Catalog strategy to bring on the go

[RobOK]

Lightroom Version

LrClassic current v 10

Operating System

1. macOS 11 Big Sur

I have 15 years of photography primarily on a desktop Mac Mini using a desktop 4tb drive. (I have backup in place too). LrC latest version, with some collections synced.
While traveling and away from home, I have been using iPad and laptop Lr (Cloudy), and while I like that, I miss not having all of my catalog with me and not having Plugins and other LrC-only features. So I think I am going to use LrC on my laptop.

I now have a mobile 1TB SSD (Samsung T7), which I was hoping to put by whole collection on for the road, but it does not fit to carry a copy of all photos (approaching 2 TB).

I am trying to think about the best way I could bring a subset of my full catalog images on the SSD which would be a live catalog for review, tagging, etc and then marry those changes up with my desktop later. Doing the catalog over Dropbox is another possible option, i explored this a few years back but am rusty on how that would work.

So some options on the table:
1. Always keep the "live" catalog on the mobile SSD, whether on laptop or desktop. When on laptop, some images would be offline. Keeping a backup of Catalog would be paramount.
2. use Dropbox for catalog (anyone have a link to description of how to setup on a Mac)

I am not looking for the exact answer to my setup, but just some input on what others have done to use Lr Classic across two machines?

Thanks All!

 

[clee01l]

I used to carry a laptop and a portable catalog when traveling. I almost always loaded a portion of my master catalog on the travel catalog I did this by making a copy of my whole master catalog on my laptop which had my collections and my keywords and then I would copy over just those folders with image files that I thought I might use while traveling. Upon returning I used the “Import from another catalog” function to Copy the changes and additions from the travel catalog into the master catalog.

When Lightroom (mobile) got legs, and I got a 13”(12.9”) IPadPro, I was able to replace my laptop/LrC combination with Lightroom (mobile) and the iPadPro.
I used LrC to sync about half of my master catalog images to the cloud using the LrC sync function that puts a proxy image in the Adobe cloud and does not use any of my plan storage allotment.

On the iPadPro, I have many of the LrC functions available in Lr (mobile). I can import my camera card into Lightroom (mobile) and full size image are sync’d to my Master catalog by the time I get home (if I have a speedy internet connection). While traveling, I can cull images, add titles, Captions and keywords* and manage some basic edits with Lightroom (mobile)

I can attest that either of these approaches work smoothly. Using Lightroom (mobile) with LrC is a lot less manual intensive which is why I switched. I use Lightroom (mobile) on my iPadPro even at home to be a front end import function to my LrC Master catalog.


*Keywords are handled differently in Lr and LrC. Sync is one way, one time and hierarchical keywords are not supported in Lr mobile)


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[RobOK]

I have been doing that, and was missing LrClassic on travel.

I think what you are saying (reading between the lines), the smoothness of Cloud sync makes up for missing functions in Lr vs LrClassic in my remote environment?

 

[clee01l]

I have been doing that, and was missing LrClassic on travel.

I think what you are saying (reading between the lines), the smoothness of Cloud sync makes up for missing functions in Lr vs LrClassic in my remote environment?

That was the conclusion that I made. YMMV.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Jim Wilde]

If you want to use LrC on a laptop, have you considered using Smart Previews instead of trying to carry your original image files around with you? That "travel light but with full editing capability" is precisely what the Smart Previews were originally designed for.

 

[RobOK]

Yes, i like that idea. Would i put the Catalog on my mobile SSD then and generate Smart Previews? That would be my “live” catalog then, right? (I.e, the Previews are stored in the catalog folder)

 

[Jim Wilde]

Yes, i like that idea. Would i put the Catalog on my mobile SSD then and generate Smart Previews? That would be my “live” catalog then, right? (I.e, the Previews are stored in the catalog folder)

That's certainly one way of doing it. Just be careful on return to copy the catalog back to the primary location (unless you're going to keep it on that mobile SSD permanently).