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Folders and tags are two complimentary methods for organizing your digital pictures on your computer. I have written in the past about the differences and similarities of folders and tags and people have written and asked questions (Read Tags vs Folders the big debate). This article explores one key difference between the two methods and how to use it for your own advantage.
Many people associate using folders for organizing digital pictures with being antiquated and “old school”. The same people indicate that using tags is the only way to organize your digital pictures. When asked why, some of the same people don’t really understand the real power of tags and they don’t understand how to harness that power (Read the series Learn how to harness the power of tags).
Tags vs Folders is not about right or wrong but it is about using the right method for the right purpose.
However, the reality is that folders represent a straight forward way for us to organize our digital pictures (Read Why folders will remain the most popular method for organizing pictures). On the other hand, when tags are used for what they’re intended for they can bring great benefit.
A little history of how tags came about is in order now. I hope is not boring even though it is long.
The strength of folders is hierarchical representation
The real strength of folders is the ability to create “folders of folders” or in other words categories of folders. It is very easy to create parent-child relationships between folders and this make sense to us. I can create a folder called Europe and in it I can create a folder for France and one for Italy to categorize my pictures taken in each country. Anyone understands this structure because it is easy to understand that Europe is a category of “country folders”, it is a container. This is the real strength of folders. In addition, a folder structure can be simply copied and shared with someone else and the relationship can be preserved.
If you only use a single criterion for organizing your pictures (i.e events or countries, then folders are your easiest and most efficient method for organizing your digital pictures.
The weakness of folders is capturing only one relationship
Folders are also weak because you can assign a single picture to a single folder that is part of a single folder structure. The only way to get around this limitation is to copy the same image in another folder structure.
For example, a picture taken in Italy showing a red old truck will be saved normally in Europe/Italy. This is the only relationship that this folder structure captures. If I want this picture to also belong to my folder showing Auto/Trucks then I have to copy this picture in folder structure as well. So, I create two copies of the same image if I want to capture two relationships.
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{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
Great post, I personally think that the mix of a hierarchical storage plus tagging is the winner. I store my images in folders named by date (year, month) and sometimes event (if there are many pictures for a single event). Anything else goes into metadata fields (people, event, location, date etc.).
I agree Hans…many times people dismiss folders for exclusive use of tags and the other way around…some people use only folders. But both methods have strengths and weaknesses and if used together they can create a very useful and efficient organization structure for pictures.
hi,
i have a folder of pictures which every file has its own tags.
i am using Bridge CS4, how can i add a “2009″ tag for example to all files so that their own tags will not be deleted ?
if you don’t know how to do in Bridge but know another program for doing so, just tell me.
Thanks for your help.
will appreciate it if you answer me via my email. (i am subscribed to this post’s comments also)
Mahdi…good question. I hope I understood the question rightly. Normally your software should not overwrite existing tags, but only add to them.
I don’t use Bridge CS4 but here is what I would try first:
I would try the simple approach first. Make a copy of the images you want to do this for so you don’t mess up the originals…you can copy only a few in another folder. Then, in Bridge CS4 select the images you copied in this new folder and apply the “2009″ keyword to them. This should not erase the existing keywords, but rather add “2009″ to the existing ones, unless there is some setting in Bridge that will force it to erase the existing keywords. I know you can do this in Adobe Lightroom. If the simple approach doesn’t work try this one.
Most other image viewers/managers will be using IPTC/IIM to save keywords to your files…this means they’re not using XMP like Bridge. So, you might not even see the existing tags that you have. So, you can try XnView or Picasa, they are free. I use Picasa to apply keywords to my images. With Picasa it’s pretty simple to add keywords, you select the pictures and hit the Tags button on the lower right corner and then add your tags. Again, you’ll be adding IPTC tags and not XMP. Then you can open the pictures in Bridge and see if you see the new tags, Bridge should be able to read both XMP and IPTC.
Also, try this link: http://www.photometadata.org/META-Tutorials-Adobe-Bridge
I hope this helps.
Thanks vlad,
i must try Picasa for this purpose.
i myself just use the IPTC core field of bridge.
P.S: the subscription to comments via email is working !
i tried the Picasa and it did great to add a tag to multi selection files.
but then Bridge is not showing the newly added keywords, though i see them in windows explorer’s file properties dialog box.
P.S: picasa 3.5 is just a piece of great software !
Mahdi…let me know how things are going. As I was explaining earlier, Bridge is using XMP while Picasa is using IPTC as far as I know. Bridge is supposed to be able to use the IPTC keywords though…so, I’m not sure why you don’t see them. Glad you like Picasa…it’s been getting much better lately.
Nice to hear from you vlad.
the only thing which i don’t know in picasa is that whether i can change the other IPTC settings such as source, provider, city , location … . and if i can how i can ?
is it just user friendly as editing tags?
Unfortunately Picasa only supports IPTC keywords. This is a new feature in Picasa…since 3.4 I believe. I think they’ll be adding more support but for now you can only add keywords. XnView will allow you to edit pretty much all the IPTC fields…and it’s free as well.