If you took the time to establish detailed keyword hierarchies, or synonym lists, you could add a single word and all of the other terms would also get attached. I have not found this to be worth my time and effort but our needs may vary. If you decide that this is worth the effort then I would encourage you to build your lists using a text editor rather than Photoshop Lightroom’s Keyword List panel. See http://lightroomsecrets.com/2009/04/building-keyword-lists-outside-of-lightroom/ for more advice.

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David Marx

Would there be a way of adding a keyword set called for example “finches” and in it have 9 different kinds of finches. When I then click , say Bullfinch, all of the obvious keywords are added as well? i.e. Outdoor photography, Wildlife, Bird, Finch, and Bullfinch. So with one click I have added loads of keywords instead of clicking five times.

Cheers!

First, are you sure that you are in the right Lightroom Catalog? Second, in your preferences under the presets tab is the “Store Presets with Catalog” option turned on? Did you change this switch recently? Where we would storing your presets before things went missing? If you are indeed in the right Catalog then I bet this switch is the culprit.

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David Marx

Thanks for the kind words about the tutorial. I hope that keywords and metadata help. You might also find these tutorials useful:

http://thelightroomlab.com/2010/06/importing-images-creating-an-import-preset-and-copying-in-files-from-a-digital-camera-memory-card-with-adobe-photoshop-lightroom-3/
http://thelightroomlab.com/2010/08/searching-with-metadata-in-adobe-photoshop-lightroom/
http://thelightroomlab.com/2010/12/selection-secrets-in-adobe-photoshop-lightroom/
http://thelightroomlab.com/2010/11/introduction-to-collections-in-adobe-photoshop-lightroom/
http://thelightroomlab.com/2010/12/tracking-sales-and-submissions-using-collection-sets-in-adobe-photoshop-lightroom/

Good luck getting all those mountain bike racing photos organized.

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David Marx

This issue seems similar to another problem I had recently – when uploading my photos I noticed instead of my 2011 copyright information showing (the 2011 + my name) it said “none” in the metadata file – when I clicked to add my 2011 info it didn’t exist any more, nor my 2007-2010 info. EVerything was still filled out though when I went to retype in my info, except for the “title” of the metadata (2011 + name).

Can you help me figure this out? Thank you!

Big kudos for a great tutorial. I am looking at Light Room purely for this feature, believe it or not. I work for the biggest mountain biking race in the world, The Absa Cape Epic. We have a huge bank of Images from the race’s inception until present but no system in place for filing the images other than in simple folders. Light Room has been recommended as the most appropriate option so here’s hoping we get it.

I don’t know of a similar feature for the Adobe Bridge. You could get clever and build something similar yourself with a utility like TextExpander.

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David Marx