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Book module: maintaining image order

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gYab61zH

Active Member
Joined
Aug 12, 2011
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263
Location
Germany
Lightroom Experience
Advanced
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Lightroom Version Number
Classic CC
Operating System
  1. macOS 10.14 Mojave
This is an old problem but extremely frustrating in that it creates a vast amount of unneccessary work for us that could easily have been avoided.

I have a folder in which I have carefully ordered all the images in the order in which I would also like to use them in the photo book. When I click create book using selected images the images suddenly appear either in a randomized order or in the original order (before the re-ordering). I have tried all sorts of work-around so as not to lose the custom order. For example, I created a collection and dragged the images in the correct order to it ... to no avail.

Has any one ever figured out how order can be maintained?
 
My experience has taught me to always add my selected photos to a 'Standard' Collection as the first step.
Then open the Book module and create a "Saved Book" Collection- and ALWAYS work your book from this 'Saved Book' Collection at any time in the future. Use the "Saved Book" collection to sort the photos in Grid view. Return to the Book module by double-clicking the 'Saved Book' Collection, and using [Clear Layout] and [Auto Layout] should always fill your pages with the photos as they appear sorted on the Filmstrip. (where you could also move photos to resort before another [Auto Layout] choice.)
 
I agree. That used to be my standard routine as well. The problem is that I then have to also rearrange everything in the original folder (which I would like to have the same order as the book) because sort orders cannot be transferred easily. Since sorting takes a lot of time (when I do several hundred shots done in a museum trying to arrange everything chronologically or thematically can take hours), this is a huge waste of time. I did find kind of a work around which I also use in other circumstances, but it is less than ideal. I arrange everything in the order I want in the original folder. Then I number all images using the one sort field that can be used in LR, namely label. This I do by hand (it would be lovely to have a plug-in that could do this automatically), but it is relatively fast as long as the total number of images isn't above a few hundred. Once done, a sort according to label in the "saved book" collection quickly puts those images in the right order too.
Caveat: don't assign colour labels to images because it will overwrite the label numbers.
 
Just a follow-up on my earlier mail. I have now figured out at least two other, much easier, ways to preserve the custom order in a folder and use this order for a book, thus avoiding having to custom sort things twice (once in the original folder and once again in the collection used as a basis in the book module). The easiest solution is to use John Beardsworth's ListView plugin and save the custom order (or any other one based on its sort facility) as a collection, which can then be used for the book.
A somewhat messy but free workable solution is to start the book module in the folder with the correct sort order. In my case this creates a very messy unsaved collection with the the images from the folder in correct sort order mixed in with images from previous books. By flagging only the folder's images a filter can then be used to only show the correct images. Once the book has been created it can be saved using only the images used.
 
This problem has been making me doubt my sanity. So glad to find this thread. In the above discussion, do you mean folder (what one would see in the operating system), or collection, visible only in Lightroom?
 
The post just above from gYab61zH mentions Folders and Collections.

Imported FOLDERS of photos are visible in Lightroom! In the Folders panel, just as they exist on the hard-drive.
If a book is to use all the photos stored in ONE folder (as stored on the hard-drive), then the grid view of this Folder in the Folders panel can be set to 'Sort' in various ways (alphabetic, capture time, etc) and this does not rename or affect anything on the hard-drive.
You can also 'Custom' sort these thumbnails in the Grid view by Drag&Drop, BUT- one big limitation - you cannot 'Custom' sort a folder IF the folder of images contains a SUB-folder!
After a Folder sort you would select photos and 'open' the Book module to start a new book.
You do NOT have to re-arrange, move, rename, export, or do anything to files on the hard-drive, Lightroom handles it all.

'COLLECTIONS' are simple lists of photos assembled together for a purpose (eg. a book).
It is FAR EASIER to assemble photos for a book from ANY folder visible in Lightroom, or by viewing 'All Photographs' in Grid view, and adding selected photos to a 'Standard' Collection.
Hint: Make a Collection for the Book that is the "Targeted Collection"- then pressing keyboard will add any selected photo to this Collection. (Note it also can toggle a photo 'out' of a Collection!) There are several ways to add photos to a Collection.

After you start any new Book you MUST click the tab to [Create a Saved Book] which creates a 'Book' Collection in the Collections panel, then you ALWAYS re-open this Book design from this 'Book' Collection - never the top 'Book' menu item!
 
Actually, I have now discovered an even easier solution to maintain sort order in both a folder and a collection. It is very simple. Order things as you like either in the folder or the collection. Once everything is in the right order, highlight all images and rename them using a renaming routine that adds a sort number to the beginning of the file name. You can then use the filename sort to sort everything in the collection or folder. The rename routine I use is: "Image # (00001) Filename."
 
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