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|| SportsShooter.com: Member Message Board
Recommendations for photo file management software
Jeff Brehm, Photographer, Photo Editor
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Lancaster | OH | USA | Posted: 10:46 AM on 02.15.06 |
->> Please excuse me if a previous thread has addressed this, but I couldn't find one in a search.
Like most of you, I've got thousands of digital photo files on CDs, most with just the numeric camera codes for names. Trying to find specific images can be a pain, especially if it's a shot that maybe wasn't one of the best but now someone wants it anyway, perhaps because it shows a certain player or moment.
PhotoMechanic helps in the searching, but I'd like to find some software that makes it easier to rename and catalog all this stuff. Anyone have any recommendations? |
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Shaun Sartin, Photo Editor
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Crystal Lake | IL | 60014 | Posted: 11:00 AM on 02.15.06 |
->> Jeff,
have a similar thread running, but not exactly. I will say this Cumulus wins over Portfolio Extensis (slow and clunky). Headed to a budget meeting, but if you have specific questions on Cumulus, drop me a PM.
Shaun |
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Monty Rand, Photographer
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Bangor | ME | USA | Posted: 11:14 AM on 02.15.06 |
| ->> I also found extensis Portfolio to be slow, but the new version is very fast. I've always used Portfolio and think it's an excellent choice. I've never used Cumulus, so I can't say if it's good or not, but both of these seem to be the best. |
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Bob Ford, Photographer
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Lehighton | Pa | USA | Posted: 11:25 AM on 02.15.06 |
->> Jeff, I read a thread on this site years ago that said something along the lines of: "You should not have any photos in your archive that are still named "dsc_8776" or "img_6554", (or whatever). If they are important enough to archive they should be important enough to rename and add caption info into the IPTC."
This will definetly help you find photos in the future, but it's more work up front. |
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David Meyer, Photographer
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Orlando | FL | USA | Posted: 11:26 AM on 02.15.06 |
| ->> Mac or PC? |
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Jeff Brehm, Photographer, Photo Editor
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Lancaster | OH | USA | Posted: 11:32 AM on 02.15.06 |
->> David:
Mac. Is there anything else worth using?
Jeff |
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David Meyer, Photographer
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Stanley Leary, Photographer
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Cameron Davidson, Photographer
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Arlington | VA | USA | Posted: 12:54 PM on 02.15.06 |
->> iView Media.
Simple, clean, easy to use. A standard with many.
Plus - they listen to their customers and make improvements where/when needed. |
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Delane B. Rouse, Photographer, Photo Editor
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Washington, DC & Seattle | WA | US | Posted: 1:01 PM on 02.15.06 |
->> Jeff-
If you use OS X 10.4+, the combination of PhotoMechanic + Spotlight does an excellent job. It's best to rename with a unique filename then caption and keyword your images if you really want to be able to do the best search. All of this can be done as you ingest the images so you can at least get the basic caption info done for e very image. Then you go back and add your specific captions/keywords/etc. for individual players.
I've found PhotoMechanic + Spotlight to be very robust for all of my file management needs since last fall when I switched back to Macintosh.
dbr |
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Dirk Dewachter, Photographer
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Playa Del Rey | CA | USA | Posted: 1:44 PM on 02.15.06 |
->> I primarily use microsoft excel, photo mechanic and extensis portfolio. I do burn a lot of dvd's and cd's depending on the size of what I need to archive and use a sequential number system preceeded by the year.
I have burn two copies of original files (all of them) and burn two copies of the edited files or finished projects of the same shoot. The excel file is a flat database that will give me access to the disk number, date of event, name of event (customer name, sport and teams, etc) and it is easy to search for the appropiate disks. They are stored in sequential order by year. Works well for most of the stuff that I do.
I do use extensis for recurring or long term customers for which I have covered and continue to cover their sporting events. For those I will import the images into extensis and tag each image with the specific player which allows me to search by name as well using the master keyword list to drag and drop tags to the images. |
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Ron Erdrich, Photographer
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Abilene | TX | USA | Posted: 11:38 AM on 02.16.06 |
->> I just upgraded to Portfolio 8 for the Macintosh. I use it primarily for editing picture stories and sequencing photos for portfolios, as well as archiving portfolio picks throughout the year. I did use Bridge for awhile, but I find Portfolio more useful and easier/quicker than the Adobe product.
Bridge is still useful, however, for sequencing the images and then importing it directly into Photoshop's web gallery builder. I haven't yet used my new Portfolio web gallery builder.
-Ron- |
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Neil Brake, Photographer
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Nashville | TN | USA | Posted: 11:53 AM on 02.16.06 |
->> Jeff,
We have over 600,000 images on our Cumulus Server - Server is on MacOS-X, but we have clients using PC's to find our images for publications. Images are searchable in a lot of different modes and if somebody pulls one off it will make a copy and leave the orginal in the server. It will find any word in the meta data in a mater of seconds. Quick and easy with no problems. Cumulus is expensive, but worth it.
Neil Brake
Chief Photographer
Vanderbilt University |
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