- Getting started
- Organizing folders
- Using collections to organize images
- Taking your collections on the road
- Using flags and ratings
- Adding metadata
- Tagging faces in the People view
- Organizing photos by location
- Finding and filtering files
- Reconnecting missing files and folders
- Review questions
- Review answers
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
Finding and filtering files
Now that you’re familiar with the different techniques for categorizing and marking your photos, it’s time to see some results. Next you’ll look at how easy it is to search and sort your images once they’ve been prepared in this way. You can now filter your images by rating or label or search for specific keywords, GPS locations and other metadata. There are numerous ways to find the images you need, but one of the most convenient is to use the Filter bar across the top of the Grid view.
Using the Filter bar to find photos
If you don’t see the Filter bar above the Grid view, press the backslash key (\) or choose View > Show Filter Bar. In the Folders panel, select the Lesson 4 folder. If you don’t see all eleven photos, choose Library > Show Photos In Subfolders.
The Filter bar picker contains three filter types: Text, Attribute, and Metadata; choose any of these and the Filter bar will expand to display the settings and controls you’ll use to set up a filtered search. You can either use the different filters separately or combine them for a more sophisticated search.
Use the Text filter to search any text attached to your images, including filenames, keywords, captions, and the EXIF and IPTC metadata. The Attribute filter searches your photos by flag status, star rating, color label, or copy status. The Metadata filter enables you to set up to eight columns of criteria to refine your search; choose from the menu at the right end of a column header to add or remove a column.
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If the Text or Metadata filters are active, click None to disable them. Click Attribute to activate the Attribute filters. If any of the flag filters is still active from the previous exercise, click the highlighted flag in the Filter bar to disable it, or choose Library > Filter By Flag > Reset This Filter.
In the Rating controls, click the third star to search for any image with a rating of three stars or higher.
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The grid view displays only the three images to which you’ve applied a star rating.
There are many options for refining your search. Click Text in the header of the Filter bar to add an additional filter. In the Text filter bar, open the first menu to see the search target options. You can narrow the search to Filename, Copy Name, Title, Caption, Keywords, or searchable IPTC and EXIF metadata, but for this exercise you can choose Any Searchable Field as the search target. Click the second menu and choose Contains All.
In the search text box, type France. Your narrowed search returns only one image in the Grid view.
In the Rating controls, click the third star to disable the current Rating filter or choose Library > Filter By Rating > Reset This Filter. Click Attribute in the header of the Filter bar to close the Attribute filter controls.
In the Text filter bar, clear the search term “France” by clicking the x icon at the right of the text box, and then type Europe.
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Tip
In the search text box, add an exclamation mark (!) before any word to exclude it from the results. Add a plus sign (+) before any word to apply the “Starting With” rule only to that word. Add a plus sign (+) after a word to apply the “Ending With” rule only to that word.
The Grid view now displays all eleven of the photos in the Lesson 4 folder.
In the search text box, type a space after the word Europe, and then type !Copenhagen (note the exclamation mark). The search is narrowed to find those images in the Lesson 4 folder with searchable text that contains the word Europe, but does not contain the word Copenhagen. The Grid view now displays three photos. Leave the Text filter set as it is for the next exercise.
Using the Metadata filter
Click Metadata in the header of the Filter bar to open the Metadata filter pane. Choose Default Columns from the menu at the far right of the Filter bar header.
Click Date in the header of the first column to see the wide range of search criteria from which you can choose for each of up to eight columns. Choose Aspect Ratio from the menu as the criteria for the first column, and then choose Landscape from the Aspect Ratio options in the column. The selection in the Grid view is narrowed to the single image with a horizontal format.
Click Text in the header of the Filter bar to disable the Text filter. This search returns five photos from the Lesson 4 folder. In the Aspect Ratio column, click Portrait to find the other six Lesson 4 images.
Click to close the lock icon at the right of the Filter bar header to lock the current filter so that it remains active when you change the image source for the search.
Click the All Photographs listing in the Catalog panel. The Grid view now displays every portrait format image in your catalog.
As you can see, there are endless possibilities for combining filters to find just the image you’re looking for.
Click None in the Filter bar to disable all filters. Click the Lesson 4 folder in the Folders panel.
Using the filters in the Filmstrip
The Attribute filter controls are also available in the header of the Filmstrip. As in the Filter bar the Filter Presets menu lists filter presets and offers the option to save your filter settings as a custom preset, which will then be added to the menu.
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The Default Columns preset opens the four default columns of the Metadata search options: Date, Camera, Lens, and Label. Choose Filters Off to turn off all filters and collapse the Filter bar. Select the Flagged preset to display photos with a Pick flag. Use the Location Columns preset to filter photos by their Country, State/Province, City, and Location metadata. The Rated filter preset displays any photos that match the current star rating criteria. Choose Unrated to see all the photos without a star rating or Used and Unused to see which pictures have been included in projects.
Tip
If you don’t see any filter presets in the presets menu, open Lightroom Preferences and click Restore Library Filter Presets under Lightroom Defaults on the Presets tab.
Choose Flagged from the Filter Presets menu at the top right of the Filmstrip. The Attribute filter bar opens above the Grid view. The Grid view and the Filmstrip show only one photo that you flagged as a pick in a previous exercise.
Click the white flag icon in the header of the Filmstrip to disable the current filter, and then click the red color label button. If you don’t see the color label buttons in the header of the Filmstrip, click the word Filter to the left of the flag buttons. The Attribute filter settings change in the Filter bar above the Grid view and both the Grid view and the filmstrip display only the image that you labeled with the Painter tool.
TipTo save time and effort setting up searches, save your filter settings as a new preset. Specify criteria for any combination of Text, Attribute, and Metadata filters. Then choose Save Current Settings As New Preset from the Custom Filter menu in the Filter bar or the Filmstrip.
To disable all filters and display all the images in the Lesson 4 folder, choose Filters Off from the Filter Presets menu or click the switch at the far right of the Filmstrip’s header.
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