sirvive Loc: South Louisiana

To delete large numbers of unwanted images ... I use this method:
Tag the keepers with a star rating, 1 is fine to indicate possibilities. (More efficient to choose the keepers than the rejects)
In Grid view, filter the folder to show all with a 1 star or greater rating .
Then choose Select All for that selection.
Now turn off the star filter; you will see all of the files with the starred ones still selected.
In EDIT, choose Invert Selection; that will select all of the un-starred images.
Hit "X" to reject all of the selected images at once.
Finally choose "delete rejected photos" and after a warning, all of the rejects will be deleted.

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

Personally, I prefer marking the losers for deletion than marking the keepers for keeping. I get distracted sometimes. If I load a pile of photos into LR, they are all unmarked. If at that point I am distracted and leave it all for later, the last download is all unmarked. If I do another download, forgetting that I have one unfinished culling job, I will be looking at the 'previous import group which will show what I just downloaded and will ignore the unfinished culling job. If I then mark the keepers, then invert, then delete all the inverted marked items, I have deleted the unfinished culling job.

Yes, marking the losers results in more files being marked, but so what? LR doesn't care about the number. And you have to look at all the images while culling to determine whether to mark them or not.

For that reason I mark the losers as rejects. Then reject them. In my workflow I actually mark the keepers also (with the red color label). Now I have a set of real losers marked for deletion, a bunch of (possible) keepers marked red for editing*, and a bunch unmarked. That tells me the status of any given image. If I see any rejects, I can delete them. If I see any red labels it means they need to be edited. If I see an image without any flags or labels, it means I can probably delete it from the catalog but leave it on the disk just in case I might need one later.

As far as the time involved, culling is moderately quick. The thing that takes the most time for me is keywording. When I import photos to LR I can add keywords that apply to all the images. But some images will need more. I really like to add the names of people appearing in any given image in the keywords for that image. That is what takes me most time. Particularly when I shot my daughter's wedding. I had to do some research since there were people I didn't know in the photos. I don't usually include ALL the people in a photo, only the ones who appear prominently in the photo. The background people are just background people.

Having names in the keywords allows me to find all the photos that show that person. I have found many occasions to exercise that ability, particularly at my age, when memorial services pop up with annoying frequency.

* Marking something as a keeper in the culling process doesn't always mean it's a keeper. I'm doing the culling fairly rapidly so I look at the overall picture. When I get to editing I look in more detail and that frequently means I need to get rid of that image (or possibly substitute an unmarked image nearby so the unmarked images don't get removed from the catalog until the editing is complete).

Hip Coyote

See if this makes sense.

Import all the photos in LR. Then select the pics you want to keep/ work on/ etc. by depressing “P”. That will flag those photos as photos you pick. In LR you can then filter for flagged or unflagged photos or any number of combinations. Once you are satisfied that the non flagged pics are
Indeed to be deleted, filter for unflagged photos, select all, delete.

I tend to do this but I keep the non selected pics from a trip or event until I am sure I have everything I needed. But once I make my little books, do prints, ID pics I might want to work on later for my photo club contest, I delete thousands of shots.

Works for me.

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

My wife was an archivist. She beat into me "Always keep the original".
I was a packrat. I kept everything, but I did delete the real junk (OOF, photos of my foot, test photos looking for sensor spots...)

So I may delete the images from the Lightroom catalog, but I keep the images on the disk.
They will be deleted when I'm deleted.

SuperflyTNT Loc: Manassas VA

You don’t really need the smart collection. Just filter out those marked to keep, select all remaining, apply the “X” and delete all rejected.
My actual process is different though. I tab through and X the obvious deletions, (glad to hear that auto advance trick. I’ll be trying it). If I have more than one similar image that needs a closer look I don’t X yet. After my first pass I do the delete rejected then I do another pass, this time comparing similar photos to pick the best and do the same thing.

Hip Coyote

I strongly disagree. If you are talking historically significant documents then of course, one must archive everything. The President writes a note, that is kept. But in the case of your photos, say you have taken 10 pics of your cat. 9 are fuzzy, the cat is not cooperating, whatever. There is one photo that is a keeper. Keeping the 9 out of 10 makes no sense. And I guarantee that when you pass on to the great photography symposium in the sky, your family will probably look at that mess and hit the delete button fopr the entire mess. I would not blame them. The word to remember is "curate." Curate would be a kindness for your heirs, and I suspect force you to become a better judge of your photography. Curate.

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

No problem. The non-keeper photos of my cat will stay as raw files, in the raw file folder. My family will never know what to do with the raw files.

PS: most of my family are dog people. But the same comment applies to the non-keeper-non-cat photos.

Hip Coyote

Cats are evil. Just sayin

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

But they're cute evil.

Until they grow up.