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[sraymond]

JRiver,

I hate to nag, but I was wondering where MC was going with photo support.  I'm currently using a 30-day demo of Adobe Photoshop Album (I've got about two weeks left), and I'm quite impressed.  Once I lay down the bucks for APA, I don't imagine I'll look back too soon.

If you're interested, I could list the things that impress me about APA.  Or, if photo management is farther down the development path, I understand.

Does anyone have something besides APA that they'd recommend as tops in the class?  I've tried iMatch and ACDSee, but didn't like either.  For a v1.0, APA is pretty solid!

Scott-

[JimH]

Fire away.  We're interested.

[sraymond]

OK.  Here goes:

First, I won't get caught up with the "eye candy" or other non-functional stuff.  And I won't address the one area that is probably beyond MC:  integration with online sharing and printing (after all, Adobe has some sort of agreement with Shutterfly - I'm not sure if they're financially related or not!).

And to be fair, I won't even discuss the detailed photo editing features such as cropping (with constrainted aspect ratio) and photo touchup (such as red-eye removal, contrast, brightness, etc.)  This can always be done in a separate application apart from organization.

I'll limit myself to the organization aspect of APA - which is the one area that I'd think MC can fairly compete.

So...  organization with APA means tagging.  But the tagging is different than MC (or at least different from what I understand with MC).  With APA, tags are just that:  tags.  Once you define a tag, you can apply it to any photo (or selection of photos).  By way of example, let's talk about simple "people" tags.  I create one for me, my wife, and my son.  I then find all the photos that contain me and add the "me" tag.  Then I find all the photos that contain my wife and add the "my wife" tag.  Same with my son.  

Now if I want to find all the photos with "me", I search on the "me" tag.  If I add the "my wife" tag (to the search with already selected "me" tag), I get just the photos that contain both me and my wife.  This functionality gets extended with Places, Events, and Other tags.

I don't see how I can do this with MC, because each "tag" (which is really a "field") is mutually exclusive.  If I create a custom field called "Subject", I can fill it with "me", "me and my wife", "me, my wife, and my son", etc., etc.  But this is fundamentally different than applying tags ala APA.  I get to choose just one value of the field with MC, making extensibility hard (or impossible).

The real benefit of the APA method is that it lets me find photos among thousands...  When I want to send a photo to my relatives in Italy, I might look for the ones that have the "Easter" and "my son" tag.  Or if I'm sending it to my folks in New York, I might look with "Santa Cruz Boardwalk", "me", "my wife", and "my son".

So then...  if MC could do the organization as well as APA, it would at least make the decision between apps difficult.  I can always use a photo printing service that lets me FTP the photos (MC's FTP option is good enough!).  MC's single "template" for making a thumnailed index of photos is probably good-enough for most people (certainly for me).  And I can always touch-up the photos separately from the "organization" process.  And I think the rest is pretty much eye-candy. (which, by the way, v9.1 seems to be addressing Head On).

I'm sure others will have a different perspective.  Guys?

Scott-

P.S.  As always, it's refreshing just to be heard.  I realize you can't please all the people all the time, but it's great to know that at the very least, we're being listened to.

[Phil Lee]

The first thing MC 9.1 should be able to do is use EXIF information to display images. This is the direct equivalent of MP3 tags and without this MC 9.1 is pretty much unusable for photo management. For example, the calculated fields for Year, Date and Month should be taken automatically from the EXIF data. That way I can immediately view my images in the order they were taken.

Secondly, the Properties form should be intelligent enough to realise that an image is selected and only display the fields appropriate to an image file. For example when on Earth am I going to need to use the BPM for an image file?

I'm sure there are a lot of other comments I can come up with and I will do in the next few days I'm sure. The single most important thing I want to ask for though is access to and use of the EXIF data stored in the jpg files.

[Ingo]

Scott,

how about seen a tag as a membership in a playlist....
create a playlist for you, one for your wife and a third one for your son.... now add that file tothe apropriate lists and you're there.

so there are two or three things missing:
- playlist membership isn't saved to the file, it's just library based and fragile (Matt, did that change?)
- using the current interface it's quite hard to have more than one playlist handy to add files to... (Matt, this is something you propbably need to change ;-) , the 'GUI improvements for MC 9.1' thread is probably on the right track ;-) )
- I don't know APA, but I would guess you take a tag and attach it to the file... not like it would be in MC: take a file and attach it to a tag/playlist. No comment here, everyone has to decide himself what's more intuitive.

