One of the most useful parts of the Library module is Keywording. Being able to assign Keywords quickly and easily to a single photo or a group of selected photos really speeds workflow. In order to reduce your typing, and to standardize the keywords you use, set up a few Keyword Sets.

Lightroom comes with a few standard Keyword sets and you can edit them, add new ones or delete them if they don’t apply to your type of photography. Each Keyword set allows 9 keywords in it. To add any keyword you can click on the word or use ALT-1 thru ALT-9. From the menu select Photo – Set Keyword to see which is which or just hold the ALT key for a bit and the numbers will appear next to the keyword.

If you do a lot of nature or landscape photography you could have sets like Flowers, Landscapes, Insects, Animals and so on. In each set you’d include keywords specific to those subjects. The Flowers group could include Rose, Hibiscus, Columbine, Cactus, Sunflower, Orchid etc. You see where I’m going.

Sit down and think through how you want to use the Keyword sets. Start with looking at your current Keyword Tags (left side of Library) and edit and revise from there. Have fun.