Today as I was pondering what to blog about, I decided to go back over last year’s photographs. The thought in my mind was that since the high school baseball season starts very soon, I could do a preview utilizing an old photograph from last year. There was an immediate problem, however. I had not kept up with rating all my photos from the previous year!
I am fairly faithful with flagging photos in Lightroom because I can then easily create a collection of each photo shoot or at least go back easily and view the keepers from that shoot. But I also use ratings to keep track of the very best photos… some of the time. So here came today’s blog thought: Rate them now or you’ll have to catch up later.
This is true in so many areas of photo workflow. Keywords are a prime example. Do you enter keywords right after a shoot or do you delay this important step until some time later? What about metadata? Do you automatically have it entered on import or do you have to remember to do it later?
My ideal workflow looks something like this:
- Import all photos (metadata and some keywords are added automatically on import)
- Flag the keepers
- Add any additional specific keywords as needed (jersey #s for ball players, names, etc.)
- Color code any I plan on using for my blog, sharing on Google+, or any other use
- Edit any of the flagged photos as necessary
- Rate the best photos with 5 stars and the next of best with 4 stars
- Create a collection of this particular shoot for easy reference later
- Create a gallery of the keepers to share on my website
This is my ideal photo workflow that works well for me when I remember to do everything in this process.
What is your workflow? What works well for you? What do you struggle with?
