P: Allow smart collections to reference other smart collections or library filter presets

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

It would be very useful if the smart collections could work recursively. What I mean is that the filters on the upper lever would work on all collections under that collection and the lower level collections could have additional filters

e.g.

| Landscape
| |- 5 stars
| |- marked red
Portraits
| |-John
| | |-5 stars
| | |-B&W
| |-Mary
|-5 stars
|-B&W

and so forth. This would make lot of organizing much more straight forward.

[johnrellis]

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"implement Boolean logic statements"

Smart collections do offer full boolean logic:

Match All: AND

Match Any: OR

Match None: NOT

You can get subexpressions by holding down Alt / Opt when you click the + button:

[johnrellis]

Moderators, @Rikk Flohr: Photography, please merge with this Idea:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-ideas/p-allow-smart-collections-to-reference-other-...

[upsidedownjim2]

I'm looking for smart collections to inherit criteria from its collection set or any smart collection can inherit criteria from a collection above it. 

For my use, I'd like to have a organizational template for every shoot. So I can have as an example

- COLLECTION YYYY-MM-DD_EVENT

--01_ALL

--02_Rejected

--03_Picked

--04_SLX1

--05_SLX2

--06_Export

----01_Instagram

----02_Print

----03_ETC

Currently, I can duplicate the collection set but then have to manually update each smart collection with the new capture date. If I could just adjust the capture date on the main collection set it would save a ton of time. 

In addition, the smart collection panel width is very narrow - i forget off hand if it can be widened but names get truncated quicky. Also, would like on phot import to add to smart collection template, update criteria. Save a few steps after import. 

I know you can sort with folder and metadata but you have to manually reset these parameters and it wouldn't be  a standardized way to sort and process photos. 

[JohanElzenga]

A smart collection set does not have any criteria. It's just a folder you use to organize smart collections. Smart collections can not reference other smart collections, so I don't think what you want is possible. Maybe there is a plugin that can do this, but I don't know any.

[johnrellis]

As Johan indicated, smart collections don't have the ability to inherit / include the criteria from other smart collections (or collection sets).

If you used Library Filter bar presets rather than smart collections, it could be just as fast with the same number of mouse clicks. For example, I have filter presets "Rejected", "Not Rejected", and "Picked".  It's as fast to click the "Rejected" preset in the Filter bar as to select the smart collection "_02_Rejected". Similarly, if you used workflow keywords to mark photos with "Instagram", "Print", "ETC", you could have filter presets for those as well.

"the smart collection panel width is very narrow"

Hover the mouse over the vertical divider between the left column (with the Collections panel) and Grid view or Loupe view. When the mouse changes to a double arrow, click and drag the divider left or right. 

If that's not wide enough, then on Mac hold down Opt while you drag to make it even wider. Holding down Alt broke on Windows LR years ago, but there's a simple workaround to let you make the columns as wide as you want:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-bugs/p-alt-drag-on-windows-doesn-t-expand-library-p...

[upsidedownjim2]

Thanks for the reply and info. Much appreciated! I had this in the ideas forum but think it got moved. I was trying to suggest a feature to Adobe.

[johnrellis]

Moderators, @Rikk Flohr: Photography, please merge with this popular Idea:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-ideas/p-allow-smart-collections-to-reference-other-...

[upsidedownjim2]

Hi John, thanks for taking the time to reply as well! Appreciate the info. I like the idea of the filter presets but I'm looking at this as more my standardized process for sorting through photos on any given shoot date and be able to reference back by going to that collection set and I think there a lot of other uses.

I can work this way and find it helpful but when I duplicate my template collection set I have to manually update each smart collection to the current capture date. Which is repetitive and tedious. Working with keywords, filters and smart collections would be the same issue, I think.

If there was a "smart collection set" or something like that which could have attributes assigned that get inherited by the smart collections within that set I think that would solve my workflow tedium. or link the criteria of one smart collection into another. Like parenting layers in After Effects.

Not meaning for you to read all of this - just expanding on my idea below and a few other ideas in case Adobe sees it and maybe finds it helpful or I'm out to lunch, who knows!?

I think smart collections can be very powerful and, while I'm not an expert, I think they could be way more powerful. 

For example,  I don't see a way to have a smart collection for annually recurring events (birthdays, holidays, etc). So a "date" criteria - with YYYY or MM or DD being separate criteria or recurring daily,weekly,monthly, annually on a specific date/month, etc. That way for someone's birthday you can have a smart collection for every time there's a capture date of MM-DD, ignoring year.  I know you can keyword the photos then add that to the smart collection but I personally don't like keywording much as there becomes too many terms that I'm reading more than just looking at photos or one year it is keyworded as X and next Y.

Of course, not expecting Adobe to cater to just me but if enough people like that suggestions maybe they'll implement it someday. Hopefully soon.

Thanks for the widen panel info. Yeah I think the issue for me is sub-collection sets get indented, which make sense, but I kind of have the opposite issue as what I mentioned. I have to expand the width which cuts into the photo editing area. I think a horizontal scroll bar in the collections panel (or folder panel) would be helpful. So I can keep the column narrow but scroll horizontally to see the sub-collections. A quicker way would be to have the Premiere, After Effects shortcult of 'tilda' to expand full screen.  So long as the scroll bar doesn't move if I expand other 

While I'm at it - the colour label should extend across the collection name and there should be a shortcut to apply the standard colours ie, 8 green. User option to keep as it is or expand. Easier for the eye, mine at least, to scan if the colour extends vs being small sliver. 

Thanks for reading if anyone did!

[johnrellis]

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@upsidedownjim2: "a "date" criteria - with YYYY or MM or DD being separate criteria or recurring daily,weekly,monthly, annually on a specific date/month, etc. "

Adobe added Month and Day criteria to the Filter bar's Metadata browser in LR 11.0:

But for reasons known only to them, they didn't add them to smart collections. (Adobe typically doesn't sweat these details -- there are a few criteria only  available to smart collections and a few only to filters.)

[johnrellis]

@upsidedownjim2: "the colour label should extend across the collection"

Please add your feedback to this existing Idea and be sure to upvote it in the upper-left corner:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-ideas/p-color-coding-text-in-collections-folders-an...

I know others have expressed similar opinions, but it appears they haven't been coalesced into a single Idea yet.

[upsidedownjim2]

Thanks, good to know! Yes, I think it would be helpful to have it in smart collection criteria. 

What confuses me about the UI/UX design of LR, to my understanding, is we aren't really supposed to work from folders for organization since it would move files around on the disk and Adobe created "Collections" in the first place for organization but I don't think they develop the concept and UI/UX further. I presume they need to devote dev time and money to flashier selling features like "AI removal" or "AI Denoise". Maybe change smart collections to "AI collections" and we'd see improvements 🙂 

[upsidedownjim2]

Thanks! I commented and upvoted on that link. 

[johnrellis]

Ther are tools other than collections for organization. LR provides a rich set of tools for organizing by metadata, most importantly keywords. Collections provide a single dimension for organizing your photos, while keywords and other metadata provide many dimensions.