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User collections

Mark Johnson

This might be a daft question, but do you need user collections? I mean all my photos are also in my folders, why do I need both, I know some people will use both and organise their photos using both, but I don't need too.

 

Thanks

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Comments

8 comments

Date Votes
  • Permanently deleted user

    Need is in the eye of the beholder.  Or something like that.

    I like the ability to organize my images in multiple ways.   To do that the solution that works for me is a combination of keywords and smart folders.  Sure, I could select the All Images collection and then enter a bunch of search terms.  I do that when needed.  But when I find I'm repeating the same search I'll instead create a smart album.   That puts the desired images a click or two away.   I've smart albums for image year, family members, motorcycles I've owned, etc.

    If you don't have a need to do that don't use them.  Collapsing the User Collections tool will minimize the needed space on your user interface to a single line.

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  • Permanently deleted user

    I rely on folders for my main organization but I use collections when I am preparing a portfolio, posting to a site or evaluating a subset of images. I could star or color rate them but a collection is a much faster way to see images you have already selected and are working on. When I am done I just delete the collection.

    Collections are also handy if you want to work on images across folders. Say you have multiple folders containing snow capped mountains and want to create a series of images. Rather than moving those image out of their original folders you can put them in a collection allowing you to work on them as a set while keeping your images in their proper folder.

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  • Eric Valk

    You can use Capture One entirely without user collections. However, my opinion is that user collections are very useful and I make a lot of use of them.
    Consider one rather nice image I have of my canoe group on the Wind river, Yukon. There are seven people at a campsite. Jan S. is humming it up with some moose antlers. I should file it under “Canoe Club”, “Wilderness Tripping”, “Wind River Trip”, “Humour“.
    The image file is stored in Only one place (and backed up there): the folder: “~/Pictures/2009”
    But I have four or more user collections contains this image. Changes made, and variants added, in one collection are immediately visible in every collection. But there is no uncertainty about where the image file resides, and where to find it in a backup.

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  • BeO
    Top Commenter

    Hi Kiwibloke,


    If you do not see an immediare value using collections/albums that's totally fine, they are not essential in order to work with C1. But they are quite useful for work on images distributed across folders.

    I do have a fairly flat folder structure (using a catalog referencing the images in that "current location", camera/year/month and sometimes a folder beneath for certain events or locations.

    I use collections in addition, e.g. static albums for certain printing projects, books etc.

    And also smart albums (which are basically saved filters which dynamically grow over time when new images which satisfy the filter criteria are added to the catalog), e.g. i have smart albums for images shot with special lenses, or smart albums for certain locations or subjects. And one or the other smart album to keep track where I have published images in the internet.

    These smart albums filter all images for specific keywords or IPTC fields which I fill for those images I want to catalog in that way to quickly find them when I need them.

    I think you will probably quickly find them useful for one or the other use case of yours, if you know how they work. They also load faster than the All images collection.

    My advice though is don't get too obsessed with cataloging work as it can easily eat up a lot of time to do it right for every new image. On the other hand it might save you time later. That's all about personal preference I think.

    Most of the time I just work with the "recent imports" collection and my folder structure, but I do not want to miss the collections anymore.

    regards

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  • BeO
    Top Commenter

    Wow, this thread qualifies for the the most-replies-within-an-hour award... :-)

     

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  • Mark Johnson

    Hey thanks for all the replies, they have given me some ideas.

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  • Mark Johnson

    Thanks Walter, yes I see a lot of possibilities now I have culled most of my user collections, I'll build them back up organising as I go. 

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  • Warren Katchmar

    Hi,

    I am late to this tread . . . but, thought it may be worth asking.

    I would like to delete a "User Collections" folder, a smart folder.  But before I do that, I would like to know what happens to the pictures in said folder?  Are my originals pics going to be okay???

    Thanks

     

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