All Those Maine Photos — Now What?

After three months away I’ve caught up with friends and family.  Of course, I’ve been taking photos while visiting and I finally finished processing them, along with doing all those errands and house chores.

It took several hours just to import, convert RAW to DNG, and double-backup the 2,576 photos–all categorized according to shooting location. This past week I started the process of tagging the photos with key words so I can quickly find what I need.  This is often an ongoing process of revision as I rethink the tagging.  But just to give you an idea, here are my current tags–imported from Adobe Lightroom:

Back Bay, Bates, Belfast, Berries, Birch Point Beach, Birch Point Beach St. Pk., Birds, Boats, Boothbay, Brass Band, Brunswick, Bug Light, Buildings, Buoys, Cairns, Camden, Camden Hills St. Pk., Casco Bay Bridge, CG Fair, Clouds, Cruise Ship, Crystal Spring Farm Land Trust, Down Front, Drydock, Flower, Fog, Foliage, Ft. William Pk, Georges River Land Trust, Landscapes, Lighthouse, Lobster pots, Mackworth Is., Marathon, Mid-coast, Moon, Netherworld, Night, Ovens Mouth Preserve, Owl’s Head, Panoramas, Peaks, Peaks* Fog, Pemaquid, People, Port Clyde, Portland, Pre-dawn, RachelCarson, Rockland, Rocks, Southern Coast, Sunset, Two Lights State Pk, Waterscapes, Waves, Wells Beach, Windjammers, Wolfe’s Neck State Pk.

These might look daunting, but they’re not. Although tagging these photos took several hours, tagging will make it easier to locate particular photos. The real task at hand is determining not only the “best” photos (i.e., technical and aesthetic qualities) to select for the book, but what subset of these will tell the best story about the Maine coast. Once I decide on that subset, those are the photos that I’ll process to enhance their look without overdoing them. The story itself will then emerge from this last set of photos–I hope. My major concern is that once I start this process I’ll discover that I’m lacking the images I really need.

Once all of this is complete, it’s off to copy-editing and graphics design, and then, a book. Can I do this by next summer? We’ll see.

If you have produced a photo book I would be happy to hear about your experience.

Author: Stephen Fielding Images

I'm a retired medical sociologist from the University of Rochester. Climate change is one of the two great challenges facing humanity (the other is nuclear weapons). In writing about the impact of climate change I read reputable books and articles on the topic. So when I make statements about climate change you will see a link taking you to the scientific source(s) of the information I provide. As for my independently published photobooks, each has gone through several layers of editing and peer review for both readability and accuracy. This is not to say that everything I say is accurate. Even the New York Times makes mistakes. So, if you find something that is factually incorrect, let me know. I hope you find reading my blog a positive experience. If you do, please encourage your family and friends to have a look. You can find photos from my other photo work by clicking on the My SmugMug Gallery tab, above. Best wishes, -Steve View all posts by Stephen Fielding Images