Ingo

[sraymond]

The first thing MC 9.1 should be able to do is use EXIF information to display images. This is the direct equivalent of MP3 tags and without this MC 9.1 is pretty much unusable for photo management. For example, the calculated fields for Year, Date and Month should be taken automatically from the EXIF data. That way I can immediately view my images in the order they were taken.

Phil,

I've asked for this so many times, I'd actually forgotten about it!  You are absolutely correct.  I think this is #1 on the list, as it is fundamental to organization by time (arguably, the most, or one of the most, important dimensions).

Scott-

[Matt]

Lots of good feedback to absorb here.

In the meantime, play with "List" type fields in MC. (keywords is an example)

They're designed to do just what you want: create one-to-many relationships. (i.e. People: Me;Wife;Son)  They work in searches and view schemes.

There may be ways we can streamline the use of list fields.

Thanks for helping everyone.

[sraymond]

how about seen a tag as a membership in a playlist....
create a playlist for you, one for your wife and a third one for your son.... now add that file tothe apropriate lists and you're there.

Ingo,

That's a good suggestion for getting around the difference between a "field" and a "tag", but I don't think it is very extensible.  How do I find the photos that are on all three playlists (i.e. those that have all of us in them)?

Scott-

[Matt]

The first thing MC 9.1 should be able to do is use EXIF information to display images. This is the direct equivalent of MP3 tags and without this MC 9.1 is pretty much unusable for photo management. For example, the calculated fields for Year, Date and Month should be taken automatically from the EXIF data. That way I can immediately view my images in the order they were taken.  

Phil,

I've asked for this so many times, I'd actually forgotten about it!  You are absolutely correct.  I think this is #1 on the list, as it is fundamental to organization by time (arguably, the most, or one of the most, important dimensions).

This is already there.  Have you tried 9.1?

[Matt]

As Ingo pointed out, playlists are another way to do one-to-many relationships.

How do I find the photos that are on all three playlists (i.e. those that have all of us in them)?

Use the search wizard Add Rule->Playlist, or type what you want in the search box.

[sraymond]

This is already there.  Have you tried 9.1?

Matt,

Really?  Awesome!  Where?  Do I need to reimport?

Scott-

[Matt]

The date field gets filled from the EXIF tag on import.

You can force MC to reanalyze a file using "Library Tools->Update Library (from tags -- always)"

[sraymond]

The date field gets filled from the EXIF tag on import.

Matt,

Unfortunately there would appear to be a bug in v.196

I just did a fresh import of a single photo.  The EXIF data that is shown via MC is:
----------------
2160 x 1440 - 490.8 KB
EASTMAN KODAK COMPANY KODAK DX4330 DIGITAL CAMERA - 6/10/2003 7:09 PM
- F/2.8 - 1/30 sec.
Focal Length: 8 mm
Metering: ?
White Balance: ?
Flash: Yes
JPEG Quality:
Orientation: Normal
Exposure Program: Auto
Exposure Bias: 0
Comments:
----------------


The field data shown is:
Date (day) = -1
Date (month) = NULL
Date (year) = -1

Should I report this bug elsewhere?

Scott-

[sraymond]

OK...  I'm getting the idea of using playlists to do the searches.  I created a Playlist group called "Photo Tags" which had subgroups "People", "Places", "Events", etc., which had subPlaylists such as "Scott", "Sabina", and "Brian" (for Places).  Thanks, Ingo, for helping me change the paradigm (tags to photos vice photos to tags) - I didn't think of playlists as tags, but you are certainly correct!

But I don't see how the List field helps me tag the photos.  I can only select one of the enumerated list items for each photo (i.e. Scott, Sabina, or Brian).  So does this do anything for me?  Would it be possible to allow more than one enumerated item to be selected?

Are there any downsides to using Playlists to tag photos?  Can someone confirm that the Playlists are saved as "strong" as fields?

I, too, echo Ingo's sentiments about the UI aspects of this topic.  Is it possible to tailor the UI to differing media types?  Photos are certainly different than audio files!

