Should I Create a 2nd Catalog?

[Newbie]

I'm just getting started with Photo Supreme. I've thus far imported about 80,000 images into my catalog. All of those are "general" images--various events organized by year. I also have about 15,000 genealogy assets that I'd like to put into PS. They're a mix of photos and PDFs, probably about 60% photos and 40% PDFs. All of the PDFs are unique to genealogy; about 200-300 of the genealogy photos overlap with my general photos.

Should I create a separate Catalog for the genealogy assets? Or is this a situation where I'd use a Portfolio for the Genealogy assets? If I create a separate Genealogy Catalog, I believe I'll need to make copies of the photos that fit into both Genealogy and General, correct?

I appreciate any suggestions/advice.

[G8DHE]

Whilst my database is mainly images there are also quite a few documents, PDF's etc I keep it all as a single database and then filter according to the file type if you haven't found it already click the "Funnel" Icon and then you can select which file types to display, as below click the file types to select as in OR (Orange ticks) and Alt Click to select NOT to exclude a particle file type (Red ticks);

Screenshot 2025-05-27 091745.jpg (266.54 KiB) Viewed 415 times

[smadell]

Definitely just one catalog. If you create two catalogs, one for genealogy and one for everything else, you’re defeating the purpose of having a DAM right from the start. After all, if you’re looking for a photograph of, let’s say, your mother which catalog do you search through? Do you really want to have to search through both to get two sets of results?

I think the better solution is to create a catalog label (i.e., a “keyword”) and call it Genealogy. Then, you can search on it to find only your genealogy-related files. Or you can do a search which excludes it to find non-genealogical files. Or, you can just search for “Mom” and include all images of your mother, genealogical or otherwise.

And, by the way, if you do decide to create two catalogs you don’t have to duplicate the photos (i.e., don’t duplicate the files on your disk). Simply import those files into both catalogs. The photos themselves don’t actually get copied into the catalog(s); the catalog only contains data about the file (metadata, a thumbnail, etc) and a pointer to its location on your disk.

[Newbie]

Thank you both for your replies! I'll keep it to a single catalog.

[Hert]

In addition to the great feedback from smadell and G8DHE.
I'm also in favor of using a single catalog. While filtering as suggested is effective, I'd like to highlight the usefulness of the Catalog Filter. By assigning a "Genealogy" catalog label to all relevant images, you can apply a catalog filter based on that label. This effectively narrows the view to just those images, making it feel like you're working within a dedicated catalog.

P.S. For genealogy work, I also recommend exploring the Attachment feature. It lets you link files or online resources to a thumbnail, which can be particularly helpful in this context.

[Newbie]

Thank you, Hert! I'll definitely do as you suggest when I'm ready to add my genealogy files.

[AlainB]

I prefer having several medium size catalogs rather than one big one. The min reason is that it is easier to recover a catalog corruption. There have been also reports in the past of problems with PSu upgrade with huge catalogs.

Some time ago one of my catalosg got corrupted. I stupidly recreated it by reading the metadata from the xmp side cars, the result was quite unsatisfactory and I spent hours correcting the errors. I was glad that it was not some single huge uber catalog.

[Newbie]

Thank you for your input, Alain.

I ended up using both approaches. Because I had so many duplicates, I started with separate catalogs. I found it easier to manage the initial de-dupe process that way. Now that I've finished that initial de-duplicating, I'm combining the two catalogs and separating them into two portfolios as Hert suggested. Then I'll de-duplicate one last time.

Your point about possible file corruption is a good one to keep in mind. I'm regularly backing up my catalog file(s) to two different external drives. Hopefully that will make restoration easier should a problem occur.

[RobiWan]

There have been also reports in the past of problems with PSu upgrade with huge catalogs.

my catalog has now about 300000 images. In the past it was maybe 1-3 time where switch to newer version or if Hert release a "bigger" feature, that this needed longer but problems - never.

Some time ago one of my catalosg got corrupted.

Functionally backup strategy is much easier and better than many catalogs. But of course you have the choice.

For me the biggest disadvantage with more than one catalog - you can't search cross all your catalogs.