Participant

Question

Rename Keyword Categories in Text-Editor and import in Lightroom

Forum|Forum|8 years ago
December 26, 2017
2 replies
698 views

Hi there

I'm just trying to get my keyword chaos in order by developing a hierarchical structure. Im developing this in a text-editor because i just have a small laptop screen. When new keywords appear, which are not fitting in my existing hierarchy, i have to change/rename my categories/subcategories.

For example; i have the keyword "Austria"

So i put in in:

[WHERE]

Europe

Austria

Than I apply this keyword to a lot of photos (some 2000)

After a while i get the keyword "alps" and "danube" which doesnt fit in my existing system. So i change my system to:

[WHERE]

[Political]

Europe

Austria

[Nature]

[mountains]

[Europe]

Alps

[rivers]

[Europe]

danube

When i import this new system. Lightroom show me then both systems, the old and the new. And i can't delete the old system, because this 2000 photos wich are tagged with "europe" would loose the "europe" tag.

So, at least my question: How can i delete all the keyword categories without loosing the keywords within?

This topic has been closed for replies.

whitefox13

Known Participant

Go into your keyword list, select the keywords you want to delete, one or many the control click (Mac), Right click (PC) and from the menu that appears select "Delete".

StefanWieserAuthor

Participant

I dont want to delete keywords. I want to delete keyword-categories without deleting the keywords within. But thanks for helping.

dj_paige

Legend

So, at least my question: How can i delete all the keyword categories without loosing the keywords within?

I don't think you can do this.

If you want to re-organize your keywords, you need to move the keywords to a different place in the hierarchy entirely in Lightroom, or assign new keywords entirely in Lightroom.

But, if I may be so bold as to suggest a different idea ... you don't need Europe under mountains and Europe under rivers. Europe goes in one place, under Political, but no Europe under mountains and no Europe under Rivers. If you have Europe only under Political, but you want to find only rivers in Europe (and not Africa), then you do search in Lightroom for all photos that have BOTH keywords (Europe and Rivers). It doesn't matter that Rivers is not under Europe, and this also makes the keyword list non-redundant.

StefanWieserAuthor

Participant

Thx for your answer. I feared i would get that one.

And for your suggestion. Its not about finding later all rivers of austria p.e. Its about having a consistent structure for assining the right keywords for a photo. I have a lot of picures of different rivers and lakes and i dont want one category "river and lakes" with about 500 keywords in it. So i want to have some subcategories like [Europe] or [Austria] so i can get some order. The distribution of keywords is also very variable. In the region, where im living my system is more acurate than in other regions.

[Rivers and Lakes]

[Europa]

[Austria]

[Styria]

[Upper Styria]

River 1

River 2

[Lower Styria]

River 1

River 2

[Northamerica]

[Kanada]

River 1

River 2

...

The keywords for rivers and lakes where im living i use on weekly basis. The rivers of canadas i only needed once when i was there for vaccations. Maybe i should use a categorie like [Rivers of Europe] >> [Rivers of Austria]

dj_paige

Legend

I'm still not sure this is the best way to do things. Rivers can travel through many countries. The Danube travels through Slovakia, Germany, Austria, Hungary and so on. Are you still planning to have Danube as a keyword under each of the many countries that it travels through? Lakes, oceans, sometimes mountains would also require keywords under many countries.

I have this:

Places

Austria

Vienna

France

Nice

Orleans

Paris

Germany

Berlin

Stuttgart

Rivers

Danube

Rhine

Rhone

You can still find the photos taken of the Danube this way, and if you want photos taken only of the Danube in Germany, that is easy to do with the Filter Bar. Under your method, you will not be able to easily find all photos taken of the Danube, because you will then have to create a filter that select Danube in Germany, plus Danube in Austria, plus Danube in Slovakia, etc.

You say you want to "get some order" to your keywords. This is, in my opinion, much more orderly than having Danube listed under multiple countries.

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