An Introduction to Albums

by Jean Lusetti

Welcome to the start of a new series about Vision. The purpose of this series is not to teach you how to be a good graphic artist (as I'm not an artist, I would be a really bad inspirational source...), but to give you some hints about the things you can do with Vision.

So, got the idea? Okay, let's start with one of the best features in Vision... the album feature.

I don't know if you ever tried to use the album feature of Vision, but believe me, it's one of the powerful ways to organize your thousands of images on your hard disk (yes, with modesty!).

The basic principle of Albums
Before going any further, I have to explain a very basic principle that Vision's albums feature uses to manage images - stay tuned, it will not be that long. Album images are based upon the category principle. If you're like me, you probably have many different kinds of images; models, comics, mangas, astronomy, movies etc.

Not only can each kind of image become an album category, Vision also allows the use of sub-categories. For example, I have a category called Models. In this category, I have many images of Laetitia Casta. Consequently, it is possible to say that all my Laetitia Casta images are a sub-category of my Models category.

So what can you do with categories?
Well, filter of course! If I wanted to view all my images of Pamela Anderson, Adriana Karambeu, Laetitia Casta and Naomi Campbell, all I need to do is to filter using the category Model. Vision would then display all the images within the Model category. However, to only view images of Laetitia Casta, all I need to do is to filter using the category "Laetitia Casta".

Got that principle ? Okay, here is an example for you to follow (you can substitute your own images for the ones I use):

How to create an Album

1. Select Catalogue from the Edit menu of Vision.
   
   
   
   The following dialog will then be displayed.
   
   
    
2. Select the icon to open the Create New Album dialog.
3. To create a new album, you need to first give it a name and select a directory for Vision to save it in. After you done this, click OK.
   
   
   
   
4. You will then be taken back to the Album Management dialog. Next, select the icon to Add a folder. The following dialog will then be displayed.
   
   
   
   
5. Here you can define up to four directories for Vision to search for images. After you have defined one or more directories and selected OK, a progress bar will appear as Vision catalogues your images.
   
   
   
   
6. Vision will then show a list of all the images it found along with their file format. To view a thumbnail of any of the images, simply select it from the list.

How to creating a Category

1. By default, Vision groups all your images within a single category called General. To create your own categories, all you need to do is select an image from the list and then click on the first category popup followed by New.
   
   
   
   Then type in the name of the new category you wish to create, such as Model.
2. To include an image within the new category, select the image from the list and then select the new category from the popup list. Repeat this step for all the images you want to add to the new category.
   
   For the purpose of this example, I have created the category Model and added the images ADRIANA.JPG, LAETITIA.JPG and PAMELA.JPG to it - but not ASTERIX.JPG.

How to filter your images

1. To filter your images, select the icon to open the Album Configuration dialog (shown below).
   
   
   
   
2. Remove the categories you do not wish Vision to display by highlighting them in the left list and selecting the icon.
   
   
   
   To return to the Album Management dialog, click OK.
3. In the screen-shot below, you will now see that the image ASTERIX.JPG is no longer in the list. This is because it is was not included in the Model category and has been filtered out.
   
   

Well, that was a very simple example of what you can do with Vision. You can easily imagine what to do with some 32 categories! To experiment with Vision yourself, why not download a copy at http://vision.atari.org.
 

Useful link Vision homepage http://vision.atari.org

MyAtari magazine - Feature #9, June 2002