Scott-

[Phil Lee]

This is already there.  Have you tried 9.1?

Yes I have. When I imported some photos I had a look at the properties of them. The calculated field for Date(day) was -1, Date(month) was blank and Date(year)  was -1. This is the same as Scott was seeing and would appear to be a bug.

I would also echo the request for a different display when looking at image files. At the moment I have a list of images shown in MC9.1. The vast majority of the columns on screen relate to music. I think MC9.1 should default to showing the EXIF data in columns for image files rather than the irrelevant music columns.

I would also like to be able to add or remove these EXIF columns from the list in the same way as you can add or remove the music columns.

I would also like to be able to use the EXIF data in the same way as tags to be able to create playlists.

Finally (for the time being ) I would like to be able to create image specific tag columns similar to how Scott described.

[nila]

the GUI side of the list data fields really needs to be improved.
Right now its extremely tricky to use it, compare that to APA which is childs play and it doesn't even hold up any competition.

[Jaguu]

I already mentioned a few times that MC9 should really adhere to media type dependency. Every media type has its own particularities and MC9 should deal with them individually.

I repeat the examples: What do you do with a cover art menu, when your media type is image? It is simply superfluous, so it should be absent.

The properties window is right now the most ugly part in MC9, as music properties, image properties, video properties, user specific fields are wildly mixed together making it hard to handle easily.

What about this kind of code everytime you deal with media files:

case media type is
audio) do this;
image) do that;
video) do this;
tv) do that;
radio) do this;
*) do that;
end case

Also the grouping in the properties window should be reworked allowing users to create their own groups.

As I already suggested the best way to define groups and fields for a specific media type would be the "Add New View Scheme" Menu. Example:

View Scheme display name:
Artworks

Fields in view scheme:
Movement
Artist
Year
Name

Property group name: Paintings
Property fields used:
Artist
Name
Year
Movement
PaintStyle

Property group name: Gallery
Continent
Country
Gallery Name

Search criteria: [Select]
Sorting criteria: [Select]

Dir/File name rules when importing/ripping: [Select]
Dir/File name rules when burning: [Select]

In this way each view scheme would display its specific properties window with groups and fields defined by the user! This would a really big improvement in file and tag organisation!

[Wobbley]

I'm sure this is mentioned by one or more people somewhere else in this huge (although admittedly searchable) forum, but I have an idea for managing and creating the different file type property display options.

Would there be a way to have functionality like this?:

1) I right click on a main node, so in this case, let's use the "Images" node as an example.  Upon r-clicking on the node, a contextual menu appears and one menu item is "File Property Scheme".  This would bring up a new dialog box that would look similar to the "Tree & View Settings" of the "Tools", "Options" section.  First, there would be a dropdown combobox or something similar from which we could select the main file property sections, such as "General", "Extended", etc., and even perhaps an dropdown option called "EXIF" for viewing (but not editing) the EXIF information for the picture.  When one of the items is selected from the aforementioned dropdown, a "Library Fields" section would refresh to display the default fields that pertain to, say, the "General" section, or the "Extended" section.  And just as we can do now, we can add fields to each section, edit the existing ones, etc.  So, that's my idea.

