Thank you, Dirt! No I don't catalog "everything", but when the opportunity arises and I have the time....
However, I do catalog my plant pics differently than most people, I think. With digital cameras, I take a series of photos of almost everything with plants. When I view them, I don't rename the files, but I pick the one or few to edit and resize for emailing, Rock Garden newsletters and such or forums like this, or when I want to refind them for myself. This way, they are always ready, johnny-on-the-spot, when a relevant opportunity arises, and I don't need to spend time searching raw camera files for the pics I want. (Plus, who can remember all those great photos taken over many years?) These get renamed and saved with the botanical latin, the date and a code I devised to aid in searching my "catalog" (seed, sdlg=seedling, plt=plant, hab=flowering plant, habbud=plant in bud, habitat, fr=fruit, habfr=plant in fruit, etc.). Occasionally, I will add other info directly in the file name so I won't forget. These edited photos get saved and organized in a separate folders on my computer. I always retain the original, camera produced file name so I can always easily find the original unreduced file and its companion photos. So the file name for that last pic is:
Polyganatum verticillatum rhizomes4Nov14 DSC07832.jpg
I've done this from my beginning of digitized plant photos when I used a computer that ran on windows 98, in anticipation of a continual growing photo cache. I thank my lucky stars that I decided back then on a very useful cataloging method. Haha, no book in the future, but I refer back to them constantly myself. Some of the photos I post here might be ten years old, but they are just as easy to find as yesterday's camera shots. I am such a plant geek that I all parts of a plant interest me, not just the "pretty flowers", and including
how they grow (or don't grow).
You've prompted me to wonder how many of these edited plant photos I have on file: categorized in 302 folders, I have about 6800 photo files.
It seems like a lot, but comparatively speaking, I don't think so. I'm just more obsessive with organization, and I can refind each one of them pretty easily.
I rarely add to the ATP data base. Dave and I have some disagreements on ATP image copyrights. You may have noticed that my forum posted photos are “ineligible” if you tried to import them to the data base. This is at my request, and Dave is happy to make such an exception for anyone who wishes it. I am very grateful to him for that, since the sites he builds are so useful and enjoyable, and foster a community of enthusiastic positive people.
