I may be adept at simplifying my home life but when it comes to my virtual life…well, it’s a shambles. Copious photo taking and a disorderly editing process has forced me into quite a predicament; I have hundred of duplicate photos floating around in bizarrely named folders and they exist on both my laptop and my external hard drive. It’s a disgrace!

The first step to changing bad habits is to admit that they exist in the first place so I’m holding my hand up high and laying my virtual hoarding habits on the table. I’ve spent the past few months dreading the process required to get everything in order but it’s something I’m resolved to fixing before the year is out. Yes, I’m simplifying my virtual life! Thankfully, Ronnie and Trish from Life : Captured Inc offered me a place in Unravel Your Photos – an online course that takes you by the hand and leads you step-by-step through the ordered process of uploading, filing and storing your photos.

As with everything Life : Captured Inc creates, Unravel Your Photos is a refined and considered course. The instructions are thorough yet simple and as always, every sentence is eloquently expressed.

As I’ve quickly learned, unravelling my photos is just the beginning. This course prompts you to unravel, discard, file and store utilising Lightroom – the ultimate tool for photographers.  Over the next few weeks I’ll be sharing my experience of each lesson I undertake. First things first…

Lesson 1 – No File Left Behind

This lesson is all about discarding bad photo storing habits and embracing new ones. Ronnie and Trish are Type A organised types who are efficient and task-orientated; I aspire to attain their level of virtual order.

Let’s begin…

I’ve been using Lightroom for over three years and yet within the first few minutes of Lesson One’s video, An Overview of Lightroom, I learnt a slew of new shortcuts and customisation options (when it comes to technology I only utilise what is necessary and never get around to discovering how to use the program to its potential, hence my disorganisation).

The aim this first lesson is to devise a plan to sort your backlog of photos and embrace a tried and tested filing system for every new photo that you take. It highlights the six principles of photo organisation:

> Importing
> File naming
> Storing
> Keywording
> Rating
> Archiving and backups

Personally I found the concept of keywording to be a game changer. Lightroom allows you to add keywords to images which means finding them months or years down the track is a simple and quick process; a brand new concept to me. For instance, if I want to find a series of photos that feature Percy at the beach, I would type “Percy” and “Beach” into Lightroom and within seconds the photos would be revealed.

Next week: lesson 2 – See the Big Picture