In The Margin · A plug-in for Lightroom Classic, by the photographer behind this site
Every photo you’ve ever taken, finally searchable.
I built this for my own 125,000-photo catalog. It writes tidy, consistent keywords straight into Lightroom, so years of shoots become searchable.
Free trial covers 14 days or 200 photos, whichever comes first. No card needed.
How it works
Step 1
Select
Pick any photos in your Library: one shoot, one year, or the whole catalog.
Step 2
Choose a mode
Instant, Batch (half price) or Local (on your Mac, free).
Step 3
Search
Keywords land on each photo inside Lightroom, ready for smart collections and filters.
What it does
01
Writes straight into your catalog
No exporting, no sidecar files.
Catalog
02
Tidy keywords, not a pile of synonyms
One fixed vocabulary: never turtle, turtles and sea-turtle.
Vocabulary
03
Knows where you were
Uses GPS, or the nearest geotagged shot within six hours.
Location
04
Built for big catalogs
Skips finished photos, resumes after a stop, Batch at half price.
Scale
05
Leaves your words alone
Only ever adds keywords. Your captions stay put.
Safety
06
Checks itself across a shoot
Neighbouring frames fill missed tags and drop stray guesses.
Accuracy
Running cost
Keywording a whole catalog costs less than a coffee.
With Claude you pay Anthropic directly, and every run shows what it cost. Per 1,000 photos:
Haiku 5.5
About $0.26 instant · $0.13 batch
A 20,000-photo catalog: about $2.60
Default
Sonnet 5.5
About $4.70 instant · $2.30 batch
A 20,000-photo catalog: about $47
Most detailed
Local AI
Free
Free for any size of catalog
Offline
Haiku Batch measured on a real 291-photo run; the rest are estimates from Anthropic’s prices.
Proof
Tested on a real archive, not a demo.
276 of 284 frames tagged with the right national park, checked against my own hand-made tags. 0 given the wrong park. 8 left untagged: night shots and the drive out, the same ones I’d skipped myself.
One afternoon at the Grand Canyon
284 frames
Built and measured on my own 125,000-photo archive, from desert road trips to dives.
Pricing
Pay once. Keep it.
The Plug
$30
one-time, per person
Use it on up to 2 of your computers, Mac or PC All 1.x updates included Works offline after a one-time activation (the key is checked with the store once, then never again) 14-day money-back guarantee
One-time price, per person
Try every feature free for 14 days or 200 photos, whichever comes first. Then paste your licence key into the plug-in and carry on; your keywords stay put.
Install: unzip, then in Lightroom Classic choose File > Plug-in Manager > Add.
Requirements: Lightroom Classic 12+ on macOS 12+ or Windows 10 (64-bit)+; local AI needs an Apple Silicon Mac.
Questions
Do I need an Anthropic account?
Do my photos leave my computer?
Will it touch my existing keywords?
Does it work on Windows?
What happens when the trial ends?
What if I don't like it?
In The Margin is not affiliated with Adobe or Anthropic.