I currently use a program called JASC Paint Shop Photo Album, and (having used just about every other photo program) I think it is probably the most robust yet still easy to use program for photo managment.  I am going to post some screenshots on my website http://pictures.chriswigley.com/JASC/ to show what I am about to describe.  When the photo app loads, there's an explorer-type folder tree view on the left listing all of the devices (hard drives), folders, etc. just like Windows explorer.  When you select the main folder where you store all of your pictures (assuming you keep your pictures within subfolders that are within one main folder - although you don't have to store your photos this way), the right-hand side of the screen shows 1' x 1' thumbnails of each photo.  Let's assume, for sake of example, that I have not organized my photos into subfolders within the primary folder where my images are stored, such that I have 400 pictures in one folder.  From within the photo album app, if I r-click the primary folder, a menu appears and I can select "New Album...", and a dialog box appears allowing me to type the name of the album and what folder I want the album to be in.  This process is really creating a new folder on my hard drive with the name that I type in, and it will be created in whatever directory I specified when I entered the album's name.  Once the new album (new folder) is created, the right-hand side (used to display all of the pictures in my primary folder) splits into 2 horizontal panes; the top pane continues to display all the pictures that are in the main folder (or whatever folder I have highlighted in the explorer-like tree view on the left), and the new bottom pane is the area into which I can drag images from the top horizontal pane.  Once I select the images from the top pane (typical options, shift+click, ctrl+click, ctrl+a, etc.), I can drag them into the album pane and the files are tagged with that album name and they are also physically moved into that directory (whose name is the same as the album's).  So I've doen 2 things at once really.  I have organized a subset of pictures into their own folder, and I have tagged them (for the photo album app's purposes) with an album name.  Once I move the pictures into the photo album (or before, it doesn't matter), I can select one or more of the pictures and then select the "Keywords" tab from the left-aligned vertical tab bar (featuring tabs such as "Browse", "Info", "Keywords", and "Search").  Selecting the "Keywords" tab presents me with another tree view that replaces the explorer-like tree view that appears when you first load the program.  This tree initially has 4 main nodes, "Location", "Occassion", "Photographer", "Subject", and each main node has a checkbox next to it that you can check to indiacte that you want that keyword to be applied to the selected photo(s).  For example, if I expand the main "Subject" node, I see 2 sub-nodes, "People" and "Pets".  I think there should be a "Place" sub-node under the main "Subject" node, but there's not by default.  So, I l-click once on the "Subject" node and type "Places" in a text box at the bottom of the tree view and then click an "Add" button to the right of the textbox I typed "Places" in.  Now, there are 3 subnodes under the "Subject" node.  If I click the "Places" node, I can then (in the same way I added the "Places" node) add several subnodes to the "Places" node, so I add "USA", "Europe", "Asia", etc.  As you can imagine by now, I can select each one of these subnodes and create nodes under them, etc., etc. Once I've done all of this, I can then go through my pictures and apply the keywords to them.  So, for example, I have a folder full of pictures of my dog (a white boxer named "Guinness"), so I select (Ctrl+click) all the Guinness pictures, then I check each checkbox next to a keyword (remember, each node in the keywords tree view has a checkbox next to it) that I want to apply to the pictures I have selected.  So, I click the "Guinness" keyword (node) that I created under the "Pets" node, which was a default node under the "Subject"node.  I can stop here, or I can further categorize my pictures.  I notice that the first 3 pictures of the 40 I have selected are from his most recent birthday party.  So, I re-select only those 3 pictures. Under the default "Occassion" node is a node (again, remember that node = keyword) called "Birthday", so I check that checkbox too.  That's good enough for me, so I stop there.  Now, I can do this for all the photos I have, and then I can test out the search capabilities.  I click the "Search" tab and I can specify whether I want to search by keyword or by EXIF information.  I choose the "Keyword" radio button.  On the "Search" tab pane, there is the same tree view as was in the "Keywords" tab pane, only it's slightly shorter.  I can select keywords from this tree view just as I did when I was adding the keywords to my photos.  I check the "Birthday" and "Guinness" checkboxes, then click the "Search button" and the right-hand side now splits into 3 horizontal panes.  The top one shows my search results, the middle one continues to display all of the pictures that are in the folder I selected from the tree view when the app first loaded.  The bottom one shows all the images that are in the last photo album that I created.  What's really cool is that there is a "Save..." icon on the left side of the new "Search Results" pane.  Clicking the "Save" button displays a pop-up menu with options such as "Copy to new album", "Move to new album", and "Save as slide show".  I'll stop here because this has become to long, and I'll post some screen shots like I said for anyone who's interested in looking at this further.

Thanks for reading all of this...

Wobbley

[LisaRCT]

Regarding Photo management, I like Thumbs Plus for quick finds, displays, minor adjustments, etc . . .
it is quick, easy, and flexible with plenty of basic operations.

For photo processing and editing Jasc's 'Paint Shop Pro' is really good for general use, my second choice being Adobe Photoshop Elements.  If you need the power and options beyond those included in the above, Adobe Photoshop is awesome, yet rather complex, best left to pro's and very serious amateurs.

Now when MC9 becomes capable of doing much of this, I may need a smaller hard drive for software   LOL

[JeffreyK]

the GUI side of the list data fields really needs to be improved.
Right now its extremely tricky to use it, compare that to APA which is childs play and it doesn't even hold up any competition.

