Help with @keywords

[ckwork]

I've been through the help files, and searched here, but can't find (or didn't understand) how best to use keywords in Imatch5.

Quick background: I have just completed migrating my Imatch3 db into Imatch5, got my old categories working and old properties assigned to attributes (for now).

Now, I could happily continue using Imatch 5 as Imatch 3, but this seems silly as there's lots of new goodness I'd like to use.

I'm pretty confident I should be using primarily keywords and @keyword categories instead of categories and attributes. Not a problem, I can see how I can import these as keywords. But I'm a bit concerned about the effect this will have.

For example I shoot a lot of yachting. In Imatch 3 I used categories for the class, make and sometimes model of the yacht and properties/attributes for the actual boat name and sail number. The reason is that any particular make/model could have hundreds of names and numbers and putting these in categories made the system very unwieldy. For me, the obvious solution is to assign all these values as keywords
so class| make | model is a pretty straightforward keyword hierarchy, but I am unsure about including the name and sail number. As I understand it I could either

a) - add the name sail no at the bottom of the hierarchy but then I would end up with 2 unique keyword paths for every boat (which doesn't seem very efficient) and it would make the thesaurus a bit of a problem to use
  or
b) simply add the name and sail no. as standalone keywords - which would be fine, but then I'll be back to having an unwieldy set of keyword categories.

Is there a way of adding keywords that don't get included in properties or thesaurus?

Or is there a better way of handling this? The problem is that some clients expect to find this info in the keywords.

On a related topic, is it possible to automatically have location names auto assigned to keywords? I like the map feature (esp. since I can point to offshore locations!) but if I still have to re-key locations into keywords, it doesn't really pay off for me.

I'm working with around 320K images, so really want to get this as right as possible from that start!

Thanks for any thoughts

Colin

[Mario]

I'm not sure that I understand every detail of your post.
Could you give us some more examples of the category hierarchy you have used?

In principle, there is no real need to switch from IMatch categories to keywords. Especially not if you don't want all that information to be added to your files.
You usually draw the line between categories and keywords by what you want to keep in the file (and under @Keywords) and what you only want/need in IMatch.
Also: Categories are much faster to re-organize, no updates to files are needed when you rearrange things, which can be a real benefit.

Keywords have been designed to be just that: Single words like "boat" or "yacht". That's also what you'll find with most agencies, press services and web sites out there.
Hierarchical keywords add a lot of oomph to that, because what was earlier only possible using the awesome IMatch categories is now also possible for keywords. Well, at least on a very basic level.

Is there a way of adding keywords that don't get included in properties or thesaurus?

The Thesaurus is a "text store". It allows you to store reoccurring texts for all metadata elements (titles, descriptions, copyright notices) and keywords.
IMatch by default does not add any keywords found in your files to your thesaurus - unless you use one of the import options.

And IMatch only adds keywords you add in the Keyword Panel when you explicitly add them to the thesaurus, or you enable the option to automatically add new assigned keywords to the thesaurus.

IMatch 5 has no properties. It's now called Attributes and is a much more advanced and useful concept. Attributes enable you to create a database inside the IMatch database, to record all kinds of information you need without any restrictions caused by the file format or whatever metadata standard.

Or is there a better way of handling this? The problem is that some clients expect to find this info in the keywords.

There you have it.  What the clients wants, you must deliver.
Please give us more examples of what you are dealing with so we may offer some advice.

On a related topic, is it possible to automatically have location names auto assigned to keywords? I like the map feature (esp. since I can point to offshore locations!) but if I still have to re-key locations into keywords, it doesn't really pay off for me.

You mean the location metadata tag (XMP) filled from GPS data during reverse geo-coding?
You should look into Metadata Templates. They allow you to fill metadata into tags (e.g. your standard copyright data), to change the contents of tags, to copy data from one tag (location) to other tags (keywords) and so on. Metadata Templates are super-useful. For example, I always run one that fills in my standard copyright info, legal text and which copies the make and model of the camera into keywords.

[ckwork]

I'll try and explain this better.

For me, the most important keyword (i.e. the one my magazines want) is the boat's name and/or sail number - this is what they search for. Ideally I want to supply this in the files metadata.

But they will also want the make and model of the boat.

To date I have not implemented keywords in Imatch, but I do have a category hierarchy

Boats
-> sailboats
-> -> class (eg. cruiser, keelboat, dinghy)
-> -> -> make (eg. Beneteau)
->-> -> -> model

And of course each individual boat has a name and sail number. As these are pretty much unique, there was no value in making these categories so I added them as properties in IM 3. But this meant that  files sent to the client needed me to add the details manually.

Ideally I want all of the above PLUS name & sail no as keywords. So the hierarchy (in the thesaurus) would need another level (name as a child of model) ... and then this would be repeated as I need the same for the sail no. (though it has just occurred to me perhaps sail no. could be added as a synonym of name?)

I'm hesitant to add name/sailno as a non-hierarchical keyword as there are literally thousands and wouldn't that make @keywords almost unusable?

I do understand the use of attributes, but that's for my benefit and is not metadata sent with the image, so I want to move away from using attributes for client targetted info.

My intention is to use my exported IM3 category and property files to create a hierarchical list for import into the thesaurus. I'm starting with a clean sheet - there is no metadata on these files apart from that supplied by the camera. All the "intelligence" is in categories and ex-properties. Essentially I'm looking for the optimum way of incorporting this into keywords with minimum effort moving forward.

Thanks

Colin

[ubacher]

Would it not be logical to put the name and sail number into the description or title field?
These are written to the files just like the keywords.

[ckwork]

Yes, for my own use that would be fine - in fact leaving them as they are (attributes) works for me. But I my clients want them as keywords. Unfortunately as image providers we have to adapt to the requirements of the client, we can't tell them how to manage their data 

[Mario]

-> -> class (eg. cruiser, keelboat, dinghy)
-> -> -> make (eg. Beneteau)
->-> -> -> model

Can it be that the same maker (Beneteau) makes different classes of boats?
If so, "make" should not be under "class".

The way I see this you have

a) The class of boat
b) A maker, with model below that

c) Individual boats, which have a sail number and a name.
But these are not really keywords, in the classical sense. It's more of a description of the boat shown in the photo.

For me these are three separate hierarchies. To describe a boat fully you pick keywords from all hierarchies:

BOATS
|- class ...
|- maker and model
|- boat name and sail number

This way you handle handle one maker that produces several classes of boats. Unless this is never the case.
Your hierarchy will remain relatively flat, which is good.
Except for the boat name and sail number, which would produce one new keyword for each boat out there.
You could try to structure that with a separate level above the boat name, e.g. the first letter:

A
B
...
N
|- Nautilus


or similar. If you make the level a group level, it will not show up in flat keywords. Or make it an ignore level to have it only in the thesaurus but not in the keywords.


Note that having thousands of keywords (boat names, sail numbers) is not a good idea in the end. Hard to maintain, deep hierarchies (thousands of children) slow IMatch down in some operations.

Better to keep name / sail in the description or title and then use a metadata template to copy the info into keywords of the files you send out to clients.

[ckwork]

Thanks for that Mario ... something to think about - yes, you are correct that a maker may produce different classes (though its fairly rare at the level of class I use), and so far I have simply duplicated the maker where necessary. Multiple hierarchies may be a better approach, and you've certainly given me something to ponder regarding the name/sail no.

Need to give further thought to the name issue, and probably my wider work flow.

I do have a reasonably good way of working using IM3, but looking to ways I can be more efficient with IM5 ... without too much cost with regard to re-inputting!

Cheers,

Colin