Keyword Taxonomies in Bridge

In biology, the term taxonomy is used to describe an ordered system for the classification of organisms, indicating their relationships. It is also used in other fields as well, notably User Experience Design, where it’s used to construct a user-centric information architecture. In photography, it’s used to organize vast image libraries.

In this case, we’re talking about a keyword taxonomy, or system of assigning keywords to images which can be used as a search criteria or filter to facilitate location of a single or group of images.

Currently, I am involved in a rather large archiving project in which I am assigning these keywords systematically so as to avoid redundant work later on. It’s not necessary at this time to assign all possible keywords to these images. That is an iterative process that never ends. But it’s essential to assign the most important keywords upfront to make it easier to proceed in the future.

In UX (User Experience Design), the general rule of thumb is to avoid going past two levels of hierarchy. After that, things become complicated. So, as I acquire new images, I assign at least two keywords to each; a primary keyword, and a secondary keyword.

Primary Keywords

These are the top level keywords, the main category under which the respective images will live. This is the most difficult level, because it requires a concrete definition of what the image is, and that is not always an easy task. But, it’s no cause for pause either, as the secondary and subsequent levels will take the burden off “getting it right” the first time.

What these primary keywords are depends largely on the user. If you work solely with portrait photography for example, then it’s likely your primaries go something like, “Headshots”, ”Head and Shoulders”, “Full-Length”, “Group”, etc. Since I work with a broader range of images, my primary keywords are the genres; “Abstract”, “Architecture”, “Landscape”, “Nature”, “Portrait”, etc. I collect the images in a single folder, and set the sorting to “by Date Modified” and “Ascending”. I then begin by selecting an image (or several at a time) and click the appropriate keyword checkbox. As I select the image next to it (or, any other image), the image I just tagged moves to the bottom of the list, out of my way. When it appears the next time, I know I have completed the entire folder of images. I assign only the primary keywords first before I consider the secondary keywords, and I do this for a specific reason: the Filter.

Once I have all the primary keywords assigned, I can use the filter to display only a single keyword at a time so I can move them into their respective folders all at once, avoiding redundant work.

Location, Location, Location

These primary keywords become the location or folder in which the images are stored, and once filtered, it’s an easy task to grab them all at one time and move them into their respective folders. This avoids redundant work. But, if this is not part of the plan, you may also use the IPTC Core metadata tag, “Intellectual Genre” to denote the primary category. You might append this tag with another word so as to make the string unique, since you cannot search by this field directly. For example, “Headshot Portraits”, “Head and Shoulders Portraits”, etc. Then, perform the search “All Metadata contains: Headshot Portraits”, and it will return only those images tagged accordingly. Or, you could just make your primary keywords “Headshot Portraits”, “Head and Shoulders Portraits”, etc. Either way works.

Secondary Keywords

Once the images are settled in their final locations, you can begin assigning the secondary keywords. These secondary keywords might span several primary categories, or be hierarchical to the primary category. You can set this up in the Keywords Panel however you wish, making it easy to remember the hierarchy.

I have several “top” groups in the keywords panel; one is “Genre”, one is “Attributes”, and one is “Subject”. While Genre are my primary keywords, those under Attributes and Subject can apply to any one of them. Thus I have not duplicated them under each genre which would be madness. However, under my genre keyword “Portrait” lies “Headshots”, ”Head and Shoulders”, “Full-Length”, “Group”, etc. as they are specific enough under this category to be manageable.

Tertiary Keywords

Here’s where things get more complex, but in the long run, immensely more efficient. One of my tertiary “Attributes” keyword groups is “Chromaticity”, which I use to describe the color characteristics of the image. Chromaticity itself is not used as a keyword but rather to store “Black and White”, “Full-Color”,  and “Monochromatic”. When all is said and done, I can perform a search on “Keywords contains Portrait” and “Keywords contains Black and White” and locate every single Black and White Portrait I have in my collection. I can then go through those, assigning even more keywords. I can narrow my search greatly through the combination of two even three keywords.