Help me organize my photographs
January 10, 2011 5:01 AM Subscribe
Good, simple photo catalog? There have been several questions like this over the years; but they're all either too old to be of much use, or their focus is different from mine. I'm a serious amateur photographer. I have several thousand digital images, and I'm looking for software to help me organize them.
I don't need editing capabilities; I already have plenty of that. I've been using Adobe Bridge, but I absolutely hate the way it does tags. I'm playing with Picasa right now, but it seems to think that it's editing software, and gets persnickety if I edit in Photoshop or Gimp. I really just need something that will let me preview, tag and sort; and I'd like to be able to open images in various editors from the interface. Also, I need to be able to view RAW images. Is there anything out there that just does these few things, without a lot of complicating bells and whistles?
I don't need editing capabilities; I already have plenty of that. I've been using Adobe Bridge, but I absolutely hate the way it does tags. I'm playing with Picasa right now, but it seems to think that it's editing software, and gets persnickety if I edit in Photoshop or Gimp. I really just need something that will let me preview, tag and sort; and I'd like to be able to open images in various editors from the interface. Also, I need to be able to view RAW images. Is there anything out there that just does these few things, without a lot of complicating bells and whistles?
How is it being weird when you edit in Photoshop? Because for me all it did was show the old thumbnail and update at the strangest times, maybe causing it to be a bit slower then I wanted. Which I was fine with considering that I was using things that weren't meant to play nicely together.
posted by theichibun at 5:19 AM on January 10, 2011
posted by theichibun at 5:19 AM on January 10, 2011
I forgot to mention both Adobe Lighroom and Apple Aperture are available with 30 day free trials.
posted by j03 at 5:20 AM on January 10, 2011
posted by j03 at 5:20 AM on January 10, 2011
Sorry, still thinking outloud here...
I just sort of realized that I use flickr as my main photo organizing/backup tool.
I archive all the images I like from a shoot and tag and organize them into sets on flickr. If I need the RAW file, I have the file name and date it was taken and I can just dig through my hard drives with that info in hand.
While I prefer flickr for it's social aspects, there are several other similar sites that offer organization and online backup for photographers you might look into like pbase.com.
posted by j03 at 5:28 AM on January 10, 2011
I just sort of realized that I use flickr as my main photo organizing/backup tool.
I archive all the images I like from a shoot and tag and organize them into sets on flickr. If I need the RAW file, I have the file name and date it was taken and I can just dig through my hard drives with that info in hand.
While I prefer flickr for it's social aspects, there are several other similar sites that offer organization and online backup for photographers you might look into like pbase.com.
posted by j03 at 5:28 AM on January 10, 2011
I've used iView/Microsoft Expression Media for years and years and love it. It's still the fastest digital asset management software I've found. Phase One bought it earlier this year.
Honestly, it looks a little clunky because it's languished under Microsoft's stewardship, but that's ok: it was almost perfect when MS bought it a few years ago and remains almost perfect. Lots of keyboard commands, lots of tagging options, super fast interface, etc. Trial available here.
posted by pjaust at 6:07 AM on January 10, 2011
Honestly, it looks a little clunky because it's languished under Microsoft's stewardship, but that's ok: it was almost perfect when MS bought it a few years ago and remains almost perfect. Lots of keyboard commands, lots of tagging options, super fast interface, etc. Trial available here.
posted by pjaust at 6:07 AM on January 10, 2011
Aperture has a lot of its own built in editing capabilities, which have been sufficient for my needs. It also has simple "edit in ..." commands that should work with GIMP.
Aperture and Lightroom are the industry standard photo-organization software packages. I imagine that Lightroom integrates with Photoshop better.
posted by supercres at 6:08 AM on January 10, 2011
Aperture and Lightroom are the industry standard photo-organization software packages. I imagine that Lightroom integrates with Photoshop better.
posted by supercres at 6:08 AM on January 10, 2011
I haven't used it but it may be worth looking into: Digikam.
posted by JJ86 at 7:38 AM on January 10, 2011
posted by JJ86 at 7:38 AM on January 10, 2011
The guys at the local photo center told us yesterday that if you do photos, you ought to use Lightroom. They said there are alternatives, but Lightroom wins because (a) it's really good, and (b) if you can't figure something out, there are thousands of resources for it, because it's the standard.
The program ought to completely eliminate the need for Bridge or Photoshop for processing images. Unless you are actually doing image editing (that is, adding/deleting/moving pixels or creating photo-montages rather than just "developing" the RAW file) you won't need an editor. There is nothing Lightroom does than can't be done in Photoshop, except that Photoshop is designed to work with one image at one time, where Lightroom is designed to either play with a single image, or grab a batch of images and do an action on all of them at once. Also, the interface in Lightroom is cleaner and more photographer-oriented than the one in Photoshop's Camera Raw interface. Plus it plays well (automatically!) with multiple monitor setups, using the secondary display as a loupe viewer as soon as a second monitor is detected. It's great.