I'll second this - I posted about this near the end of 9.0 development and I'll restate it here: the list type is EXACTLY the right type for tracking things like who or what is in the photo, but using it is nearly impossible.  The first thing needed is the ability to multiselect some images with different keywords (or a custom list type) and be able to add a new keyword to all of them - without destroying the existing ones (right now, the field shows "<varies>" and attempting to add a new term results in "<varies>; Bob" for the actual keywords for all of them) - this particular one seems easy to fix.  Beyond that, there really needs to be a way to define possible list items for a list field and be able to choose between them (not that I completely like this GUI, but if you use MS Outlook for mail, right click on a message header and select categories - this is the basic idea that I think you need to make this useful).  This would additionally allow for locking the possible list of items for a given list field.

I'll also second the need to filter the properties for different media types - many of the properties that make sense for music, don't make sense for images, etc.  (Composer?)

Finally, one of the main reasons that I am currently using ACDSee for cataloging my photos is that they have a wonderful backup system where you can have an .xml file written per directory that includes all of the non-EXIF tag information that will be usable even if I lose my ACDSee database (and this is what I use before I burn backups of my photos - knowing that I can get all this info back).  Although I will add that I would prefer the ability to write into the XML (or even just a comma-delimited text file) the full EXIF info (since it is easy to cause that to be destroyed) and to be able to write a single file per image (so that they can always be kept together).  Obviously, it would be nice to be able to easily read from this file as well to rebuild the database.

Anyway, those are the three key things I think need to change.

Thanks!
-Jeff

[Phil Lee]

The new version with EXIF date support is a definite step in the right direction, especially if you use the new beta interface.

[sraymond]

I like (well, love, but I don't want to make my wife jealous!) the EXIF functionality to fill the Date field...  but I wonder if there's any way to get choice about the [Date (month)] calculated field.  I want to rename photos and I'd like it to be a two digit number vice the month spelled out.  Similarly, the [Date (day)] should be a two digit number as well.

Is it possible to get a right-click that lets me launch a photo editing application - say Photoshop Elements?  That would make the issues of photo editing a non-starter.

If I've understood the merits between fields and playlists for "tags", it would appear that the playlist is more analagous to tags and fields are less a good fit.  I don't understand JeffereyK's perspective on this.  I certainly don't want to have to create a new "tag" (or field, using his method) for each permutation of individual tags.  Of course, this would be moot if I could choose more than one value of the enumerated list.

I strongly suggest that searching on the "playlist" be somewhat streamlined.  To get "AND", I need to navigate to Add Rule/Playlist and open up the tree to my PhotoTag/Persons/ playlist group for each tag.  That gets to be too much.  I guess this might be a fairly big change, but I think it's important to do if playlists are to be used as tags.

Acquiring Photos
Acquiring photos from my Kodak DX4330 isn't working too well.  I have to use "scanner" because the Kodak driver presents the camera as a fixed drive (so MC doesn't see it - it looks for removable only!).  The generic XP driver presents the camera as a "Scanner and Camera", but MC isn't very camera-friendly when using the "Scanner" option.  I don't get the option to delete photos from the camera and the name of the photo is "Scanned Picture".  And worst of all, none of the EXIF information is preserved!

So:  Please allow for XP's "Scanner and Camera" support that preserves the "Camera" treatment.  This is obviously a show-stopper for me:  I've got to get the photos off of the camera somehow!  Which makes me wonder:  is there a command-line parameter for "acquire images"?

Enough for now...

Scott-

[sraymond]

About the renaming...

If I want both the filename and the Name to be date-based, it seems to be a lot of work.  

First I have to r"ename files from properties".  I'm not sure how I go about adding sequential numbers for the same date (i.e. 2003June11-001 and 2003June11-002) - the closest I can come is first filling the Track #.

Then I need to "fill properties from filename" to get the Name the same as the filename.

Is there an easier way?

Scott-

[NoCodeUK]

Scott,
I cannot help you with the renaming problem but if you want to right click, send to Elements, you need to set it up as an external tool.  This is in the right click send to menu under external tools, then click add, and enter the path to Elements.  I have set this up and it works well.

