5 steps to create precise keywords for tagging your pictures

This article is part of the tutorial called: Harness the power of keywords.
< Previous Lesson >|| Next Lesson > Once you get started with Digital Asset Management (DAM) software you will quickly run into another management issue: your keywords. I believe any DAM software user will eventually ask himself the question: how am I supposed to create my keywords? Reading various internet sources on the subject I usually run into two kinds of advice: some say you should just start adding keywords to your images while others say you should be careful and think through your keywords before creating them. Even though it seems that most advice falls in the first category, I happen to fall into the second category. I do believe that you should be careful when you create keywords primarily because if you create too many, then you will have to manage your keywords as well pretty soon…as if managing your pictures is not enough headache.

Why think about your keywords?

Keywording your pictures requires significant effort and I believe you have to have a strategy for directing that effort. So, what do you need to be thinking about when developing keywords for your pictures? I created a list of five steps that should help you think through the potential problems when developing keywords for tagging your picture collection.

STEP 1: Imagine what searches you would be performing

Try to think about the kinds of pictures you’re taking and imagine what you would be searching against. For example: You want to find out all the pictures taken in Yellowstone National Park that have deer in them and they were taken at sunset. All these highlighted words would represent actual keywords but at this time try to think in terms of categories that these keywords fall under. So, would you be searching against cities? Or events? Or animals? Or parks? There might be more than one answer to this question, like both events and animals, or both parks and animals. The answers to this question would help you identify the domains that you currently have for your pictures.

The example I have given would result in three domains: parks, animals and time of day. The scenario I have presented above would represent finding the pictures that belong at the intersection of these three domains. The more scenarios you can think of the more domains you you may discover for your pictures.

STEP 2: Defining keywords for each domain

Step 1 will help you manage your keywords so that they’re somewhat organized in your mind. This will help you so that you won’t have too many duplicate keywords…hopefully none :). For example when you think about the parks domain you can create keywords like: yosemite, yellowstone, sequoia, santa monica and others, depending on your pictures. DAM software should help you group your keywords into categories which would represent your domains. A domain like animals will also be easy to create keywords for. Most people would probably use the events domain together with many other domains. The events domain would contain keywords like birthday, graduation, game, hiking_trip, photo_trip, biking_trip and so on. Some people create a date domain as well even though keywords would not be needed since the “Date picture taken” field would contain all the information about dates.

STEP 3: Avoiding duplicate keywords

When you pick one domain and start creating keywords for it, you only have to be careful about one thing. Make sure you don’t create duplicate keywords like: birthday, birthdays or bday. This WILL mess you up very quickly. So, how can you avoid creating duplicate keywords? Well, it’s easy at first but it gets harder later because you will not remember what keywords you have created…unless you look up your keywords.

The easiest thing to do in order to minimize duplicate keywords is to create a few naming conventions for yourself…but only a few conventions. If you create too many conventions you won’t remember your own conventions. Here are a few examples of useful conventions:

• Always use singular in your keywords and no plurals. This would translate in birthday instead of birthdays.
• Don’t use any abbreviations…I think this is a must for any keyword since abbreviations are very hard to remember.

STEP 4: Add new domains when new pictures don’t fit in the existing domains

When you would like to assign a keyword that doesn’t exist, don’t just add it but see if you’re actually discovering a new domain. For example let’s say you take a bunch of pictures at Sequoia National Park and you transfer them to your computer and start tagging them with sequoia (from the parks domain), camping_trip (from the events domain), sunset, sunrise (from time of the day domain and flower, tree, grass (from the plants domain). Let’s assume you have already defined the keywords for these domains.

However, now you find yourself that you would want to add tags for the friends that appear in the pictures: George, Jerry and Elaine. You could simply add the keywords, but they actually belong to a new domain: people. This domain could have sub-domains like friends and family. I believe that if you think in terms of domains will help you develop great keywords and avoid creating duplicate ones.

STEP 5: Apply keywords when you transfer your pictures

This article is part of the tutorial called: Harness the power of keywords.
< Previous Lesson >|| Next Lesson > This is probably the easiest step to understand but the hardest to implement…’cause you might be lazy like me However, if you don’t apply at least a minimal set of keywords right when you transfer your pictures…well, you’ll be working very hard later.

Read similar articles

• All you need to know about organizing your pictures
• iMatch - an exercise in frustration
• The road frequently traveled…by image metadata
• Adobe Lightroom - an exercise in keywording
• When folders are not enough…tags are your friends.
• A look at 21 months of statistics for OrganizePictures.com
• How to insert precise tags in folder names

Article published on: Apr 22 , 2008 under Most Popular, Organize Pictures

Spread the word

| Subscribe to my blog ! | Stumble it ! | Digg it ! | Bookmark on del.icio.us

Share your own experience

Have you discovered a better way of doing things? Have you tried something and it didn't work? Whether good or bad, I am always interested in reading about other people's experiences with managing their pictures. So, feel free to leave a comment or a link below and share your own experience.