Combined use LRC and LR

[JVMiddleEast]

Lightroom Version Number

still have to buy it

Operating System

1. macOS 14 Sonoma

Hi,

I am new to this forum and look forward to interacting with all other members. Unfortunately, it will initially be one-way knowledge-sharing traffic because I am new to LRC and LR.

I have used Luminar in the beginning, then switched to ON1. Initially, I was pleased with ON1, but as my portfolio grew and my editing and library management requirements became more demanding, I felt it was time to switch.

And right off the bat, I got confused with LRC and LR and the interaction between those 2 (if any).

Please allow me to explain my preferred setup:

1) I use an Apple Studio as my main central station at home. My portfolio is on internal storage (4 TB internal), which is backed up daily to an external drive and automatically synced to a cloud service.
2) On the road (but also at home when I am on the couch), I use an M1 Max Apple Macbook Pro and occasionally an iPad.
3) I often print images, have relatively large batches to edit, publish books, etc.
4) On the road, I would like to be able to edit, print, and work with batches, but I would also like to use this Cloud storage (not for the entire portfolio but for the active part which constantly hovers around 500-600GB)

You probably already know where this is headed:

- Should I use LRC (stronger data catalog management, printing, batch editing) or LR (cloud-based)
- If I use LRC as the main station at home, but I want to use the laptop as well, would both machines have their own catalog, and those catalogs are not syncing?
- Can LRC and LR be used together as a team? How would that work?

Looking forward reading your feedback.

Thanks in advance

 

[clee01l]

You probably already know where this is headed:

- Should I use LRC (stronger data catalog management, printing, batch editing) or LR (cloud-based)
- If I use LRC as the main station at home, but I want to use the laptop as well, would both machines have their own catalog, and those catalogs are not syncing?
- Can LRC and LR be used together as a team? How would that work?

I am one of the people that uses LrC and Lr together. Because it is the most feature rich, most mature (and where this all started), I use LrC as my primary Image management tool. I host my master catalog on a Mac Studio (desktop). For all of my mobile devices (which would include your MBP) , I run Lightroom which accesses the Adobe Cloud.
I have the 1TB Photography plan because I use my iPadPro and Lightroom as a front end to my master catalog on my Mac Studio. There are inconsistencies between Lr and LrC.

• Foremost for me it is Keywords. They only sync one way one time from LrC to Lr. Lr has Sensei (a very powerful AI keyword search tool) LrC does not. . LrC has Hierarchal keywords, Lr only provides a flat list I save all of my keywording for the Master Catalog on LrC. And I have modified my workflow to accommodate this difference in functionality.
• LrC Makes use of Smart Collections. Lr only has static Collections called Albums. Smart Collections are very useful for automating your workflow. I can't manage my inventory without them
• Printing is only offered seamlessly through LrC. As is Publish Services.
• LrC offers Color LabelSets which I use to see at a glance what stage an image is in my workflow This is not a feature of Lr. In fact Images are import in Lr unlabeled which created issues with my Workflow that depends upon them.
• Lr integrates seamlessly with Adobe Portfolio. I use portfolio to share my best albums to friends and family.
• There are other issues between LrC and Lr but they are IMO minor. Things like photo merge and Denise can wait until.

Lightroom Classic sync Smart Previews (smaller DNG files suitable of editing on a small mobile display). These do not consume any of your Adobe Plan storage. OTOH Images imported into Lightroom are full size and sync down to the LrC Catalog full size. These do consume your Plan storage and most camera cards are larger than the basic 20GB Photography plan.

Typically, I shoot 48mp Nikon NEFs and import these through Lightroom on my iPad Pro. This work very conveniently when I travel or out in the field away from my Home Workstation. Because my Mac Studio runs 7X24X365, If I have a decent internet connection, all that I import to the iPadPro are synced to LrC by the time I get home. My iPadPro is so convenient that I use it downstairs to import rather that to import using my Mac Studio in my upstairs office.

When traveling I may use the iPadPro for basic culling, editing and making quick albums for immediate sharing through Adobe Portfolio. When I cull, I do not delete images using Lightroom. Instead I mark the as rejected and delete them when my workflow has finished from my master catalog on the Mac Studio. The reason for this is that Lr does not delete images immediately, it move them into a "Deleted" album for 60days. This interferes with syncing to and from the LrC catalog.

These are the Highlights. I use a variation of John Beardsworths "Workflow Smart Collections ". I have modified his basics to include Publish Services. This should be enough to get you started.
In LrC, you should organize your images using keywords and Collections and import using one of the default Date Named folder schemes that integrate nicely with the images that sync from the Adobe Cloud. Trying to organize images by folders is too limiting for a robust data asset management tool like Lightroom Classic.

 

[JVMiddleEast]

Dear Clee,

Wow, I’m really impressed and grateful for your superb explanation. Thanks for taking the time to put all of this in this post. Much appreciated.

