AzPicLady Loc: Behind the camera!

I simply use Windows to "sort" my images. Most of my work is connected to travels, so I simply name the file by the trip name. Easy to remember and find. The problem comes in the places I frequent on an on-going basis - like the Arboretum, or the Salt River. I was doing those by years but soon learned that I couldn't remember what year I took a particular image. So I discarded the annual separation and threw all the images into one file. But the file got huge, so I ended up breaking them into subjects: cactus, flowers, etc. That makes images a LOT easier to find.

I have lots of external hard drives, so adding my latest images to the most recent HD does sort of keep a chronological order. I also write on the outside of the HD what is on it. I have recently assigned one particular HD to my collection of images used for bookmarks and cards, and because there are so many, the Arboretum pictures.

Jimmy T Loc: Virginia

Lots of great ideas prior to my post!
Since I stopped using LR, here is my "Windoze" process:
Click on Search "PC"
Click on "Pictures"
Click on (add a) "New Folder"
Name the new folder (Year-Month-Day) as follows: 2021-09-03 Jays.Big.Wedding.Bash.on.the.OBX (Something Really Descriptive with keywords)
Take great care to be consistent when adding the date.
Then place the camera memory card, with new files in the card reader, click and drag/copy/move the new picture files to the new folder.
This new folder is as searchable as your "New Folder(s)" name is.

I keep ALL of the original RAW/jpg files and ALL Changes to that file. All changes are sequentially identified by "XX.01/02/03, or by XXX-JAT-Final.jpg/DNG/etc."
I realize that my process is not for everyone, but it works for me and it makes me . . .
Smile,
JimmyT Sends
Edit: 1. Each day of shooting receives a "New Folder", 2021-09-03 followed by folder 2021-09-04, etc.
2. Frequently used folders for "New" pics or projects like calendars etc. receive future dates like 2030-01-01 XXXXXX, etc.

DL Loc: St. Petersburg, Fl and Island Park, Idaho

I use lightroom. I made albums for certain things , for instance - VACATIONS -. In that album I make a folder for each vacation I take and name the folder for the place I went. I have a cabin in the west that I go to every year so I have an album named CABIN and I have folders in that album named for each year. I also have folders which are not in albums such as - 2021 MOMS 100th BIRTHDAY -.Using this method it is easy to see a whole group of photos pertaining to a certain event. I also make good use of keywords. Every photo gets a year keyword. After the year I use keywords for people, places, holidays, events etc. The more keywords the better. I take a lot of pictures of wildlife out west for instance. I label them all with the keyword wildlife and then I use a keyword for each animal like Moose, Bear, fox, etc. so I can look at all wildlife pics or just a species. It took a long time when I started to organize all my photos but once you have the old photos done it only take a few seconds to do your new imports. I think this is the best program for organizing but I strongly suggest you think about what albums and folders you want to set up when you start so you don't have to go back and redo. With keywords some would argue that folders aren't necessary but I like the album, folders, and keywords system. I use the Cloud version of Lightroom and I have the app on my phone also. Friends are amazed at how quick I can pull up a particular photo to show them out of all the photos I have. Whatever program or system you use think long and hard about how to organize them so you won't have to redo it later. I think lightroom, with its keywords, is the easiest and best by far.

StevenG Loc: Long Island, NY

Lightroom

billnikon Loc: Pennsylvania/Ohio/Florida/Maui/Oregon/Vermont

I save only my best images to two external hard drives, and thumb drives, after calling on my memory cards, I reformat them.

Picture Taker Loc: Michigan Thumb

First of all I have 2 sets of files (lost a hard drive with pictures, now have 2 sets). The firs is as taken by date (today 210903) so they are stored in sequence the other set bis by location or incident. (Country/state, etc. or Air show,etc)

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Since I was a teen yearbook photographer putting each roll of 35mm negatives or slides in chronological order and labeling its topic, I have continued to do so. That has made it easy to remember most of the events from 50+ years ago as if I were just there!

I copy all files from a camera card (SDXC) to a folder on my Mac. I give that folder a topic label (or split it into more folders if there is more than one event or project or subject deserving of its own folder). Then I put it in a YEAR folder in my Mac's Pictures folder.

