## 19 Sorting

Like Sisyphus and his boulder, here I am, sorting through my photos all over again. To give you an idea of the scale of the task, there are now over 25,000 of them, and not all of them have been named correctly or tagged, but I’ve now settled on a tried-and-true sorting method.

First is the name of the picture, using the date as prefix, yyyymmdd, and then 2 or 3 words to understand the subject, and a number. It's an easy way to find a picture without managing tags in a specific software. But I had to add a code to identify which picture is in Black and white (NB in french), and which picture was taken with a film camera (FLM for example). With that, it's easier to find a picture. But I think that 50% of my pictures have not this code as a name. So, it's the first work to do.

The second step is to sort the photos by quality. Most of them haven’t been edited yet. There’s certainly potential, but I’m noting their current state. Some are blurry and, frankly, not very good. XMP tags allow you to add ratings on a scale of 1 to 5. I use XNViewMP to do that because it's a very good way to see, to refine and to rename pictures. But for that, I had to make sure that the XMP is modified and has not become a "Companion" file. I have to rename the files, to add generic key words and after that to rate my pictures. 1 is for "Missed", 2 for "correct", 3 for "Good", 4 for "Very Good" and 5 for a "Master Piece". I have approximately 70% of 2, 20% of 3, 5% of 4, 1% of 5 and the rest is 1...or soon deleted. I think I can do most of that work in 2 or 3 months.

But the third step is the most complicated. I will use Darktable for that. I must had the GPS coordinate, more tags, and sometimes correct tags and rotation. The fourth part could be to refine the most interesting pictures. I’ve come a long way since I first started editing photos. After experimenting with layers, filters, and a whole host of tools that drastically altered the original image, I’ve returned to what you might call “light” editing: cropping, contrast adjustments, occasional color corrections, and at most a subtle HDR filter. I want to stay true to the reality of the moment. In a world full of AI, especially in Photoshop and other tools for Photography, I don't want to participate in that global lie.

But for the moment, my work is to sort my pictures ... and to manage the new pictures, taken with my film cameras and my smartphone and digital cameras. And you will see the result soon, somewhere, ha ha.

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