Collections in Photo Mechanic Plus

Collections are virtual groups of photos you create within your catalogs. You can even create sub-collections within a larger collection. Each collection tells you how many photos are in it, and you can open them just like other contact sheets. Because this is a virtual group, adding or removing photos from collections does not move or delete the original photos.

Note: At this time, collections are static and based on the photos you've selected and added. Photo Mechanic Plus does not currently support "smart" collections.

Creating Collections

Create a collection by using the Create button or right-clicking in the collections section.

You can only create collections within catalogs that have Add/Modify enabled. Once you have created a collection, you can add photos to it, even if the photos you want to add are stored on media that is not online.

Deleting Collections

You can delete or remove a collection - and any of its sub-collections, by right-clicking on the collection name and choosing Remove collection. Deleting a collection does not delete the actual photos in the collection or remove them from the catalog. It just deletes the virtual grouping.

Adding Photos to Collections

Select photos in a contact sheet. Right-click on the collection name and then select Add selected items here.

Alternatively, select a collection name and then right-click on photos you have selected in a contact sheet. Then, select choose Add to Collection. As yet another option, select a collection name and photos you would like to add and use the keyboard shortcut of Control-B (Windows) or Command-B (MacOS).

Note: Even if the photo is already in the collection, the menu will still offer to add it. However, when you try to add a photo to an existing collection from the context menu, nothing will happen. It won't double the number of times the same photo appears in the collection.

Adding Photos from Another Parent Catalog

In order to add items into a collection, they must first be in that collection's catalog. If you try to add photos to a collection in a different catalog, Photo Mechanic Plus will offer to add the photos into the catalog.

Removing Photos from Collections

Just as you can add photos by right-clicking and using the contextual menu, you can remove photos the same way. Removing a photo from a collection does not remove it from any catalogs, even if you had to add it to that catalog in order to put it in the collection.

Finding Which Collections Contain a Photo

If you have a lot of photos and a lot of collections, it may get confusing to figure out which collections hold which images. Right-click on a thumbnail in a contact sheet and select Reveal in Collections to see which collections contain that image.

Sub-Collections

Just as you can create collections, you can create sub-collections within a larger collection. This acts as a virtual folder within your collection, but as with collections, it does not physically move your cataloged photos.

Create sub-collections by selecting the desired parent collection and then using the Create button. Alternatively, you can right-click on the collection and use the contextual menu.

Move a Collection or Sub-Collection

You can move collections within the same catalog. If you want to move a collection, for example under a new parent collection, you do this by:

Select the collection you want to move
Right-click on the new parent collection to make this a sub-collection or the catalog if you would like to make this a top-level collection.
Select Move Collection...