Once the folder is located, I open Lightroom Classic and import the files from that folder to the catalog to begin the culling and rating process. Obvious misfires (awful exposures, blurred images, images I would not line a bird cage with...) are deleted from disk. The remaining images are rated from zero to five stars. I develop those images in the Develop module, starting with five star images first. Inevitably, as I work, I'll delete a few more files from disk.

Once I've developed the images I like, including trips out to Photoshop or other plug-ins, I'll export them to JPEG folders for various uses (labs, Internet, social media, proofs...).

DWU2 Loc: Phoenix Arizona area

I agree completely about Lightroom (Classic). I use key words and star ratings, and sometimes color flags. In addition, I create directories by year, then by date with description of event. So, I'll have a folder \photos\2021, and within that subfolders titled 2021-05-18 New Car or 2021-08-20 Anniversary Party, etc.

rmalarz Loc: Tempe, Arizona

Phil, I should add that my disk file structure facilitates finding photos easily. Each camera has its own directory. The directories are
Year
--Month
-----Date suffixed with Roll number (session number for digital)
--Bob

PHRubin Loc: Nashville TN USA

You missed my point - I keep the SOOC copies there, the processed ones are organized by subject. That way if I want, at a later date I can revert back to the original.

K2KImages

I understand your method. Let me offer a suggestion. Having worked with db's for many years its important to have unique file names. Hence I use the default camera name ie dsc_xxxx. To keep them unique I auto save the first 3 characters as to the camera and sequence. Example: 750_xxxx when images turns close to 9999 I set the camera file to 751_xxxx. I do this for all bodys to keep them unique. 851_xxxx. I never have a duplicate. Also my file structure is Photos/fauna/heron or Photos/flora/carnation etc. This way I always can find them. The date is in the metadata. Its then a simple matter of keywording and placing them in the named folder. Just another way of organizing. Thanks for your method.

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

It is not important for a database to have unique file names. It's the path that's important, so duplicate file names are OK as long as they have different paths (are in different folders).

But the file name is not very useful as far as finding a photo unless you have a really fabulous memory (which I do not). So I discard the file name DSC_5423 in favor of "Suzie's Birthday 20170623 12440715". That way the file name can be used in a search. Of course only the "Suzie's Birthday" part of it is really useful in searching for a subject. The date and time (to 0.01 second) are only useful for making the file name unique (since they are all going to be in the same folder). I occasionally use bursts of shots, hence the 0.01 time granularity is important. Including the datetime also means I don't have to recall just when an event took place (which is not one of my skills). The only part of the file name I keep is the extension, usually .NEF (as a Nikon user). I have never had occasion to refer to the numeric portion of the original camera file name.

But I rarely search by file name anyway. There are plenty of keywords that I add that make the search more flexible. The only reason I put the generic subject on the file name is so my family, who doesn't know how to use the Lightroom database, has a chance to find the images they may be interested in.

PHRubin Loc: Nashville TN USA

While I didn't mention it, I do that. For files from my Lumix pocket cameras I use a different file naming sequence then my 80D, and for uniqueness, files from the T2i are labeled T2i_xxxx.jpg I use the identical file names for the processed files, but have them in different folders named for the subject.

jensonmd Loc: Freeland, MI

I have found a good and simple way that works for me is Google Photos. My smartphone photos to my galaxy and are automatically transferred to Google Photos. My Nikon pictures are downloaded and imported to Google Photos where they are saved to Google Cloud. From there I can categorize them by importing them to Albums, dated chronologically or however. Google Photos gives me the option of adjusting, cropping or altering my photos as necessary.
So far, it works for me

nealbralley Loc: Kansas

Phil,

I manage my photos by placing them in named folders identified by four digit year, two digit month, and two digit day, then I log those folders in an Excel spreadsheet. I simply have the date, then I have a second field identify the general types of photos that I have in those folders by day. If I suspect I may really be looking for an image again, I will highlight by color, italics, or bold font an image. That way when I go looking for something later, I can find it pretty quickly. Back up that spreadsheet once in a while too!

I back up all my photo folders into two external hard drives because I once had one external hard drive lock-up. My laptop has nowhere near the storage capacity for all of these photos. I have two active sets of 4 TB drives holding images. I don't view myself as being a high capacity or high volume photographer, but it is still a lot of photos.

It works pretty well for me.