Adam

[sraymond]

Thanks Adam...  I didn't know that feature existed.  Any idea how I force the thumbnail to update after the image has been modified?

Scott-

[NoCodeUK]

Again in the right click menu I think, there is an option to refresh thumbnail.  If not in the right click there is an option somewhere to tell MC to junk all the thumbs and redraw them next time you load the list

Adam

[JimH]

If you had to name the top three functions you do with an editor, what would they be?

For me, for example, the list might be:

1.  Resize (MC does this)
2.  Crop (MC could easily do this)
3.  Convert format -- tiff to jpg, for example

I very rarely change the brightness or color of an image.

I occasionally copy a desktop window and paste it into an editor.

Any help here would be appreciated.  Please keep it simple -- we're not trying to replace an editor.

[NoCodeUK]

I'd probably agree with those 3 too.  Resize, crop, convert.  Also at work I use the increase canvas size to get an irregular picture to fit a certain size without stretching eg our logos have to be 110 x 60 so if a logo is 110 x 40 I use that to add 10 blank lines above and below

Adam

[nila]

I wouldn't want editor functions as a priority to be honest - I have Photoshop for that and thats what it's designed for.

I'd want tools more related to the management and sharing side of it, or to quick bulk tasks.

- print contact sheet of selected photos
- resize (also ability to set to resize to fit within a certain sized box (I use this to make all my photos a specific width but dont care about the height so that they can then be used in a frame in my website).
- convert (or change compression ratio - jpg (IF u do this PLEASE support jpeg2000 - it's sooo powerful and the compression is awesome yet no one supports it properly and natively yet).
- ability to export to website, preferably done in a smart way and not just the standard thousands of page solution that most programs do - most hosts have mySQL - why not let us export the db along with the pics so that it can all be dynamically driven in a single, editable page using a mySQL db - obviously with a static html version for those who would rather it. Export the thumbnails, main pics and the sql code - a ready made - PROFESSIONAL database driven styled website - no other program offers this yet.


MC's skills is it's db - let us expand this db and use it on any website we want too for our images.

Imagine if MC created a db driven website for our pics that was fully searchable by our MC fields, keywords, places, dates etc - the power of what that would offer would blow away any and all competition and would be setting the standard. It's also relatively easy to do:

• Export all the info related to the images being used for the website as an SQL command and save it to a .sql file in the directory that the web pages are saved to along with the images
  
• fit the images into constraint boxes that we set (or resize them to a specific size) and let us choose the jpeg quality to save them at - for both the thumbnails and main pics
  
• Allow us to specify the css to be used to define what colours the text, links etc are going to be and save this in an external css file so we can easily customise it manually
  
• Allow us to specify which info is displayed with each image (filename, date, etc) and whether it should go above or below
  
• Let us choose one of a few custom done layouts to export to.
  
  
  I've seen all your holliday websites Jim with all your pics so I'm sure you as well as everyone else who has all their pics digitally knows the value of being able to export to a website - with digital cameras the way of sharing the pics is via a website - it's more or less the equivalent to photo albums with normal prints and so is crucial.
  All the other tasks can be done easily with an editor set up as an external tool, this one alone pretty much relies a lot of the program organising them. unless we want to do a lot of manual work ourselves.

[JimH]

Nila,
You may know, but it isn't clear; MC can resize and can build a page and upload it to a web site.  Right click on selected photos and choose send to external tool/web or FTP server.

[NoCodeUK]

Sounds like a fantastic idea Nila.  Not sure about how easy it would be implement but would be amazing.  I have a program called Media Plus which does this but only in HTML.  It is quite powerful but very underrated as a piece of software as it cam out around the same time as APA and wasn't anywhere near as featured.

Adam

[nila]

Hiya Jim,
I've seen this option but it really doesn't give any of the basic options I'd like to see. It's EXTREMELY basic.

All the other programs: ACDSee, Photoshop, CompuPic Pro all give ALOT more options and they still just dont have it set up properly or done well.

Basic Features:
- Creating an external .css file for all the pages is NOT hard and would allow us to totally tweak the look of the whole site by editing one file. Easy to do for the program - NONE do it.
- Allowing us to choose what field information is displayed along with the images (year, location, etc.)

