Digital Camera Master

Have you ever wanted to find all the photos that have something in common, no matter when or where you took them? In Picasa, you can create keywords, attach them to photos, and then use the keywords to pull up those photos later. For example, if you apply the keyword “Canada” to your Montreal vacation pictures when you import them into Picasa, you’ll have an easier time locating them later.

Keywords are one of the properties that Picasa’s search tool reads when it’s looking for photos. They stay with your photo, even if you shuffle the photo into different folders.

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Note: While labels, described in the previous section, help you browse your photo collection, keywords help you search it.
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Follow these steps to add a keyword to your photo:

1. Select one or more photos, and then choose View –> Keywords (or press Ctrl+K).
   The Keywords dialog box shows you a thumbnail of your photo. If you’ve selected more than one, the box shows one image and lists the number of selected photos.
   If the image already has keywords associated with it, you see them in the Keywords text box.
2. Type the keywords you wish to add.
   You can enter more than one keyword at a time in the Add Keywords text box; just leave a space between each word.
3. Click Add.
   Picasa adds the keywords you just typed to the photo file. The dialog box remains onscreen, so you can continue adding keywords if you want. (If you want to delete a keyword, select it and then click Remove.)
4. Click OK to close the Keywords box.
   Clicking OK accepts your additions to the keyword list and closes the box. Although you don’t see any visible changes in your photo thumbnails, rest assured Picasa has stored the keywords with the photo.

1. Adding captions to your photos
You may think that adding captions to your photos is frivolous or a waste of timebut it’s not. A good caption helps you identify your photos and distinguishes one shot from another. Even more important, Picasa reads the words in captions when you ask it to search for photos. So, captions are helpful when you browse through your photo library and when you use Picasa’s search tool.

To add keywords to your photos, select a thumbnail and then use Ctrl+K to open the Keyword dialog box. You can add multiple keywords at a time. To delete a keyword, select it and click Remove. Click OK when you’re done adding and removing keywords.

To see captions in the Library View, choose View Thumbnail Caption Caption. Picasa shows the caption text below each thumbnail. If the text is too long, it trims the caption to fit.

To add a caption, you need to be in Edit View , where you work with single images. Follow these steps:

1. In the Lightbox, double-click the photo you want to caption.
   Picasa’s window switches to the Edit View, where you see a single large image. If the photo doesn’t already have a caption, you see “Make a caption!” just below the image.
2. Click “Make a caption!” and start typing.
   As soon as you click, “Make a caption!” (or any existing caption text) goes away, and you can enter a new caption. That’s all there is to itno button to click to confirm the event.
3. When you’re done, click the large Back to Library button (at upper left).
   If you’ve set Library View to display captions, your thumbnail sports its new caption.

2. Adding stars to your photos
Picasa gives you a quick and easy way to single out a photojust give it a star. Starred photos stand out in the Lightbox. Furthermore, when you search in Picasa, as described in the next section, you can even limit your searches to starred photos.

To add a star, select a photo in your Lightbox and click the Star button (at the window’s lower left). Most people probably use stars to mark favorite photos, but they can mean anything you want: photos Joe took, photos to order at wallet size, and so on.

Adding captions to your photos makes it easier for you to identify them when you browse (and easier for Picasa to find them when it searches). In Edit View, type your caption in the space directly below the image. The button to the left of the caption toggles the caption display on and off in Edit View.

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Note: You can’t add more than one star, so it’s a yes or no proposition.
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