You've probably heard of the Smart Collections feature in Lightroom 2.0? Well, I've discovered a truly wonderful use for them: making a set of collections that are there for the purpose of quickly finding various categories of components that I often find useful in "decorating" the land/city-scape photos I'm so find of making. I can't tell you how many times I look at a beautiful landscape and suddenly think how much more dynamic it would be if there were just a nicer sky, a bird in that sky, a cyclist going down the road, a deer in the field, a backpack-toting student walking down the road...

So this morning I was thinking how cool it would be if, when I came home from my day of camera-roaming and started downloading my files, if I put the keyword "component' into any image I thought might be used as a part of another image. After all, I often shoot things for that very reason, just on the chance that I might find a use for it someday.

So I came home, opened my Lightroom catalog, and put the word "component" into the field for the spray can (Paint) icon and started hitting the Page down key while in Library mode. Every time I saw a complete and reasonably isolated sky, background, cyclist (motor or pedal), animal, person, or whatever else might work as an item or background in an image, I clicked with the Paint can to add that "component" keyword.

So that I could easily find those collections by category, I clicked the + icon in the Collections Panel header and choose Create Collection Set.

I named the Set Components in the Name field and chose "None" in the Set field and clicked OK.

Next, I clicked the + icon again and chose Create Smart Collection.

I chose my Components set from the Set dropdown menu, typed the name Skies into the Name field, choose Keywords and contains from the two criteria drop down menus and typed "sky" into the first criteria field. I then another Keyword criteria bar (you can have any number of these...at least if there's a limit, I haven't gotten that far), and made the keyword "component" the second criteria. The instant I clicked create, there were all my eligible sky photos (the sky had to be pretty much whole frame to earn the "component" keyword).

When I've chosen the component I want, I right click and choose Edit in Photoshop CS3 or Edit in Photoshop Elements 5+ and then use the Extract or Magic Extractor (depending on the program) to extract the element I want to use. When I save that extraction, it is automatically saved to the collection, so I never have to do the extracting again if I want to use that element in another photo composite.

Next, I just go to the folder where I have my main photo, select it, and tell Lightroom to edit it in the same program where I made the extraction. I then do all the re-sizing, transforming, re-lighting, and shadow-making that it takes to make the knockout look natural in its new surroundings. In case you're curious, the two kids above were shot against a very busy country soccer-field background and knocked out with Photoshop Elements 6's Magic Extractor.