Photo management tool

[Christoffee]

Hello everyone

I have a very simple workflow requirement, and I wonder whether any of you can help me.

I have all my family photos on my Mac, organised in folders by year and then by quarter (I ditched iPhoto years ago and have decided I didn't want to be locked into a database anymore). Every so often I like to a photo printing session. The last time I did this I did it with Mylio.

Mylio allowed me to tag photos on the computer or on my phone, view all these tagged photos, then copy all these photos to a separate folder (for uploading or USB sticking). Unfortunately, Mylio has changed slightly. It now exports them, which results in bigger files (typically about 3x as big) or I need to start reducing quality. There is no "original" export.

Is there any software out there that will do this for me? It looks like ACDSee and Picktorial will do this, but they don't have iOS apps.

I am happy to pay for an app, particularly if it has facial recognition and a good search facility, but not subscribe.

Thank you

 

[chscag]

Not sure if Pixelmator for iOS does what you want. Take a look and decide.

 

[Christoffee]

Not sure if Pixelmator for iOS does what you want. Take a look and decide.

Cheers buddy. Pixelmator is photo editing, not management.

 

[nicholasg]

Cheers buddy. Pixelmator is photo editing, not management.

You could use Photos with a referenced library i.e. your photos stay in your folders, but you can edit them in Photos and create projects for prints, books etc.

Goto Photos -> Preferences... General

Then unselect "Copy items to the Photos library".

Then import your Photos.

Other tools to manage photos include Lightroom from Adobe or Capture One form Phase One.

 

[Christoffee]

You could use Photos with a referenced library i.e. your photos stay in your folders, but you can edit them in Photos and create projects for prints, books etc.

Goto Photos -> Preferences... General

Then unselect "Copy items to the Photos library".

Then import your Photos.

Other tools to manage photos include Lightroom from Adobe or Capture One form Phase One.

Referenced library library sounds like a great plan. And I’ll check out the other two too. Thank you.

 

[nicholasg]

Referenced library library sounds like a great plan. And I’ll check out the other two too. Thank you.

One other program to keep an eye on is Luminar 2018. It does not have photo management functionality yet, but that has been promised "soon".

 

[robgendreau]

I'm not sure what the issue is with Mylio and how that relates to the tagging. In Mylio you can watch local folders, so that the originals are always there and hence no need to export them at all. Of course a synched image might be just a preview, with the original on another device.

If you've already keyworded the images, you can use just the Finder/Spotlight to find images by keyword. You might have to use the "other" to add a keyword search, but assuming the keywords are in the images (like with JPEGs) Spotlight indexes them. Add "kind" is image, and you've got your images to do with what you wish. The problem is you can't enter the keywords.

Look at Xnview MP. It's a freebie that works well with both flat and hierarchical keywords. Or download Lightroom and just never pay the subscription fee; it'll work even after the trial period for keywording.

 

[Christoffee]

I'm not sure what the issue is with Mylio and how that relates to the tagging. In Mylio you can watch local folders, so that the originals are always there and hence no need to export them at all. Of course a synched image might be just a preview, with the original on another device.

If you've already keyworded the images, you can use just the Finder/Spotlight to find images by keyword. You might have to use the "other" to add a keyword search, but assuming the keywords are in the images (like with JPEGs) Spotlight indexes them. Add "kind" is image, and you've got your images to do with what you wish. The problem is you can't enter the keywords.

Look at Xnview MP. It's a freebie that works well with both flat and hierarchical keywords. Or download Lightroom and just never pay the subscription fee; it'll work even after the trial period for keywording.

Thank you, I think you may have cracked it but I cannot test until Sunday evening.

So, when I tag a photo purple in Mylio, it is tagging the actual file. So then I just use labels in macOS (or whatever they are called now) to search for all the purple photos and away I go. Great work.

 

[maflynn]

[MOD NOTE]
Moving the thread to the Digital Photography forum, so you a more targeted audiance can respond.

I'm testing out ACDSee right now, and there's some stuff that seems ok, and some stuff that I don't like. I'm leaning not to buying it.

There's Capture One. Its very pricey but offers solid DAM (Digital Asset Management) capability, but its strength is editing.
There's Apple's photo app, decent management, i.e., keywording, plus its nicely integrated into apple's ecosystem, i.e., iOS and macOS.
Luminar Currently its an editing only app, but we were promised DAM capability in 2018
On1 PhotoRaw. Another editing only app that the authors promise to add DAM capability in 2018
Adobe LightRoom, this is the 800 lbs gorilla in the room, it does it all. Very good editing, plugin support, very robust DAM, good printing options. The downside? Subscription only, and Adobe seems more focused on the mobile platform. I've cancelled my subscription and I'm about 90% sure I'm wanting to go to Capture One

 

[robgendreau]

Thank you, I think you may have cracked it but I cannot test until Sunday evening.

So, when I tag a photo purple in Mylio, it is tagging the actual file. So then I just use labels in macOS (or whatever they are called now) to search for all the purple photos and away I go. Great work.

If by tag you mean keyword "purple," then you've gotta use Mylio to write it to the image file or its sidecar. I think it does it automatically. If you mean label, they're trickier cuz not all applications support labels in the same way. Ratings should work though. Spotlight indexes keywords. Not sure about labels; the labels one usually sees in the Finder I think are extended file attributes, which are something completely different.