Photographer Matthew Meier wrote to us about his experiences using MarineLife Keywords:
MarineLife Keywords is incredibly easy to use and is a tremendous time saver. What a joy to never have to type in scientific names again. Species are searchable by common names or part of a common name and once selected the scientific name is automatically filled in along with other pertinent
information regarding the genus, species, and family etc.
I have yet to find a species in my library not listed in MarineLife Keywords.
Keywording your marine life photographs couldn’t be simpler. Not only does it save time, but it also eliminates typing mistakes and adds consistency to your catalogue system.
I highly recommend MarineLife Keywords for anyone wishing to properly label and track their marine life images.
Award-winning underwater photographer Alexander Mustard has written a entry about MarineLife Keywords:
I have been trying it and there is no doubt that it is awesome. Anyone who has to keyword marine life should get it – whether it is for library submissions or for your own indexing. For me its a no-brainer because it works and saves masses of time. Its that simple…
So far I have not found any marine species that are not there (and I have tried some tricky ones) – well apart from Sus scrofa – which I think should be added as a tribute to Wetpixel Expeditions!
Now you might think that I am only writing positive words because a friend of mine helped develop it. Far from it. I have tried to look as critically as I can, but it is hard to find criticism. It installs non-destructively to all you previous work in seconds, just works and saves masses of time.
Underwater photographer Tony Wu has posted an article on his blog about organizing and cataloging photos using MarineLife Keywords.
There’s help available now, at least for marine photographers, in the form of a pre-packaged list of key words for marine life that covers the genus and species of over 4,000 fish, 4,000 invertebrates, and all known marine turtles, rays, skates, sharks, marine reptiles and marine mammals…basically, just about everything you’re likely to encounter.
What this means is that once you’ve identified your subject (No…unfortunately the keyword list cannot ID marine life for you!), you can literally drag-and-drop all the relevant keywords onto your file(s), saving you the time and hassle of typing, and also ensuring consistency.
Tony Wu keywords in Aperture
So to wrap up, if you take a lot of photos and need a good filing system…use Aperture or Lightroom, and get the MarineLife Keywords list to make keywording quicker and easier.
Tony is one of the most prolific underwater photographers around. At his blog, tonywublog.com, Tony posts regular updates from his regular trips to incredible dive destinations. Not only does Tony post examples of his incredible work, he also writes about the techniques he uses to capture them.
I’ve recorded a short, informal video demonstrating how I use MarineLife Keywords. Although the keyword list isn’t meant to replace reference and ID books, it does help a great deal in metadata workflow if you already know an animal’s common name. In fact, the keyword list works best in conjunction with existing ID books. Once you find an animal’s common or scientific name, it’s easy to search the keyword hierarchy.
This video is most helpful for Aperture users, but Lightroom users may find it interesting as well since keywording workflow is similar in both products.
Welcome to the MarineLife Keywords blog, where you’ll be able to find articles on keywording and metadata entry using the MarineLife Keywords product for Adobe Lightroom and Apple Aperture.
