Create a new photo library
Create a photo library from a folder — empty or already full of photos — choosing its name, where originals are kept and how imports are filed.
A new library is made from the same form wherever you start it: on the first screen of a fresh install (Welcome to Portman2), from New library on the library menu or the library picker, or from New library in Settings ▸ Libraries.
The form
- Name — what the library is called, such as "Family". Its avatar's colour comes from the name.
- Photo folder — where the photos are, or will be. Portman2 checks it and says Folder found once it exists.
- Keep originals in a separate folder — off by default, so originals are kept in
.originalsinside the photo folder. Tick it to choose an Originals vault elsewhere; every computer that opens the library must be able to reach it. - How photographs are filed — the Folders and File names templates imports will use, with a sample. Chosen once: changing it later would mean moving everything already filed. If the folder is already filed some way, Portman2 offers to keep to it.
Press Create library. From the picker the button is Create and open.
A folder that is already a library
If the photo folder already belongs to a Portman2 library — set up on another computer, for instance — the form says so: adding it here joins that library rather than starting a new one. That is how a second computer opens the same library.
Creating a library does not open it. It is registered and its folder made ready; it stays empty until it is scanned or something is imported into it.
Open its folder opens the folder.