The Photog Formula

One of the most time-consuming, yet essential, steps to Digital Photography is organizing your photos. Although digital photography eliminates all the shoeboxes full of pictures and negatives, there is still the need to stay organized. If you keep up on your organization as you go, this process will be far less painful than if you wait until you have hundreds of pictures to sort through.

There are many different approaches to organizing your photos, but they can be categorized into 4 basic levels.

• Level 1 – Operating System
• Level 2 – Digital Camera Software
• Level 3 – Photo Management Software
• Level 4 – Digital Asset Management Software

We’ll take a look at these one at a time.

First is the operating system. If you’re a “snapshot shooter”, and only take a couple hundred pictures a year, then you computer’s operating system will provide a simple way of organizing your photos. If you’re using Windows, then the My Pictures folder in the My Documents folder can offer you a way to handle your pictures. It even has several viewing and image management tools.

If you’re a Mac user, then iPhoto is the default image management program. It offers similar features and is extremely easy to use. I’ll be going over iPhoto and its features in a later post. If you take more than 1000 pictures, then a more powerful image management program should be used.

The next level is your camera’s software. This software is more advanced in both organization and image editing and comes free with most digital cameras. Canon’s Digital Photo Professional (DPP) allows for more advanced control over your images. You can process RAW images, adjust exposure, brightness and contrast, as well as tag and batch process your images. I will also be going over using this program in future posts.

Level 3 deals with photo management software. These will cost you a bit of money, but offer more features. These programs include Photoshop Album, Ulead Explorer, and Paint Shop Photo Album. These programs offer more organizational features, such as increased search and viewing capabilities, album pages, and greater file compatibility. However, some of these programs don’t support RAW files. So if you shoot in RAW, make sure the program supports this before you buy.

The last level covers digital asset management software. Again, this software will cost you some money, but can be very powerful. Depending on your level of expertise, you can expect to pay anywhere from $50 to thousands of dollars. There are software programs for the advanced amateur, professional photographer, multi-person/multi-computer studio, and corporations. Some popular programs include ACDSee and Cerious, and Extensis for the more professional photographer. These programs are for those who shoot lots of photos and are comfortable using computers and software.

Nate