Are you wondering about how will you ever be able to find that one specific photo you need to dig from a large number of images on your computer? You don’t need to worry about that as we will prove to be your white knights here to help you sort your unarranged photo library by using naming conventions and organizational suggestions. The following lines contain some of the best naming convention and structure for photos you should know and follow.
Easily Rename Photos in Seconds
Easy File Renamer follows Google Software Principles
Determine Your Needs
Before beginning to rename image files and setting up folders and collections, what you need to do first is to think about what you need to achieve in the end. You should take out a few minutes to ask yourself about what you really need, it will prove to be really helpful for figuring out your wanted organization system and naming conventions later. A few examples have been listed here:
- You wish to improve your workflow
- You wish to arrange your pictures in such a way that you’re able to find your family vacation photos faster
- You are building a brand of your own and wish to keep essential assets, campaign images, etc. organized
You should not worry about defining your organization system right now—it is most likely to change when you start to name your images.
Make Your Filenames Descriptive
When you rename your files you should keep in mind that file names should make it easier for you to sort through a wide number of images from multiple shots. You may not want to put in job names or descriptions because of the fact that they will make the filename too long, instead of that you can use some basic info or codes to make it easier for you to spot and identify group related images.
Build your filing structure to be software independent
You will need to come up with a filing structure that will enable you to easily locate wanted images even without the need of any photo management software. When you are done with your file naming pattern your priorities are the first thing to keep in mind while developing the filing structure. How do you want to sort your files to make it easy for you to fetch the images you’ll need: by date, client, photographer, event, or by something else? If you are someone who sorts images mentally by the date they were taken, then your first level of folders should be by the year (YYYY).
Naming Your Images & Files
It is always better to go from general to specific, most of the dates will be expressed as YYYYMMDD, you can also try changing the date format to be YYYYDDMM. You should opt for the one which makes it easier for you to sort your files. Moreover, if you have a lot of photos from an event or a place and want to organize them, you can use the info. For instance, you have a big bunch of photos from an event in Seattle in April 2017, you can add up this info at the start of your file name, and assign each picture a number.
