Photoshop® Lightroom® 2 for Dummies®

Chapter 5. Viewing and Finding Photos in the Library

In This Chapter

• Becoming familiar with the Library interface

• Customizing the Module Picker

• Understanding Grid view and Loupe view

• Managing photo folders

• Grouping photos into collections

• Making virtual copies

Just like your friendly local public library, the Library module is the place you go to find and check out your photos. Except in this case, you're also the head librarian and that means you have the power to organize and manage the contents as well. The Library module is Lightroom's hub — all your photos pass through here on their way to the other modules and beyond. Feel free to make as much noise as you want.

You can do a heck of a lot to your photos in the Library module — hopefully good things, but you never know. This chapter focuses primarily on the operations performed with the organizational panels. For help on sorting, developing, and applying various types of metadata to your photos, you need to turn to Chapter 6.

Exploring the Library Module

When you first enter any building, you need to become oriented to the lay of the land. Although each of Lightroom's modules contains tools and options that are task specific, the layout of the interface is essentially the same. This common interface is designed to help you become acclimated to the modules as you move through them. More importantly, the common interface clues you in that ...