How do you organise your photos - Location/Date/Subject?


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WuffRuff

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Jan 10, 2007
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opp. East Coast Park
I need to re-organise all my photos and wonder what is a better way to organise them.
Wonder how do you organise them and why - pros and cons?

I'm not talking about which software to use...
I'm talking about whether to group them in the folders according to location, date, or subject or theme??
For e.g. location would be say ECP, Bukit timah park, City Hall, etc.
Theme would be say macro, still life, landscape, portraits, etc.
Subject would be say spiders, beaches, food, people, etc.

Wonder which is the most effective organisation to be able to find the photos fast and with little overlap with other folder types.
 

really depends on yourself and the photos usage.

ie, if you shoot events, then date is more important sorting criteria. if you shoot portraits, subject is more important. or if you are mainly landscape shooter, location is priority.

the above is for filing and directory structures. nowadays, tagging (and searching) is more efficient.
 

I organised by location initially but I realised it wasn't a way to organise my photos. After which, I changed to by date. Then I tag the photos with locations and types.
 

I store everything on a big storage and use software with library function: Adobe Lightroom. You just tag all photos with key words, in addition you can sort and select by date. Easy to create collections of photos. Best of all: the pictures are never touched or changed since all data are stored as meta data in a database. LR only creates links. From the collection and selection you can directly go to image development (also only saved as meta data without touching your files). Once finished you "export" the pic - that's where all the manipulation work is done and a new file is created - again leaving the source file intact.
LR is a development and library tool, for pixel editing you'll need PS, PSP, Gimp or whatever you like. LR version 2 is just released.
 

Type of photo - e.g. travel, models, events
Then date
Then name of model / location / day of travel.

e.g. Travel - Hongkong - 22/07/2008
Travel - Jap - 10/09/2009
 

I go with date, followed by subject using Explorer flders. Tried using Lightroom a bit but it hasn't stuck so far.:)
 

I file them by date and subject

I.e.

2008 08 01 (...)
2008 08 02 (...)
 

File by Year Month then location

For example:

2008 July
Night Festival
Light Installation
Misc


2008 August
NDP 2008
Sunset at Labrador Park
Misc

To file by month and year the advantage is that there are events happen on the same day/month every year, for example NDP, Christmas and etc it allow you check back fast and also remind you what event is coming.
 

i file by type
for eg
Singapore folder->(various other folders of different places in singapore)
Events
etc
 

i organise by date. e.g. 14 August 2008
but i think it isn't good enough, i'll probably switch to doing it by Month, then sub folders for events
 

If u want to do it systematically, i suggest a format like Date-Subject-number
i.e. 080630Jane001 for 30/6/08 shoot for Jane, 080627SBG001 for 27/6/2008 for shoot at Singapore Botanical Gardens.

The rationale for date 1st is that it's easier to sort and also you will never have same file name, unless u can shoot 2 photos at the same time. use YYMMDD format helps sorting as well, otherwise 1/12/2008 will come before 30/6/2008, for example.
 

Just to add, i usually will create a folder for each shoot i.e. 080630 Jane and put into a main folder for Portrait/photoshoot etc. then the SBG folder maybe will go into a nature main folder.
 

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