BACK!!!!!!!

So I'm using lightroom 3 to import all photos off my camera and memory cards. Is there a simple way of organzing them thru Lightroom. Right now it is all done by date but I'm a little more anal then that. I want to be more descriptive.... Exp: New Years Eve photos, Christmas Photos, Fun times with sister and son at park photos.... some of these which were on more than one day taken. Do yal get what I'm trying to say lol

Thanks guys! IM BACK!

Robin Usagani · Feb 15, 2012

You can add tags, or you can do collection.

DigDoug90 · Feb 15, 2012

Yes I've had better luck with tagging as well...

RebeccaAPhotography · Feb 15, 2012

ok another dumb question how do you add tags?

Big Mike · Feb 15, 2012

The beauty of lightroom, is that you can sort & organize the images without having to actually move the files around.

You should still have a file structure though, so your current 'by date' is just fine.
Once you have imported them all (or during the import), you can add tags, ratings, colors or keywords to the photos. I find it easy to do in bulk, just select a bunch of images with a similar theme and put in the keyword you want. Repeat as needed. Then you can sort/filter your catalog to get the photos you want, without having to move or copy your image files from their structure.

Further to that, you can create 'collections'. Select a bunch of images (easy after filtering) and click to create a new collection. The images aren't copied, just cross referenced. You can even create smart collections that will automatically grab images that meed the criteria you set...including future images you import and label.

Big Mike · Feb 15, 2012

Tags = keywords. In the library module, it's on the right hand side.

Robin Usagani · Feb 15, 2012

under library.. should be on the right somewhere.

Tagging is messier. You can put whatever tag on a photo. For example if you took a photo of me.. you can tag that photo as:

awesome, handsome, sexy, dreamy, asian

Then when you search a tag for dreamy, you will see photo of me along with photos of Brad Pitt and Tim Tebow

A collection is almost like a virtual folder. You can have a collection called "FAVORITE WEDDING PHOTOS". Then every time you see one you really like, just add to that collection.

RebeccaAPhotography · Feb 15, 2012

Thanks guys for the help! Greatly appreciated

RebeccaAPhotography · Feb 15, 2012

Saw I were to look thru my photos in windows viewer. It won't show that orginization tho would it?

Robin Usagani · Feb 15, 2012

Nope. But if you send the raw file to someone else, they will see the tag on their Lightroom.

RebeccaAPhotography said:
Saw I were to look thru my photos in windows viewer. It won't show that orginization tho would it?

KmH · Feb 15, 2012

The key to using Lightroom effectively is in keywording your images and putting them into collections. Collections are virtual folders.

None of your photos are actually uploaded to Lightroom. The folderrs stay in the regular folder structure on your computer.

Another key to using Lightroom effectively is to put all of your images into a single catalog (folder) arrange into collections, because Lightroom can only search 1 catalog at a time, one of Lightroom's biggest problems.

Lightroom is database mangement software first, and it's image editing function is in about 8th place.

I highly recommend The DAM Book: Digital Asset Management for Photographers if you want to learn how manage your photos in a way that makes them easily retrievable.

RebeccaAPhotography · Feb 15, 2012

KmH said:
The key to using Lightroom effectively is in keywording your images and putting them into collections. Collections are virtual folders.

None of your photos are actually uploaded to Lightroom. The folderrs stay in the regular folder structure on your computer.

Another key to using Lightroom effectively is to put all of your images into a single catalog (folder) arrange into collections, because Lightroom can only search 1 catalog at a time, one of Lightroom's biggest problems.

Lightroom is database mangement software first, and it's image editing function is in about 8th place.

I highly recommend The DAM Book: Digital Asset Management for Photographers if you want to learn how manage your photos in a way that makes them easily retrievable.

Thanks I'll get that book. I do want to be able to just look thru easily and organize easily. I did just make a whole bunch of collections with the 3 months of photos I had stored. They're all raw anyways so its not like my windows viewer can look at them. lol