More advanced ones would be:
- None of them give ANY options to allow us to export to dynamic sites, only plain html ones - Seems to make no sense to me as if it exported to a dynicam styled site we could again easily tweak the site produced by editing just one file. Making this optional in replacement of 100's of html pages would seem logical.
- This gives us no way of exporting all our MC data to use for the website as well in a dynamically driven one so that the website MC produced would be as easy to use as MC is.


Also its really not clear if the resize option here actually resizes our copy of the image or just resizes the copy its going to put on the server. There is also no option to make the image fit within certain dimentions rather than to actually resize it to those exact dimentions - it should be optional to do one or the other.

[nila]

Adam,
Do u have a link for that?
Most of the programs I've found for creating html websites from my images collection really suck and do a pathetic most basic job which might be the easiest solution for people with no idea but make it almost impossible for people who have even a basic bit of knowledge to teak them.


I currently have some actions created in photoshop that do a batch job on any folder I select and make the images fit within specific dimensions. This resizes all the images for me. I then have to upload them to the website and modify the page I have there to display them - it's db driven so it coping with extra images is not a problem.

The main problem is sorting the images that are going to be uploaded, deciding which to use, ordering them into the correct order and then re-naming them to the correct sequence. This isn't too bad but then say sliding another picture into the group means then shuffling tons of filenames up one digit to slide the other one into place - a bit of a pain.

U can see how I've set it up here: http://www.britcrew.com - click on the 'View Photos' link on the left.

I'm seriously behind with my photo collections mainly because of the time taken to sort them, order them and then re-name them.  I have like 4 or more big collections to add. I'll get around to it soon.

I'm probably going to make the whole thing driven by a php app so that I can simply upload the new images to a folder, tell it the directory and it'll make the thumbnails, resize the main pics, insert the appropriate info into the db and just automatically add it to the list of available collections available to view. I might even automate it so that other people can login and upload their own collections and add those to the site using the php app.

Because of the way it's set up changing the way the images are displayed and the page looks is easy as all I have to do is tweak the page calling for the image info.

[JeffreyK]

If I've understood the merits between fields and playlists for "tags", it would appear that the playlist is more analagous to tags and fields are less a good fit.  I don't understand JeffereyK's perspective on this.  I certainly don't want to have to create a new "tag" (or field, using his method) for each permutation of individual tags.  Of course, this would be moot if I could choose more than one value of the enumerated list.

You'd only have one field created - Subject - which is a list type.  Then, your values are things like: "Me; wife" "Bob;Andy;Sara", etc.  MC9 already does a great job using these in view schemes, but the problem is with creating the values - as you point out, there is no way to add/remove values to these list fields easily and that is what needs to change.

I don't like the playlist solution mainly because it doesn't keep the information with the image - with a field, the information about the image is stored with the image, and that is resilient to moving or renaming the image file.

-Jeff

[sraymond]

Jeff,

I see what you're saying - but (as I've said) it is very inefficient (bordering on impossible) to create a separate field entry for every permutation of "tags".

JRiver:  Any chance of making multiple selections on the list?  This would make fields work as tags - adding the positive aspects Jeff highlighted.

Scott-

[sraymond]

If you had to name the top three functions you do with an editor, what would they be?

For me, for example, the list might be:

1.  Resize (MC does this)
2.  Crop (MC could easily do this)
3.  Convert format -- tiff to jpg, for example

1.  Crop to a fixed aspect ratio (i.e. 2:3) or add letterboxing to get to a fixed aspect ratio.  The cropping needs to show a movable and resizable fixed-ratio window!
2.  Remove red-eyes (maybe I should how to avoid these in the first place?)
3.  Change resolution in anticipation of moving archived photos to some "production" platform (such as sharing on the web or emailing)

And here's an added thought...  why not see if Shutterfly will let you tie into their service?  I'd imagine it's FTPable (even though users can't FTP).  If Shutterfly won't play nice, are there any FTPable printing services?  Oh, yeah, and I like the FTPing function - but it needs a few more options:  I want to be able to choose the destination directory (and create it, if it's not there).  And I'd like MC to save the login information (names and passwords).

Scott-

[JimH]

Scott,
It does resize.  It doesn't do aspect ratios but that would be easy to add.  It does create directories.  It just doesn't make a new directory two or more deep.  We'll fix that.

We have talked with Shutterfly.