Confession: I have been using Picasa for years to organize files. I haven't even begun to touch what Lightroom can do. But I haven't really decided to commit to shooting RAW all the time until yesterday, while taking a course at the aforementioned photo center.
posted by caution live frogs at 8:23 AM on January 10, 2011
The program ought to completely eliminate the need for Bridge or Photoshop for processing images. Unless you are actually doing image editing (that is, adding/deleting/moving pixels or creating photo-montages rather than just "developing" the RAW file) you won't need an editor. There is nothing Lightroom does than can't be done in Photoshop, except that Photoshop is designed to work with one image at one time, where Lightroom is designed to either play with a single image, or grab a batch of images and do an action on all of them at once. Also, the interface in Lightroom is cleaner and more photographer-oriented than the one in Photoshop's Camera Raw interface. Plus it plays well (automatically!) with multiple monitor setups, using the secondary display as a loupe viewer as soon as a second monitor is detected. It's great.
Confession: I have been using Picasa for years to organize files. I haven't even begun to touch what Lightroom can do. But I haven't really decided to commit to shooting RAW all the time until yesterday, while taking a course at the aforementioned photo center.
posted by caution live frogs at 8:23 AM on January 10, 2011
Aperture is great for organization and tagging (if you like the way it works), but the editing is crap. This is because it's designed to use an outboard editor (Photoshop, of course); you can right-click on any image and do "send to editor" and it will spawn a new version of the photo and open it in Photoshop. You work in Photoshop and when you save and exit, you drop back to Aperture where your edited version is there, alongside the original. It works very well.
The program is a bit of a beast and you'll need good hardware to run it (lots and lots and lots and ohchristjustbuyitinbulk of RAM), particularly at the same time as Photoshop, but that's about the only complaint I have.
posted by Kadin2048 at 8:44 AM on January 10, 2011
The program is a bit of a beast and you'll need good hardware to run it (lots and lots and lots and ohchristjustbuyitinbulk of RAM), particularly at the same time as Photoshop, but that's about the only complaint I have.
posted by Kadin2048 at 8:44 AM on January 10, 2011
Aperture if you want tag-friendly, metadata-based management as well as professional editing capabilities. iView/Expression Media if you just need cataloging functionality.
posted by Hankins at 9:19 AM on January 10, 2011
posted by Hankins at 9:19 AM on January 10, 2011
Also - if you aren't using a Mac then Aperture is out of the running anyway. Lightroom is cross-platform; Aperture is essentially a pro version of iPhoto. It's not bad, and it's certainly cheaper than Lightroom, but if you don't like iPhoto (or are not on a Mac) then don't bother considering it.
posted by caution live frogs at 9:38 AM on January 10, 2011
posted by caution live frogs at 9:38 AM on January 10, 2011
Lightroom Lightroom Lightroom.
Adobe Lightroom was invented to solve your exact problem. As photographers moved to an all digital work-flow, they became overwhelmed with the need to manage entire shoots as entities, while Bridge was designed to manage smaller sets of files. As the CS suite evolved, Photoshop increasingly became just a bootstrap for the Camera RAW editor anyway.
Lightroom isn't an just an editor, it's a photo management system and workflow program with the Camera RAW editor the middle and a publishing/exporting module on the back-end. It also will let you edit files in Photoshop (or other editors) and keep track of your edit versions within it's own system.
Seriously, give it a try. If you have any questions let me know.
posted by volition at 2:26 PM on January 10, 2011
Adobe Lightroom was invented to solve your exact problem. As photographers moved to an all digital work-flow, they became overwhelmed with the need to manage entire shoots as entities, while Bridge was designed to manage smaller sets of files. As the CS suite evolved, Photoshop increasingly became just a bootstrap for the Camera RAW editor anyway.
Lightroom isn't an just an editor, it's a photo management system and workflow program with the Camera RAW editor the middle and a publishing/exporting module on the back-end. It also will let you edit files in Photoshop (or other editors) and keep track of your edit versions within it's own system.
Seriously, give it a try. If you have any questions let me know.
posted by volition at 2:26 PM on January 10, 2011
Response by poster: Thanks, everybody. I've downloaded evaluation copies of most of the software mentioned here, and will let you know how it turns out (and besiege you with questions, probably.)
Cheers.
posted by steambadger at 2:57 PM on January 10, 2011 [1 favorite]
Cheers.
posted by steambadger at 2:57 PM on January 10, 2011 [1 favorite]
Second and third what volition said about Lightroom. It's shaved off hours for me. Amazing at cataloging. With a simple right-click or keyboard shortcut you can export to zenfolio, flickr, istockphoto etc., edit it Photoshop. It's amazing at what it does. The catalog aspect can be a bit tricky at first to get it to organize exactly how and where you would like it to but once you figure it out it's all automatic.
posted by no bueno at 7:48 AM on January 12, 2011
posted by no bueno at 7:48 AM on January 12, 2011
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by j03 at 5:18 AM on January 10, 2011