Every photographer needs to cull. The value is speed and decisiveness — separate the keepers from the rest, write XMP ratings, move on.
Every shoot ends the same way: a card full of images, most of which are fine, some of which are good, and a handful that are actually worth keeping. The difference between a photographer with a tight portfolio and one drowning in duplicates isn't talent — it's the willingness to decide.
Photo Culler exists to make that decision fast. Open a folder, move through the photos, pick the keepers, reject the rest. Your picks, ratings, and color labels are written to XMP sidecars — portable to any app that supports XMP. Close the app and your decisions travel with the files.
Trim the fat before you organize. Cull before you keyword. Decide before you develop.
Point Photo Culler at a folder. If XMP sidecars already exist — from Photo Archive Lite, Photo Developer, or a previous session — they're read automatically. Your existing ratings and pick status appear immediately.
Move through your photos full-screen. Pick, reject, rate, or label with a single action. The EXIF inspector shows camera, lens, shutter speed, aperture, and ISO at a glance — enough to understand each shot without leaving the app. Filter to show picks only, rejects only, or everything. Live stats in the header show where you stand.
When you're done, export writes XMP sidecars. Every existing setting is preserved — develop adjustments, keywords, collections, anything written by other apps. Photo Culler writes pick status, star ratings, color labels, and optionally stamps IPTC metadata: copyright, creator, and keywords — applied once during triage so you never have to think about it again. Delete rejects from disk if you're confident, with size tracking and confirmation. Generate a session report for your records.
No editing tools. No catalog management. No organizational hierarchy. Photo Culler does one thing: helps you decide which photos are worth keeping. Everything else has its own app.
Picks, ratings, and color labels are written to standard XMP sidecar fields. Your decisions carry straight into any app that supports XMP — no lock-in, no proprietary database, no import step.
On re-export, existing develop settings and every other XMP field are preserved untouched. Photo Culler writes culling decisions and optional IPTC metadata — nothing more.
Photo Culler sits between import and organization. Rename your files with Photo Batch Renamer, cull with Photo Culler, then add the keepers to Photo Archive Lite. XMP sidecars carry your ratings and pick status between all four apps — no re-import, no sync, no catalog.
"The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak."
Hans Hofmann
Fast, focused photo culling for macOS. Pick, reject, rate, and label — with XMP round-tripping, IPTC metadata stamping, and session reports. The decisive step between import and archive. One-time purchase. No subscription.