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Primary and Secondary Categories


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As I have said before I've been away from Alamy for a while and now I am just starting to update my image collection to try to bring it in line with latest Alamy requirements.

 

Primary and Secondary categories are pretty new to me, and it does appear to take quite a while to not only set them but to set them appropriately.  The question is, has anyone ascertained yet whether the time spent doing categories really worthwhile?  (I have just short to 7000 images to go through).  How are the categories being used?  Do images with them appear to sell better?

 

Finally, for some images I find it difficult to think of a really appropriate second category - in those cases what's the best option?  Not set the second category?  Set it the same as the first? Or just pick one of the others even if it is only vaguely appropriate.

 

Thanks

Ian.

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I only choose a category if an image obviously fits well into one of the options. Otherwise, I don't bother.

 

Alamy has yet to reveal how categories might be used. Also, the current category list is somewhat lacking IMO. But this has been discussed in another thread...

 

 

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I do try to set at least one category. Very seldom both. Usually only if it is a concept image and also fits another.

None of us know when and if searches eventually will involve categories, so I do it for the "just in case" and "covering my bases" concepts. :D

Betty

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Thanks for the replies - I hadn't realised that they weren't being used yet.  Will be interesting to see how they come into play in the future.  Oh well, I guess I'll just keep setting them and see what happens. 

 

I think the thing that is shocking me more than anything is how much has changed while I have been 'away'.

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You've probably missed several changes and should be grateful you did!  Some of the implemented changes involved a ton of reworking keywords only to have those changes not implemented. Stemming, for instance.

Then there was the use of " " quotes, and [ ] brackets around phrases that did seem to work but made a mess because they didn't transition well to the new AIM. I'm still reworking those messes.

I do like AIM because it suits perfectly the way I work. I tag in Bridge, make commonly used sets of tags in Bridge set as templates.  I also have a basic template. My images, when uploaded, already are tagged and captioned. It's a matter of setting supertags and filling out the Optionals, so prepping is faster than the old way. But those who tag only after upload aren't as happy, and those who tag in Lightroom were unhappy about alphabetical arrival. It made it hard for single tags proximity to work as well. For instance, when I tag in Bridge, the single tags: storm,clouds, arrive next to each other, so it works for proximity. In LR, clouds, then other tags, then storm. You've lost proximity which makes the image further down in a search using "storm clouds". 

The way to get around it is to use the phrase, storm clouds.

Betty

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Hi Betty,

 

Thanks for the reply.  I wasn't aware of the 'proximity' thing.  I'm effectively still using " " and [ ].  I do almost all my tagging in LR, but Jim Keir's Lightroom Alamy Bridge has a priority sorting algorithm which does a pretty good job of shuffling the keywords so that the most appropriate are at the front and the then the top 10 get chosen as the super tags.  For my images, it works pretty well, and I only need to do a few tweeks to what it has selected once everything is here.  I can also set all the optional data in LR and transmit that via the plug-in.  I've spent a little time this week developing a set of smart collections which tell me exactly which images are missing which bits of optional data - including the primary and secondary categories.  So hopefully it won't take me too long to bring my pre-AIM images up to scratch - I'm just doing a handful each day until I get there.

 

Ian.

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I posted the following in the Alamy suggestions forum:

 

(I note that the use, or not, of categories by the contributor has reared it's head again.

 

What I would like to know is, are the categories in AIM being used by Alamy yet?

 

I also note that Alamy have for some time had images sorted by category on their homepage. Are Alamy curating a selection themselves?

 

There are 56 categories for the customer to search according to the homepage so why are the contributors only given 23 categories to select for their images which also do not reflect those on the Alamy homepage?

 

Allan

 

Surely it makes sense to have both lists of categories in AIM and on Alamy homepage the same.)

 

ITMA

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18 minutes ago, Allan Bell said:

I posted the following in the Alamy suggestions forum:

 

(I note that the use, or not, of categories by the contributor has reared it's head again.

 

What I would like to know is, are the categories in AIM being used by Alamy yet?

 

I also note that Alamy have for some time had images sorted by category on their homepage. Are Alamy curating a selection themselves?

 

There are 56 categories for the customer to search according to the homepage so why are the contributors only given 23 categories to select for their images which also do not reflect those on the Alamy homepage?

 

Allan

 

Surely it makes sense to have both lists of categories in AIM and on Alamy homepage the same.)

 

ITMA

All fair questions.  Especially the last one.

 

If 23 becomes 56 just after I have finished categorising ~7000 images and I have revisit them to check if any need recategorising then I I won't be happy. 

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23 hours ago, IanButty said:

 

 

All fair questions.  Especially the last one.

 

If 23 becomes 56 just after I have finished categorising ~7000 images and I have revisit them to check if any need recategorising then I I won't be happy. 

 

Sorry Ian.:(

 

Allan

 

 

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