Categories vs. Keywords

[lintujuh]

Hi!

 

I have been wondering is there a need to use both Categories and Keywords. Both are hierarchical and controlled. I have read the Murat's blog from 2011 about categories and keywords, but I still don't quite get it.

 

I have currently defined both categories and keywords, but I'm now wondering should I merge my categories into keywords. Also I'm not sure how well the XMP:Photoshop.SupplementalCategory is recognized by other programs. Any views on this?

 

-Juha

[WilfriedB]

I also use keywords and categories and would never consider to merge them, simply because the list of values would become too long. I have to admit though, there situations, where I'm not quite sure whether placed a certain value into keywords or categories, but in general the categories are more generic (e.g. "blossoms") whereas the keywords are more specific and individual (e.g. "roses").

 

Recently I also started to use keywords to describe places more specifically, when I made many pictures in the same town for example.

[lintujuh]

I have been using the categories and keywords the same way. In order to manage the keywords I have created there hierarchies. Like in your example Wilfried, I have "fauna&flora|plants|flowers" as the categories and "roses" in keywords. But in order to find the flowers I actually have "flowers|roses" in keywords. Because there is no limit in the depth of the hierarchy, why not have everything in one hierarchy? And should that hierarchy then be categories or keywords?

 

-Juha

[WilfriedB]

And should that hierarchy then be categories or keywords?

I believe, keywords is more commonly used than categories. So, if you get rid of one, then it would be categories.

 

I would be afraid making such a kind of change involving almost all images, though.

 

[lintujuh]

That's what is concerning me also. It will be a big effort and lot of disk activity. Let's see if there are more views on the subject.

 

-Juha

[Uwe]

Hello,

I use only the Keywords tag. I don't see an advantage to splitt e.g. "fauna&flora|plants|flowers" and "roses".

In my case it would be: "fauna&flora|plants|flowers|roses" as Keywords tag. AND: I don't have to switch between two input masks. Entering "roses" in the Keyword field is enough to create also all entries above in the hierarchy.

I'm not sure if other tools really distinguish between Keywords and Categories. E.g. XnViewMP use both synonym... There is used "Catagory filter" but it means "Keywords filter".

Regards, Uwe

[Paul Barrett]

I use only keywords and I use them exclusively for People Places, Events and various other parts of my taxonomy. I played with categories but, like Juha, I struggled to differentiate keyword from categories.

 

The deciding factor for me was that the ONLY was to get all of these metadata sets recognised by Synology Photo Station was was to create them all as keywords, because that's all that Photo Station recognises.

 

I have to admit though that my images don't reflect my tags.. All the old discarded Places, Events and People specific tags that Daminion supports are still in place in the images, even though I have deleted them from the catalog. I do wish that when we delete a tag from the tags panel, we had an option to also delete the tags from the image(s). I appreciate that leaving the tags in place is a good disaster recovery technique because you can recreate the tags by reading from file. but when you genuinely do want to be rid of redundant data it is a pain to have to resort to ExifTool.

 

- Paul

[Paul Barrett]

That's what is concerning me also. It will be a big effort and lot of disk activity. Let's see if there are more views on the subject.

 

-Juha

 

Yes it is a big effort. No way round that but there are some things you can do to make it easier.

 

0. Stop Auto-sync (to prevent multiple disc writes top the same image

1. Export the tags as a CSV file.

2. Import the file back and choose the option to convert the tags to keywords

3. Once you have all the keywords in place, you can select each of the original tags so that the images display, select all and drag them onto the keyword.

4. Then delete the original tag so you know where you got to.

5. Turn on auto sync

It's painful but it's also a one-off effort. I haven't regretted the effort.

- Paul

 

 

 

[WilfriedB]

I'm not sure if other tools really distinguish between Keywords and Categories.

Many photo organizers and picture browsers only have keywords and sometimes not even place tags, but when it comes to digital asset management, it should be part of it (in my opinion). For example iView Media Pro 15 years ago already had "Supplemental Categories" and so does Media Pro by Phase One today.

 

Also the IPTC recommendations have "Supplemental Categories" (while the IPTC Category allowed only for three characters).

 

I don't have to switch between two input masks.

When I add new images, I rarely use the tags tree, but the Properties panel instead. I customized the panel so that place, people, categories and keywords are next to each other while other tags, I rarely use are not shown. The auto-complete function allows to select from existing values after entering the first letters, thus avoiding typos.

[Uwe]

When I add new images, I rarely use the tags tree, but the Properties panel instead. I customized the panel so that place, people, categories and keywords are next to each other while other tags, I rarely use are not shown. The auto-complete function allows to select from existing values after entering the first letters, thus avoiding typos.

Hello,

I'm working in the same way using the Properties Panel - except the Category Tag.

Here are the tags I use, additionally I get the information regarding Geo-metadata if already existing. Unfortunately one can move (up/down) the tags only in their section. I my case I would like to move the "Collection" tag up and below the Keywords tag.

I don't use the "Comment" tag but my Panorama Stitcher (AutopanoGiga) writes some information in there. I delete these information.

Typically Title and Description tags are equal. But if I use a photo as source of a photobook I change the Description tag because it is used in Adobe Indesign as "Live Caption".

Regards, Uwe