There are so many images on the internet one has to wonder how anyone finds anything they are looking for. I really have sympathy for photo researchers and editors trying to find something very specific, and having to weed through so much of what they don’t want. Of course, as a photographer who markets my work on the internet and through stock agencies – just having a good picture isn’t good enough, having the picture someone wants isn’t good enough – you have to provide a lot of help to getting that image found. And of course, the buzzword here is keywording. It is something that can help finding images in a personal collection for sure, but it takes on a complete artform when trying to work it into business strategies.
Bugs with dots
I have been uploading more of my work to Alamy, a stock agency I belong to. I only have a gnat’s eyebrow worth of a presence there compared to their total collection. That’s slightly smaller than a pimple on a flea, but I have made some good sales over the past year even with my tiny amount of work there. They currently have 15 million images online. It seems like a huge number, but how about compare to Corbis with 100 million images in their collection? The number seems to lose some meaning after a certain amount. It’s a hell of a lot! After awhile, it just becomes this sea of pictures of anything you can imagine. Finding those images is up to the photographer, or their arsenal of helpers (in my case – it is me, myself, and I), or maybe even a hired service or software to keyword them appropriately.
I can understand outsourcing the job for some – because it can be a lot of work and very time consuming. In addition to needing a thesaurus, I think you need to be able to objectively look at a picture for it’s many potential uses and thematic elements. You need to be able to change your mindset on words someone else might use to describe it, the ideas it might represent. You need to think about the commonplace to the obscure. I think someone who has knowledge of many different cultures also has some advantages because they are more able to generate ideas outside the realms of their own. Afterall, photographers on the internet are in a global marketplace.
Also, it is a lot like role playing – pretending you are person making the search and thinking about what terms might be important to you. Putting on the hat of a biologist, layout editor, or interior designer can help you think of new words and concepts.
There are so many aspects of keywording, it can be quite overwhelming actually. In fact, many companies now try to keep keyword’s hidden from view, but are active in searches, because they are considered intellectual property.
Keyword Parents
I basically follow the advice of a lot of keyword strategy articles I have read over the years – be methodical and drill down from very vague basic descriptions to the finite details. It all starts in Lightroom for me where my list of words grows basically every time I import a set of images. I have tried to create some general parent categories as shown here, and then place the keywords as children underneath them. It helps me in being methodical about assigning keywords because I can move category to category and pick fitting words in each one. It also takes a lot of discipline. I still have thousands of images that I consider to be not adequately keyworded.
I also find that I come up with new ones from time to time. Older images I may think I have exhausted the thought process on all of the sudden have some new angles to them. I am not very disciplined at keywording species scientific names and their genus and families – so I already know that is a lot of work that needs to be added.
It is a mundane chore at times. It can be self-challenging to see how much you can actually come up with. So having a list in front of you to pick from easily can help a lot – and following the methodology of moving from generic to specific.
I don’t claim to be an expert at this, but think I have had some good practice. I thought I would share an example of a fairly simplistic image that can generate a lot of different keywords. Sometimes the more generic and simple the image, the more words you can derive from it because it can mean so many different things.
Water reflection - or something else?
Keywords: reflection blue gold yellow water mimosa impressionistic Great Lakes Lake Superior Michigan Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore Upper Peninsula U.P. yellow calm calming colorful gradient gradual color merge blend graphic diagonal angle motion movement peaceful lake pond wet liquid relax relaxation repeating rhythm impressionism sheen shoreline tranquil pretty tranquility complimentary ripple ripples rhythms waves shimmer shimmering fresh horizontal merger merging blending spa space open copy text aqua refreshing refresh dream dreamy dream-like environment environmental aquamarine marine aquatic H2O nature beauty beautiful luminous cool cold warm inviting background…
So I think that is a pretty good list to start – certainly some words more applicable directly than others. Never underestimate the possible application or thought pattern of someone doing the search. Who knows, it may be one particular word or phrase that someone uses and finds it as a match to exactly what they are looking for. Obviously abuses are frowned upon, even penalized if you get too carried away. Certainly placing some celebrity name in my list for this image is going a bit too far.
I welcome any feedback or suggestions on this subject. It is one that I find as an extremely interesting game of match-making.