Thanks for your suggestions and prodding.

Jim

[lee269]

The biggest single (simple?) improvement for me would be to let me choose the library fields I want in my MC created web page. Having DSC00014 etc seems to defeat the object of tagging my photos.

[sraymond]

The biggest single (simple?) improvement for me would be to let me choose the library fields I want in my MC created web page. Having DSC00014 etc seems to defeat the object of tagging my photos.

This is one reason why I rename all my photos...  it goes a long way in helping the non-MC users identify the photo.

Look previously in this thread for my explanation of what I do to rename the photos.  I've got my fingers crossed the JRiver helps us in this respect!

Scott-

[sraymond]

Thanks for your suggestions and prodding.

I'm just glad you don't interpret it as "nagging"!

Thank you for the feedback - I greatly appreciate it.

Scott-

[lee269]

This is one reason why I rename all my photos...  it goes a long way in helping the non-MC users identify the photo

I agree... but Im still trying to figure out what to call them in MC. Ive got Album/Name, Country/Location/ Name, Year/Album/Name etc. Id like to be able to name them on a web page regardless of filename.

Theres just too many options I think youre simply too far ahead of me here.

[NoCodeUK]

I use dot photo to post my photos to the web.  might be worth talking to them.  they have a ftp update I think.  Good album display.  And unlimited size free accounts!  www.dotphoto.com

Adam

[Wobbley]

For those of you running your own websites AND who own Dreamweaver MX and Fireworks MX (or Studio MX), Macromedia has an extension that automatically creates "navigatable" photo album web pages with a reference to a folder (containing your images) and a few clicks. If you have ANY   questions, email me or send me an IM.

Wobbley

[sraymond]

I think youre simply too far ahead of me here

It's probably more like I'm far too simple!  I name the files like yyyymmdd-<serial>.  I'm just looking for a way to create indexible thumbnails and date seems like the easiest way.

Scott-

[Quisp]

Nila,

If you haven't already, you should check out IMatch at http://www.photools.com. I think a lot of issues related to organizing and creating Web sites will be solved by this software. It's pretty amazing, basically what MC is to music, only more so...

[nila]

Thanks - I'll give it a look

[sraymond]

Bump.  Especially the sequential number part.

About the renaming...

If I want both the filename and the Name to be date-based, it seems to be a lot of work.  

First I have to "rename files from properties".  I'm not sure how I go about adding sequential numbers for the same date (i.e. 2003June11-001 and 2003June11-002) - the closest I can come is first filling the Track #.

Then I need to "fill properties from filename" to get the Name the same as the filename.

Is there an easier way?

Scott-

[Matt]

Bump.  Especially the sequential number part.

Would a calculated field that formatted the date in some filename-friendly way do the trick?  What would that format look like?

[sraymond]

Would a calculated field that formatted the date in some filename-friendly way do the trick?  What would that format look like?

When I "rename the file using properties" the [Date (x)] fields work OK (except I'd prefer the month to be a two digit number (vice spelled out) and the day a two digit number (vice a single digit for 1-9)), but the sequential number is a bit hard.

I name my files "yyyymmdd-<sequential number>", i.e. 20030607-001, 20030607-002, etc.

Could a calculated field address the sequential number?  I've been using the "fill track number from list order" to do a sequential number and then use the [track #] with the "rename the file using properties".  So the rule is "[Date (year)][Date (month)][Date (day)]-[Track #]".  This works OK, expect track # is only two digits (though I haven't taken more than 100 photos on the same day yet - but it could happen!)

An alternative to the <sequential number> is to add the hours, minutes, and seconds to the date (i.e. yyyymmdd-hhmm-ss).  I wonder if anyone can take more than one picture a second?  My camera sure can't!  So adding [Date (hour)], [Date (minute)], and [Date (second)] to the calculated fields might help with the flexibility (vice a single calculated field with the scheme yyyymmdd-hhmm-ss)

I hope this makes sense to those reading!

Scott-

[sraymond]

The more I consider the new feature:

9. NEW: MC now supports fully flexible, user-created template database fields. (i.e. "[Artist] - [Album]")

I'd be happy with [Date(hourminute)] and [Date(second)] calculated fields.

Then I can use a template field to rename easily...  without worrying about the sequential number.

Scott-