Finding your digital images

[JDArt]

Once your digital photos are on your hard drive, how do you locate the ones you're looking for weeks, months, or years later? Please pass on your secrets. Typing keywords seems so time-consuming, yet I sit here for fifteen minutes looking for a picture I know I have, and it's buried somehwere in thousands of files.

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[davenelsondotcom]

I also use ACDSee for Batch editing of EXIF data and search based on EXIF data. It also has a handy Calendar view. The latest version of the software has way to many unnecessary features. See if you can get version 4 or so.

The thing that helps me find photos the fastest though is saving them in folders that are named with the date and event name. So "20050919_PhotoCamel" would be a folder name. I do not generally change file names, but when I do it is usually with Exifer and change the name to the date and time like "20050919-111507.jpg"

Here is my process that makes finding files later easier for me:
1> I copy a memory card over I drop all of the files from the day into a single folder named like I described above
2> I copy the entire folder to my Backup hard drive
3> Make backup DVDs (one I keep and the other goes off-site)
4> Make a subfolder named "eh" where all the non-keepers go
5> Make a second sub-folder named "Original" where all of the keepers get copied
6> Then add/edit Exif Data using ACDSee
7> Cropping, color-correcting, and sharpening in PhotoShop.
8> Upload to SmugMug for sale and backup

This has worked fine for me over the last 5 years with tweaks here and there.

[bavanor]

Try out Extensis Portfolio program. That will help you log all of your files, add key word search parameters and let you do searches.

[BigB]

I just keep my main folders properly named regarding the subject and date that the photos were taken on. If I have more than one folder of the same subject, then I'll make a main folder and put the sub folders in there (named again by more detail subject and date). In those folders, I'll have the RAW files, then a sub-folder for my jpegs, one for web size files and another for various print sizes that I might use.

[danwolfgang]

I use the Organizer component of Photoshop Elements. You can easily and quickly create tags, then just drag those tags to the photos. I use most tags many times over, so I'm not spending much time typing. All photos get several tags: photographer, camera used, person/people, event, and place. Then, too find all photos of waterfalls with me in them I can just click the "Waterfalls" and "Dan" tags. (I think there's only one of those, BTW.) There are a handful of programs that do this: Portfolio, IView Pro, iMatch, etc... but I think PSE Organizer is the best.

I gave up on the "directory tree" method long ago, simply because it doesn't allow for easy cross-referencing. If I took a photo of a flower on vacation in Pennsylvania, where does it get filed? In the flower directory? In the vacation directory? In the Pennsylvania directory? It's an endless battle.

Dan

[deluco]

I keep it simple. I file everything by client's last name. Weddings are filed by bride's maiden name. Every wedding is accompanied three folders: Masters, Browsers and Proofs. The browser is a full set of low-res images in browser format. I open the 'bridesname.html' file and up pop the browsers with thumbnails. Select a thumbnail for a larger image. Nearly every image management program now has features to create browser sets easily. I put the browser set on CD for proofing to the bride.

[badpickev]

the nice thing about elemensts is it imports the pics to a catalog. no looking for your stuff. this is the same software as photoshop album.

[Paul Shields]

My foolproof method is to print the ones I like - so long as you don't lose your prints then you're sorted :P