Creating an album & linking media

Albums are the primary way to group related media. A typical album: a fieldwork campaign, a year of monitoring photos, an exhibition, an event.

When to use an album vs. an archival collection

Use this	When
Album	A loosely-grouped set, often by event or campaign. Light-weight; mostly cataloguing-oriented.
ArchivalCollection	A formally archived collection that has a creator, requires preservation context, and may be subdivided into CollectionParts.

Albums and archival collections are not mutually exclusive — a media can sit in an album and be part of an archival collection at the same time.

Step 1 — Create the album

Screenshot to add

Sidebar with Albums highlighted, and the "+ New album" button visible at the top of the list.

1. Sidebar → Albums → + New album (or Add album, depending on the build).
2. Fill in the required fields:
   • Title (e.g. Koksijde 2014).
   • Context (e.g. general vliz).
3. Optional but useful from the start:
   • Description — one-line scope of the album.
   • Keyword — the broad themes this album covers.
   • Marine region — if all media share a region.
   • Project / Event / Partner — if relevant.
4. Click Save.

You're now on the new album's detail page.

Screenshot to add

Album detail page right after creation, with the (still empty) Media panel visible.

Step 2 — Link media to the album

There are two equivalent ways:

A. From the album

1. On the album's detail page, find the Media panel (the virtual has_media reverse).
2. Click + Add media.
3. The picker lets you pick existing media, or upload new ones (which get the album set automatically).
4. Save.

B. From the media

1. Open a media's detail page.
2. In its metadata, find the Album (has_album) field.
3. Set it to your album.
4. Save.

The album immediately shows the media in its panel because Album.has_media is virtual — set on the media side, visible from the album side.

Bulk move

To move many media into an album at once, use the list view's bulk-edit and set Album on the selection in one go.

Step 3 — Attach an album to an archival collection (optional)

There is no direct relation from Album → ArchivalCollection in the data model. The link runs through the media records:

1. For each media in the album that should be in the archival collection: open it, set its Archival collection (has_archival_collection) and optionally Collection part (has_collection_part).
2. The archival collection's Media panel will then show those records.

If every media in an album logically belongs to the same archival collection, bulk edit is your friend — select all media in the album and set the relation in one shot.

Practical structure example

Say VLIZ runs an annual coastal-monitoring campaign at Koksijde. A clean structure:

ArchivalCollection: "Coastal monitoring (Belgian coast)"
└── CollectionPart: "Koksijde — annual campaign"
    └── Media (set has_archival_collection + has_collection_part)
└── Album: "Koksijde 2014" (containing the year's media)
└── Album: "Koksijde 2015"
└── ...

Each year's album collects that year's media. The CollectionPart aggregates all years for archival/preservation purposes. A single media is linked to both — the album for everyday cataloguing, the archival collection for long-term context.

Editing an album later

Same as any other entity — see Editing metadata. You can rename it, change keywords, add or remove media, etc., without affecting the underlying media records.

Deleting an album

Deleting an album does not delete the media in it. The media records stay; their has_album link is cleared.

Confirm before deleting

There's no undo — the album record itself is gone. The media stay. If you delete an album by mistake, you'll need to recreate it and re-link the media (a quick bulk-edit).

Naming convention tips

• Year + place is the most common pattern (Koksijde 2014, North Sea — sediment cores 2023).
• Avoid putting the partner name in the album title unless it's part of the brand of the campaign — the Partner relation already captures that.
• Keep titles short. The album shows up as a chip and a column on many list views; long titles wrap awkwardly.