Understanding the Library

Asset Management is the means to catalog your digital photographic assets (called Master Files), add metadata to these assets, and search and browse based on that metadata. Thus, building and managing a library with one or more Catalogs of images is a key part of asset management.

If you choose to use Bibble 5's Asset Management features, you will start by importing images into a Catalog. This Catalog is where data and metadata about your photos will be stored. The Library consists of one or more Catalogs, which store many types of data:

•	Original Master Files (or references to Master Files stored in other folders on your computer)

You may prefer not to manage your photographic assets in Bibble 5, while still utilizing Bibble 5 for image editing and RAW file conversion. Or, you might want to get started quickly, just selecting a folder on your computer to work in without even thinking about Asset Management. That's no problem!

Though Bibble 5 does contain advanced asset management tools, Bibble 5 is unique in that it does not require you to use these tools. If you are content with a file-system based management approach (where you organize your images by folder and sub-folders that are already present on your computer), or if you use a 3rd Party Asset Management tool that builds and maintains your folders of images, then you can use Bibble 5 in "File System Mode" - just like in Bibble 4.

If you are not sure if you want Asset Management or not, you don't have to decide now! Start using Bibble 5 from the "File System" tab, browsing folders of images direct from your computer or memory card. You can browse, edit, and optimize images from folders on your computer right away - without importing them, building a Library, or even thinking about "Asset Management"! Later, if you decide that you'd like to see images from many folders in one browser view, would like to search or browse by EXIF, IPTC, or other metadata, or would like to use any of the other features that require Asset Management, then just import your folders of images "By Reference", leaving them in place on your hard drive, and instantly building a Bibble 5 Catalog.

You can build a Catalog of some or all of your images, but still use Bibble 5 to work on images without having to import them into your Catalog. This is perfect when you just need to quickly work on a small number of photos and don't want to search or keep a permanent record of these images.

You'll gain access to the following features when using Bibble 5's Asset Management features, but you'll need to import images into a Catalog first.

•	Browsing Multiple Folders at once - select multiple folders to view thumbnails from all the selected images, or you can Recurse folders to shown thumbnails from the selected folder and all sub-folders of the selected folder.

•	Persistent Edit History - maintaining a log of every image or metadata adjustment you've made to your images, and keeping that log available from day to day, month to month (working in File System mode limits the adjustment history only within that one Bibble 5 session).

•	Image Searching - Find images by searching for filename, EXIF, IPTC or other metadata.

•	Metadata Browsing - Browse through your catalog using EXIF, IPTC or other metadata.

•	Image Stacks - Group Versions from one or many Master Files together into Stacks.

•	Off-Line Image Browsing - Find and manage images that are stored on off-line media like CD's, DVD's or external hard drives.

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Initial Image Settings - Bibble will store the first set of adjustments found for a every image as those images are bring imported, allowing you to quickly revert to these settings at any time. The Initial Settings may be the Default settings at the time of import, or may have been edits or adjustments made by Bibble 5 on a different computer, or before importing the images into your Library.

Bibble 5 Pro allows you to build, open, and work with many Catalogs from your Library simultaneously. This allows you to group, backup, and manage sets of files as Catalogs, while preserving the ability to browse, search, and access any image in any open catalog.

When images are first imported into a Bibble 5 Catalog, the initial settings used for that image are taken from a Bibble XMP file if one exists. If no Bibble XMP file is found, metadata settings (Keywords, Rating, Labels, IPTC or XMP tags) are read from standard XMP files, or the image file itself.

Once images have been imported into a Bibble 5 Catalog, changes to any image or metadata settings are stored within the Bibble 5 Catalog. These may be written back to the Bibble XMP files "on demand" by selecting the thumbnails for the images you want to write out the settings for, then right-clicking one of the thumbnails and selecting XMP -> Write Bibble XMP files. Alternately, you may choose to have Bibble 5 always keep the XMP files up to date with the Preference "Allow Bibble .xmp creation for photos in Catalog".