Two parents for the same keyword?

[ralphlouzon]

Hi everyone,

I wonder if it is possible to assign two parents to the same keyword.

Example: A parent keyword STUDIO for various studio things (still life for instance) and portraits. A parent keyword PORTRAIT for general portrait stuff, studio or not.
And a child keyword XXX for a person shot in portrait and in the studio.

Any option to have this XXX kw in both STUDIO and PORTRAIT? Any trick?

How do you manage this kind of situation?

Thanks

[patrickl32183333]

Yes you can for sure. You can't have a same keyword with the same name on the same level. But you can have the same keyword with the same name as long as they are each under a different parent.

[JohanElzenga]

You can do this, but why would you? It makes more sense not to use a parent/child hierarchy in this example.

[ralphlouzon]

I probably wasn't clear... The purpose is to avoid to double assigning the same keyword to the same set of pictures: "JohnDoe < Studio" and "JohnDoe < Portrait" in my example.
Anyway, it seems to be impossible.

Thank you

[JohanElzenga]

You were clear, and that is why I advised not to use a parent/child hierarchy. If you simply use three separate keywords, 'JohnDoe', 'Studio' and 'Portrait', then you'll never have to double assign a keyword. If it is a picture of John Doe, then you assign 'JohnDoe'. If it is a portrait of him, then you assign 'Portrait' as well. If this portrait was shot in a studio then you assign 'Studio' as well. If this portret was not shot in a studio then you do not assign 'Studio'. If it is not a portrait but it was shot in a studio, then this picture will have the keywords 'JohnDoe' and 'Studio', but not 'Portrait'. It's as simple as that.

[dj_paige]

I probably wasn't clear... The purpose is to avoid to double assigning the same keyword to the same set of pictures: "JohnDoe < Studio" and "JohnDoe < Portrait" in my example.
Anyway, it seems to be impossible.

Thank you

By @ralphlouzon

Person's name, and whether or not the photo is a Studio or a Portraint photo, should not be nested keywords, as logically, they are not nested. They should be independent keywords.

[Lumigraphics]

Yes, remember that keywords are WRITTEN as plain text into a file. The graphics viewer is what interprets them as nested/hierarchical or not.

And determining how to organize keywords is purely logical, based on your needs. There is no right or wrong, just what works to help find your files.

[ralphlouzon]

Ok, I understand. Not sure that I don't need nested person names keywords though...

Unless it is possible to exclude some keywords in a metadata search, but I didn't find how. For example typing "John Doe" and excluding "Studio" to find out outdoor or casual portraits of John Doe and not the studio ones. Do you think there is a way to do that?

[JohanElzenga]

Ok, I understand. Not sure that I don't need nested person names keywords though...

By @ralphlouzon

Nested person keywords sounds logical. After all, they are often called 'parent' and 'child' keywords. In practise it is ill advised to really nest parent and child person keywords, for the following reason. If Jane Doe is the daughter of John Doe and so you make Jane Doe a child keyword of John Doe, then Lightroom will assume that every picture of Jane Doe is also a picture of John Doe. Just like every picture of Death Valley is a picture taken in California. In reality this is of course nonsense, however. You will have pictures of Jane Doe without her father in the picture, so you do not want to find these photos when you search for John Doe.

[dj_paige]

For my "person" keywords, they look like this:

Doe Family

---- John

---- Emily

---- Jane

---- Herb

---- Snuggles the Dog