The plug-in has five main features:
1. New species data displayed in the in the Library metadata panel
2. A new dialog box to add and change the species data
3. Ability to add dynamic Collections of families, based on your species info
4. A report of all the tagged species in your Lightroom catalog
5. An additional option in the Export dialog
The new panel isn't of much interest until you have added species data to a few photos, so we will start there.
Open the library module and select a few photos, all of the same bird species.
Open the new Species Info dialog Library->Plug-in Extras-Species Info...
First choose the species list you wish to use. This will load the families and species into the dialog. Selecting a Family from the list will filter the available species, or you can just go straight to the species list and select from the full list.
Tip: as well as scrolling through the lists, you can type the first few letters to jump to the correct place.
When you pick a species, the preview section at the bottom of the dialog is updated to show what information is added to the selected photos.
The language selection allows you to choose which language the lists are displayed saved in. The 'Alpha Sort' checkbox sorts the family or species list alphabetically rather than taxanomic order.
Selecting sex, age or indicating the subject was captive will also update the preview.
The final checkbox provides the ability to clear all the species data from the selected photos. There will be no warning when you press OK, so be careful using this!
Now back in the Library, open the Metadata panel (in the bottom right of the screen, below Keywords) and select the "Nature" panel from the selection.
Note: There is an issue displaying the panel with the current version of Lightroom - see known issues for details.
The data you specified in the dialog box should be presented, along with some of the standard IPTC fields for captioning and location.
You have the ability to modify sex, age and whether the subject was captive in this panel. Changes to the species have to be made through the dialog.
Note: There is an issue when displaying the panel, with new photos, in the current version of Lightroom - see known issues for details.
So, now you have added species information to your photos, you probably want to start using it. The plug-in comes with the facility to create dynamic family lists (smart collections). You create the smart collections using the plug-in, and then import them into Lightroom. Open the Create Nature Collections dialog, Library->Create New Nature Collections...
Select the species list you wish to use - this will determine the family lists created. The language you select determines how the family names are displayed.
The dialog needs to save the family lists as files, so select a folder location using the browse button. When you press OK files are created in the selected folder ready for you to import.
I recommend creating a Collection Set (Library->New Collection Set...) and naming it the same as the list you selected (e.g. Western Palearctic). Make sure 'None' is selected in the 'Set' field.
To import the collections, right-click on your new collection set in the Collections panel and select 'Import Smart Collection Settings'. Navigate to the folder you selected in the dialog to save the files and select all of the 'lrsmcol' files in that folder, and press Import.
Once they are imported they automatically update with photos in the catalog as you assign species to photos. The following example shows a selection of families added, with scientific language and stored in the "Western Palearctic" collection set.
You can also create a simple text report of all the photos that you have assigned to a species. Library->Plug-in Extras-Species Report... will open a simple dialog. Try the options and then press Save. Decide on the file name and location for your file and click Save again.
This data is all very well within Lightroom, but it would be useful to include it within files that get exported from Lightroom. This functionality has been added to the Export dialog.
Under the Post-process actions section, select Nature Data LR and press Insert. This will add the "Nature Data Keyword Writer" section, which contains one checkbox. If the box is checked, any of the plug-in's extra data will be added to the Keywords of the exported image.