Aperture 3 Portable Genius, 2nd Edition

Chapter 4: How Can I Use Metadata to Organize and Find My Images?

Metadata is data about a file that helps describe the contents of the file. Aperture provides powerful tools to manage the metadata attached to an image, whether it’s entering IPTC Core contact information, adding keywords to help you quickly find an image, or setting an image rating so that you can easily pull your top images from your library. This chapter helps you explore how to use metadata in Aperture to make it easier to manage your library.

Using Ratings to Sort Images

Using Flags and Labels to Further Organize Images

Using the Info Inspector

Adjusting Date and Time after Import

Working with Keywords

Adding Custom Metadata

Applying Batch Metadata Changes

Searching for Images

Writing IPTC Information to an Original

Using Ratings to Sort Images

One of the fundamental pieces of metadata that you can set on an image is a rating. When you first start to shoot, a keep/delete system is probably more than sufficient, but as you become a better photographer and your image collection grows, you will realize that keeping or deleting isn’t enough to separate your best images. Ratings are incredibly useful because they let you quickly pull the best images from your library, separate the best from the good-enough-to-keep images, and identify the worst images that you can delete first when you run low on space.

Each ...