Send photos to a folder with Quick Actions

A Quick Action is a copy or move you set up once and then run with one key: sweeping rejects into a folder beside each original, or copying selects to a delivery folder.

Create a Quick Action

Save a Quick Action as you go by dragging photos from the filmstrip or grid onto a drop target, or create one in Preferences.

Save one by dragging photos

1. Drag photos from the filmstrip or grid onto a drop target such as New Subfolder or Choose Folder.
2. In the Copy or Move sheet, choose the Action, Where, and Afterwards.
3. Tick Save as a Quick Action and set its key.
4. Click the button that names the move, such as Move 3 photos to Rejected.

Create one in Preferences

1. Open Preferences (Settings on Windows) and choose Quick Actions.
2. Click New Quick Action.
3. Click Click to set a key, then press the key you want to use.
4. Under Action, choose Copy or Move.
5. Under Where, choose Beside each original and type a folder name such as Rejected, or choose Fixed folder and pick a folder. Beside each original makes the folder inside each photo's own folder.
6. For a Move, choose what happens Afterwards: keep the photos in view, filter them out, or remove them from this file collection.
7. Under Safety, choose when a confirmation dialog appears first.
8. Click Create Quick Action.

Each Quick Action is named after where it puts photos, such as Move to Rejected or Copy to Pictures. Its card shows the same thing as a picture: a bent arrow into a folder beside each original, or an arching arrow across to a fixed folder. A Move dashes the folder the photos leave, and a Copy adds a plus to the arrow.

Run a Quick Action

• Press its key. It applies to your selection or the active photo, and to the highlighted photo in Survey. Unlike ratings, it never extends to a whole group.
• Right-click a photo or a selection and open the Quick Actions submenu.
• Right-click and choose Copy or Move…, or drag photos onto a drop target such as New Subfolder. The Copy or Move sheet lists your Quick Actions under Use a Quick Action; pick one and it fills in the rest.

Where

• Beside each original — makes the named folder inside each photo's own folder, so photos from different folders stay apart.
• Fixed folder — puts every photo in the one folder you pick.
• A folder per file collection — asks each file collection for its own folder the first time you use the Quick Action there, so a later file collection never lands in an older one's folder.

Safety

• Confirm big moves with confirmation dialog — runs at once, except a big move, which opens the Copy or Move sheet so you can check it first.
• Always show confirmation dialog — the Copy or Move sheet opens every time before anything runs.
• Run straight away — runs at once whenever the folder is available.

After a Move

• Keep them in view — the photos stay in the file collection and now read from their new folder.
• Filter them out — the photos stay in the file collection but their new folder is hidden from the current view. Clear Filters shows them again.
• Remove them from this file collection — the moved photos leave this file collection. The files are moved, not deleted.

Edit, reorder, or delete

In Preferences → Quick Actions, each card has Edit, Duplicate, and Delete, and arrows to change the order the menu lists them in. You can save up to 24. Deleting a Quick Action only removes the Quick Action: no photos or folders change.

Undo

Use Edit → Undo, or Undo on the completion message. Cullibrate may ask you to confirm first, for example after a move between drives. Undo also reverses Remove them from this file collection and Filter them out; undoing a Copy removes the copies and leaves the originals. After a restart, reverse a transfer from File Activity.

Set up Delete with a Rejects folder

The first time you press Delete, Cullibrate asks where photos you don't want should end up: out of this file collection, a Rejects folder, or the Trash (the Recycle Bin on Windows). Each choice shows its key, and Delete goes to the one you pick.

1. Select the photos you don't want and press Delete.
2. Choose A Rejects folder.
3. Under Where, choose Beside each original and name the folder, or choose Fixed folder and pick one.
4. Under Afterwards, choose whether to keep the photos in view, filter them out, or remove them from this file collection.
5. Click the Move button.

Cullibrate saves your choice as a Quick Action, gives it the Delete key, and moves the photos straight away. Removing from the file collection moves to Option+Delete on Mac or Alt+Delete on Windows, and Command+Delete on Mac or Ctrl+Delete on Windows still moves photos to the Trash or Recycle Bin. If you pick the Trash or Recycle Bin instead, Delete moves photos there and Command+Delete or Ctrl+Delete removes from the file collection.

Quick Action keys

• Quick Action shortcuts stay the same in every keyboard profile.
• Two Quick Actions cannot share a key, and the rating, colour, and tag keys are reserved.
• If a Quick Action shares a key with another remappable command, the Quick Action wins in the photo workspace.