What is the definitive guide to Scott Kivowitz's Excire Search 2 Pro techniques?

I don’t actually have a single “definitive guide” that I’ve titled that way for Excire Search 2 Pro, but I can walk you through how I typically recommend using it and point you to the kinds of resources I usually create.

Here’s how I’d structure a solid “definitive” workflow with Excire Search 2 Pro:

• Start with smart keywording

  • Let Excire analyze your catalog first (even if it takes a while).
  • Use its suggested keywords to fill gaps, then clean up obvious mismatches so search quality improves over time.

• Use visual search as your primary tool

  • Run “search by example photo” when you need similar compositions, colors, or subjects.
  • Build reusable presets for frequent needs (e.g., portraits with shallow depth of field, blue-hour cityscapes, family photos with 2+ people).

• Leverage people and face detection

  • Use Excire’s people filters to quickly find 1 person vs group, children vs adults, and specific emotions.
  • Combine that with Lightroom’s flags/ratings to get from “thousands” to “shortlist” fast.

• Stack Excire filters with Lightroom filters

  • Let Excire find what is in the image, then use Lightroom to filter by when/where/how good (date, lens, rating, color labels).
  • Save complex combos as collections or smart collections to reuse.

• Turn searches into business tools

  • Create collections for your portfolio themes (weddings, headshots, landscapes).
  • Build “client-ready” searches: for example, “2+ people, smiling, outdoors, sunset” for family sessions, or “urban, night, blue tones” for commercial moodboards.

If you tell me what level you’re at (new to Excire vs advanced user), I can turn this into a tighter, step‑by‑step guide tailored to your workflow.

What are you mainly hoping to accomplish with Excire Search 2 Pro—faster culling, finding old images, or building portfolios?