Matt, Steve, et al., here are my ideas for how Media Center could handle library organization of image files (if a later point contradicts an earlier point, or vice-versa, forgive me, I'm stupid):
Allow me to input the names of people I know (Not really sure what the input form/screen/method would look like). Afterwards, I could then build views kind of like I do smartlists. I'd create a view scheme called, say, "People". Now, each item in the "People" list would be equivalent to an "Artist" for a audio file. And, I would treat pictures with multiple people in them (as most pictures have) in a similar way that MC treats albums with multiple artists. I'm a long-winded as mofo (as you can already tell) at times, so I'm gonna leave out alot of what I'm thinking and head straight for a mock scenario.
1. I select the "<click to add view>" sub-node and create a view called "People / Photo Album", chosing the fields "People" and "Photo Album"
2. I have the ability to pre-enter names of people that I know (i.e. "Chris", "Stephanie", "Mom", "Dad", "Tamara", "Natalie", etc.), and for each name I enter, I have the ability to enter "AKA" names. For example, my name is Chris, so I enter "Chris" as a value in the "People" field. I can select "Chris" and enter comma-delimited (or something like it) values (in some other field, not the "People" field) that I might use to refer to myself in picture tags in case I don't use "Chris" when I tag them (i.e. a picture with the "People" field filled with values such as "Me", or "Wobbley", etc.). I might run into this if someone else takes a picture that includes me, and they tag the picture with "Wobbley" instead of "Chris", then they send that picture to me and I import it. With the "AKA" ability, it'll automatically show up in the series of pictures displayed when I select "Chris" (or "Me", or "Wobbley", etc.) from the "People" pane. So again, for me, I might enter "AKA" values such as "Me", "Wobbley" (a nickname), or my buddy Jon, who often goes by "Duvet" - "Jon" would be the value in the "People" field and "Duvet" would be entered as an "AKA" value.
3. When I select the view scheme I've created, the upper pane splits, showing "People" in the left pane(which lists all legitimate "People" values, as well as all "AKA" values that I have entered - and the display of "AKA" values would be controlled in the "Tools...", "Options...", Images..." window, where I can turn on or turn off the option to "Show 'AKA' names in 'People' pane"), and "Photo Album" in the right pane.
4. Let's assume I have already tagged all of my images with only the "People" values (all other tag field values are empty for all of my pictures), and let's say I have some pictures taken in Seattle during 2001 when I was there for business-related reasons. Again, the "People" pane is showing me a compiled list of all of the unique values used in the "People" and "AKA Name(s)" tag fields found in the tag info of all the image files I have thus far imported. I might also have the ability to add names ad-hoc because I might anticipate using said names as "People" tag values in the future. To carry it even further, perhaps there would be an option to import First Name, First Name / Last Name, or Full Name values from all the contact listings in my Outlook/Outlook Express Contacts folder?...hmmm :-/...
6. I click my name, "Chris" in the "People" pane and the "Photo Album" pane shows two items, "<all>", and "<empty>" because I have not entered any data in the "Photo Album" tag for any of the photo's catalogued by MC.
(continued...)