I thought after playing around a bit more with versions and stacking I would leave some lessons learned for others new to the software and who does bracketing photography.
What I do once I have culled and uploaded the files to iMatch, I add keywords as required to each photo, then process those I think are the best. Once reading the processed files back into iMatch I create versions and stacks to reduce the number of files on the screen. I tried a few fancy scripts but found what Mario has as a default is actually the best way to go about it with one small change. Also, I keep the versions with the same name as the original - much easier to manage.
- I first create vesions and found it is best to keep the original RAW file on top and not the jpg or tiff file. You end up with a mixture of versions on the screen (if you keep your original and processed files in the same folder) and I found it confusing when you have a mixture of file types on the screen.
- The one change I made is to add a new VERSION rule whereby a tif file becomes the master and a jpg becomes the version file. I have done this as some steps in my workflow I have created a tif file with a different name and from that I have created a jpg as the final output. All my final outputs are jpg's.
- Once completed and all your files have been processed, create versions and then hit the "T" key to group the files.
- Then stack adjusting the time slider as needed using the EXIF time slider in the auto-stacking command box and don't create rules unless you really know what you are doing. Rules just creat a complication and I found it can corrupt your workflow.
- Once you have done this then use the filter to see the final jpg file only. This way the only photos on the screen are the final outputs.
This is what I found and as a non-technical person when it comes to software I thought others may benifit from what I learned. Mario has done a great job with this software and if you use the custom settings it actually works a lot better than trying to be fancy and do things your own way.