Keyword Tutorisal part 2

This is part two of my keyword tutorial
In Part 1 (below) I gave the following example as homework



My method, and it may not be the only method or the best method, but it works for us, is to start with caption
Once the caption is in place the keywords usually materialize
So let's talk about the caption
there are conventions not quite so imposed by agents anymore.
For location I use country, city - some use continent, country, city
Not always is continent relevant for one thing everybody knows that Jordan is in Asia, and those that don't couldn't care less. Second if a search for Asia returns a picture of an Arabian Camel not sure that this is an image the buyer had in mind. for images of Thailand I would put Asia

Back on topic. We have a man jogging on a beach Age is important and should be taken from the model release. So we have
Man in his 30s jogs on beach. All in present tense
This is the minimum requirement, now let's think of what else is required. This was shot in Tel Aviv, so should we have Israel, Tel Aviv, Man in his 30s jogs on beach. ?
To tell you the truth, I am not sure, the same image could have been shot anywhere it is very generic. Would a buyer looking for an image of the Tel Aviv beach use this image? could a buyer looking for images from Italy use this image? On the other hand an editorial buyer may want to know this information. So yes probably worth the extra 2 words to put it in.

Next time we will go over the required keywords

Keep your comments and suggestions coming

Ilan Rosen
www.PhotoStock-Israel.com


Thailand travel stock photos - Images by photostock-israel .

Stock images Keywording tutorial

Well it finally started raining here after quite a long heat wave

Back on topic: Lets talk about stock photography keywords
First of all WHY? simple, if your image has no keywords buyers will have a hard time finding and licensing your image

Three IPTC fields are important to buyers, Title caption and keywords
Different stock photography sites have different names and sometimes different usages for these fields.

Title: A small description of the image can appear bellow the thumb or on the pop-up screen that is very popular now - usually 20 - 40 characters depending on the site

Description: A long(er) description can and should contain as much information as you think can be useful to the buyer Has to answer the 5 WH questions if they are relevant

• When - Date, Season, time of day
  
• Where - Geographic location
  
• Why
  
• What - is happening
  
• WHO - is in the the picture
  
• How - special technique, low / high view. facing camera etc

Please note, not all of these questions are relevant to all of the images. For example, a studio shot of still life does not require a geographical location

Keywords: This is where the whole effort becomes art
Before we can talk about keywords we have to consider where the image will be placed. Each site has a different set up and uses different parameters for their search engine so you must know your sites capabilities and limitations and keyword accordingly
Stemming - stemming is the search engines capability to take the search term, find the root of the word and bring back results of all words that stem from the root. Example: will a search for running return images with run, runner, runners. Will a search for ox return images with the keyword oxen and even more important will oxen return ox. will Israel Images have the same results as Israeli Images
Weighting - many sites have some weighting system in place. Images with the search term in a higher ranked position will placed higher in the search results
Synonyms - does the search engine know that lift and elevator are the same?
Limiting - some sites limit the number of keywords allowed or by word count or character count

If, like us at PhotoStock-Israel, you keyword for more than one web site you have a lot of thinking to do before even looking at an image

Like everything in life there are two extremes: the minimum approach and the maximum approach
The minimum approach adds as few images as possible
The maximum approach adds any and every relevant keyword - very often over done
Advantages of the minimum approach - less work more images keyworded in a time frame. Less false returns
Advantages of the maximum approach - your images will be presented in more searches but if the specific image does not meet the buyers needs this is a bad result for you and the site
As always, there is the middle ground
With each word you want to add ask yourself:

1. Could a buyer searching with this word use this image?
2. Would you be left out of relevant searches if you do NOT use this word
   

Look at the following example of a table set for a meal will a buyer use it for a table - probably not but table is important for searches like "set table" so yes I would leave it in



Example 2

What keywords would you place here? in parentheses depending on stemming capabilities
run, (running, runner.....)
jog, (jogging, .....)
sport
action
beach
sea / ocean
man / male
young
vacation / holiday ? (I'm not sure)
seaside, beach, seashore,
baseball cap - only if you feel a buyer looking for an image of a cap would or could use this image
I'm leaving the rest for the student

Add you comments or keywords here or email them to me at
Ilan.Rosen (you know what goes here) PhotoStock-Israel.com


Ilan Rosen
www.PhotoStock-Israel.com

Stock Photography and keywording

By far the most challenging activity a stock photographer and especially a small stock agency has is the task of captioning and keywording images
Captioning is quite a lot of fun

We sit with various resources; books, dictionaries, on line resources and research each topic. The fun part is learning. We try to answer the relevant W questions in this part

Keywords on the other hand is more of an art than a task. When is enough enough?
Some keywording tips:

1. Remember to use both American and UK spelling - Harbour / Harbor
2. Remember to add words from American and UK English Trunk and boot spring to mind
3. Plurals are needed at some outlets others do this automatically
4. Various forms of the verbs used such as: run running
5. Don't get carried away some words are more commonly is other meanings
6. Spell check. This is probably the most important tip. I have seen way too many images ith incorrect spelling including images I got back from a keywording company - Never used that company again

Look at the following image carefully and tell me if you would order the dish


Summary: We don't use any bells and whistles software we use our brain. In one word THINK And we try to think as a buyer / researcher may think. For each relevant keyword we ask ourselves: Would this image be used for to represent that word or phrase. If there is a chair in the background would this be a good keyword to use? Probably not as the image will never be licensed for it's chair quality. That's the easy example, It becomes much more difficult with concept keywords

so here is the image to lead you down the right path



Hope this helps you all
Ilan Rosen
PhotoStock-Israel