Organizing all my photos - this is harder than I thought
DarinSpence
Registered Users Posts: 1 Beginner grinner
I need to organize 10 years of photos and videos. I thought I would just start using SmugMug, and the best way to do this would present itself. The way I did it on the PC is pretty decent, I just organized using folders:
Folder: 2002
Sub-Folder: 20020906 (so this means the created date on most of these photos is 9-6-02
Been on a Mac for about 4 years now, so all those photos are in iPhoto Events.
In SmugMug, think I get it:
Category > Subcategory > Gallery > Photos
I could organize by Event:
Category = Holidays
Subcategory = Christmas
Gallery = Grandma's House 2009 (i.e. Something about the Event)
Gallery = Great Grandma's House 2009 (i.e. Something about the Event)
Does anyone have any advice on organizing photos from Family and Life in general? I'll bet lots of people have done this, and put lots of time into thinking about the best way to do it.
Here's my plan:
1) Create a Folder called SmugMug on an External Drive
2) Upload Photos to SmugMug, try tagging, etc as I go
3) Move the folder I uploaded to SmugMug into the SmugMug Folder on my computer. On my computer, I will mimic the organization in SmugMug using folders. This is going to be hard to maintain, but it looks like once I put photos into SmugMug, they only way to get them out is per Gallery...which is very, very tedious. So a simple, send me a DVD of everything I've done in SmugMug is not an option anymore (it used to be when I first signed up, in fact, it was one of the main reasons I was so comfortable with SmugMug).
Any advice? I guess a short-list of Categories and Sub-Categories would help. I look at how I might do it and end up with Categories like:
Kids
- Birthdays
- Plays
- School
- Horseback
- Piano
- Swimming
Holidays
- Christmas
- Halloween
- Easter
Vacations
- Yosemite, 2011
- South Dakota, 2010
- Disney World, 2009
General
- 2011 (galleries of every little thing that doesn't go above)
- 2010
- 2009
I'm most interested in advice from those that have done this, what they did, and what they would have done it differently.
I feel lucky to have a forum like this where such open ended questions can be asked.
Thanks, -Darin
Folder: 2002
Sub-Folder: 20020906 (so this means the created date on most of these photos is 9-6-02
Been on a Mac for about 4 years now, so all those photos are in iPhoto Events.
In SmugMug, think I get it:
Category > Subcategory > Gallery > Photos
I could organize by Event:
Category = Holidays
Subcategory = Christmas
Gallery = Grandma's House 2009 (i.e. Something about the Event)
Gallery = Great Grandma's House 2009 (i.e. Something about the Event)
Does anyone have any advice on organizing photos from Family and Life in general? I'll bet lots of people have done this, and put lots of time into thinking about the best way to do it.
Here's my plan:
1) Create a Folder called SmugMug on an External Drive
2) Upload Photos to SmugMug, try tagging, etc as I go
3) Move the folder I uploaded to SmugMug into the SmugMug Folder on my computer. On my computer, I will mimic the organization in SmugMug using folders. This is going to be hard to maintain, but it looks like once I put photos into SmugMug, they only way to get them out is per Gallery...which is very, very tedious. So a simple, send me a DVD of everything I've done in SmugMug is not an option anymore (it used to be when I first signed up, in fact, it was one of the main reasons I was so comfortable with SmugMug).
Any advice? I guess a short-list of Categories and Sub-Categories would help. I look at how I might do it and end up with Categories like:
Kids
- Birthdays
- Plays
- School
- Horseback
- Piano
- Swimming
Holidays
- Christmas
- Halloween
- Easter
Vacations
- Yosemite, 2011
- South Dakota, 2010
- Disney World, 2009
General
- 2011 (galleries of every little thing that doesn't go above)
- 2010
- 2009
I'm most interested in advice from those that have done this, what they did, and what they would have done it differently.
I feel lucky to have a forum like this where such open ended questions can be asked.
Thanks, -Darin
0
Comments
Okay -- so here is the method I used to set up approx 10 years of photos for a friend which has worked very well.
So --
Master Category named Family Life
Master Subcategories by Year
Master Galleries
Virtual Categories by Event (Holidays)
Virtual Subcategories by "What" Event (Thanksgiving)
Virtual Galleries
Establish Smart Rule on Virtual Galleries
Code Smart Rules in Keywords on Master Galleries
Basic Setup
Category - Family Life
Subcategory - Family Life 2010
Galleries - Actual Albums
(depending on the number of photos you have -- you may want to add one more layer betw Category & Galleries -- i.e., subcategories by Quarter (Jan thru Mar, etc)
Then set up your other categories for "virtual copies" of your photos to post to:
Birthdays
Holidays
Events
Special Occasions
Vacations
Friends
Family
Pets
Everything Else
http://stone-partyof4.smugmug.com/
Now to populate say Holidays
I then made a subcategory for say Thanksgiving, Easter, Christmas etc
As I added galleries/albums in the Master -- I did this in the Holiday category
1) Added gallery/album for Christmas 2010 in master category
2) Created an empty album under the Christmas subcat within Holidays
3) Under Settings - created a smart rule for Christmas 2010 ---- xmas2010
4) Re-accessed Christmas 2010 master and went to keywords/captions bulk under settings.
5) mass entered xmas2010 in all keywords & saved
6) Voila -- go back to Christmas 2010 under Holidays & it will be populated with virtual copies.
Thanks, Monica
I was around before virtual galleries, so I've got an archive category that is just by year. And then I re-upload any of those that I want to work on into various different galleries and categories. A bit of a space waster, but it works.
Want faster uploading? Vote for FTP!
I too, have set the bulk of my photos up before the smart gallery functions was available. So I actually uploaded pics twice to put them in multiple places. Yuck. I have Public Galleries, Client Galleries & Private Galleries. Under my Private Galleries --- I have Family Life grouped by year & quarters. I didn't use Family so that I could take advantage of the smart gallery functions to populate my favs of family members over the years -- like grandma/grandpa, each grandkids, each daughter. I suspect this will really come in handy when it's time to create a anniversary, wedding or graduation slideshow on the fly.
Several of my daughters use the smart gallery function to populate their Friends Category with favs for each year (Friends Favs 2010 etc).
I used a different set up for my oldest daughter who travels, loves animals and nature.
She loads everything into her master categories -- like Vacations and Pets.
She uses the smart rules to populate the following smart galleries:
Animals (subcats: captivity, domestic, wild) --- pulls in fav animals pics from Africa, Yosemite -- favs from zoo & circus -- favs of her pets
Nature (subcats: Flora & Fauna, Other, Weather)
Objects
Places (stuff like landmarks, buildings, monuments)
Everything Else
Thanks, Monica