UKC

Can anyone recommend a good (+free or cheap) photos cataloguing program?

I've got over 20,000 photos that I want to tag with searchable keywords. I don't care about editing the photos - I've already got tools for that. Ideally I want the keywords written into the photo files with IPTC, so that I'm not tied to using a single catalogue program or operating system.

Many thanks

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC:

Lightroom
Picaso
IView

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC:
I have used Portfolio from http://www.extensis.com/en/home.jsp for several years.
I'm one version behind the latest but very happy with it.
Its keyword/cataloguing can be used in several ways from automatically deconstructing file paths into keywords right down to manual addition or picking from a list.
It can both extract and insert metadata, comes in Mac and Windows versions along with all the plug-ins for raw files. There's even a powerful server version.
Only problem is it seems to have gone up in price recently.
In my experience in this software field, 'cheap' = very basic and 'free' = time-limited.

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC:

lightroom
portfolio
iView

as said above, cheap or free is not good in this arena

Ian

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC:

Haven't used this library myself, but sounds like you could roll your own?

http://www.exiv2.org/index.html

In reply to Matthew B: Yes, I suppose I could, but life is too short!

I wish Exifer was being developed - it is brilliant for browsing photos, doing slideshows, and has extensive EXIF/IPTC editing controls, but the author stopped developing it 4 years ago and it doesn't have any keyword searching facilities.

If he'd made it open source, I'd definitely be working on improving it.

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC:

There's a link to a list of projects already using that library... had a nose at a couple and they didn't look amazing, but might be worth a proper look:

http://del.icio.us/tag/exiv2app?setcount=100

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC: You can do what you want in Adobe Lightroom, while it's a free beta???

TTG

In reply to O Mighty Tim: And then when the beta stops working and I have to fork out £XXX? No thanks!

I've downloaded a bunch of cataloguing programs to try - idImager sounds good, and there is a completely free 'Lite' version.

I bought a licence for iMatch a few months back after trying the demo and being impressed, but soon gave up using it. The technical features were great but the useability / UI was a nightmare.

In reply to haydn: Just tried kaImages. Has all the features I need, but it is so SLOW and really unfriendly. Takes an age to index a few hundred files, then searching is slow and adding new keywords is a right pain. Avoid!

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC:
I couldnt live without Photo Mechanic.
For captioning/copyright/data its the bomb! So fast and sharp.It makes snapping, captioning and wiring under deadline pressure a lot less stressful
Ace
www.camerabits.com..

In reply to Barry Chocolate: I'm in danger of swamping my PC with programmes- I'm using CS2 and Nikon Capture NX, so I don't want Lightroom too, so would Photo Mechanic be a simple /effective way of keeping track?

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC:

J uses the s/w that came with his Nikon camera - seems to do what you're after. You'll have a pop round some time and take a look...

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC:
Will Canon Ex Browser not do it (not sure about your IPTC malarkey right enough).

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC:

Isn't Adobe Photo Album Free? Sure I downloaded a copy of version 3.0 from Adobe. Not got access to that PC at the moment though.

I find it okay to use. Mind you, I also use Photoshop Elements for editing on another PC. So compatibility of the catalogues helps a lot.

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC:
How did you get on in your quest, Nick?

In reply to haydn: Ended up downloading a whole load of programs, and I'm still evaluating them Some aren't good at handling IPTC tags (title, keywords, author, etc) in JPEGs so I've binned them.

I'm using Exifer to tag all my photos, but it doesn't have a keyword searching interface.

I quite like ACDSee and ThumbsPlus, but I've got about a dozen other programs to install and try (!)

In reply to Nick Smith - UKC:

Try breeze browser - http://www.breezesys.com/

It's very easy to use, isn't too expensive (£30-£40) and you can download for a free month's trial.

chris.