When I read first time I almost got confused. You had stated that the Mac Studio is your main management tool, yet you import your images using your iPad and via Lightroom. I thought the catalog can only be on one device.

It is only on second, more concentrated read, that I realized that your using both apps. So if I understand correctly, you import images using iPad with Lightroom (hence they go to the cloud) and for your master pool of images you use LRC. Correct?

That raises 2 questions: if you import using LR the full size original is uploaded to the cloud. But where do you store the images for LRC: I assume on an external drive?

Basically that would result in one set originals in the cloud for Lightroom plus a set on internal or external storage for LRC. I assume it is not possible to sync the edits. Almost certain not if only due to the fact that the key wording structure is completely different.

Once again big thank you. I had not imagined such a warm welcome.

Regards

 

[clee01l]

That raises 2 questions: if you import using LR the full size original is uploaded to the cloud. But where do you store the images for LRC: I assume on an external drive?

Basically that would result in one set originals in the cloud for Lightroom plus a set on internal or external storage for LRC. I assume it is not possible to sync the edits. Almost certain not if only due to the fact that the key wording structure is completely different.

When you import via Lightroom All of the images are stored in the Adobe Cloud. When you sync the Adobe Cloud with Lightroom Classic, full size images are since to your LrC catalog and stored as directed by the Catalog import settings. The end result is that ALL of your full size images are maintained locally by LrC. For the Adobe Cloud, any images that you first import to the LrC catalog in the usual way are stored locally in the usual way. Syncing these sends Smart Previews (DNG proxy image file with a maximum long edge of 2560px ) to the Adobe Cloud

Any edits that you make in LrC are saved as instructions in the catalog file and only applied when the original image is viewed in LrC or exported as a derivative. These edit instructions are sent as metadata while you are constantly syncing to the Adobe Cloud. So whenever you view an image in Lightroom (Mobile/Desktop/Web) these metadata instructions are applied to the image that you view. Likewise any edits that you make using Lightroom are stored as metadata in the Adobe Cloud and get synced down to LrC. IOW, all of your images remain in sync across the Adobe universe no matter where thy original or no matter where they are modified.

 

[JVMiddleEast]

You’re a gentleman thank you

 

[johnbeardy]

My preference is to work with LrC on both desktop and laptop computers, only importing into Lr or LriOS or LrWeb as an exception.

With a main catalogue on the desktop, I would normally import into it. Some images would be synced from it to the cloud - favourites, portfolios of certain projects, sometimes sets of pictures that I'm currently working on. So on my phone, ipad or laptop I would have access to those pictures via Lr or LriOS or LrWeb, not full res versions but good enough versions for showing people, adding ratings or captions etc, and to some extent for keep/trash decisions. All the metadata entered in LriOS would sync back into LrC.

When away from home, or if I have new photos but don't want to go into the home office, I import them into LrC on the laptop. I'll do everything like adjustments and metadata entry, including keywords and location data. Then I'll get all that work and the images over to the desktop using File > Export as Catalog which saves the pictures and catalogue to a network location (currently OneDrive where I have 1 tb). Over on the desktop, File > Import from Another Catalog brings it all into the main catalogue. Unlike Lr, this means all the metadata is passed to the main catalogue (if I used Lr, I wouldn't bother entering keywords etc and would have to remember to do it later).

I mentioned only importing into Lr or LriOS or LrWeb as an exception, so what are those exceptions?

• Sometimes, in my away or in the kitchen or living room situation (3rd para above) I might not have many photos to send over. So then I will import them into Lr, not bother with the Import/Export Catalog route, and accept that I'll have to enter keywords etc later.
• Other times I might be on location or travelling home and want to show or share some pictures immediately, and in those cases I'll import them directly into the iPhone or more likely the iPad. When I do a proper import into LrC, it recognises the LriOS imports and brings in the rest of the card.
• I might want to have full res files or videos when I'm going away, in which case I'll import them for a second time but into Lr.

Hope that helps. You'll probably observe there's little role for Lr in this. On the other hand, I have all the advantages of LrC on both computers, while LriOS and LrWeb give me remote access to files.

 

[JVMiddleEast]

Hi John,

Thanks for sharing your workflow with. Very useful. Especially the part on how you work with LRC on both the desktop as well as the laptop. That’s very close to what I have in mind and what I would like to realize.
Have the mighty desktop for bulk, organizing etc, have the ability to continue to work on a collection on the laptop.
Although I didn’t realize it but now that you’ve mentioned it it is very logical in hindsight to exchange collections or folders between the two devices.
It does lead to one other question: am I correct if I state that it is probably not possible to have images on external drive and work on them with both devices? Probably not possible since the catalogs will be different

Thanks for your great feedback

 

[johnbeardy]

It does lead to one other question: am I correct if I state that it is probably not possible to have images on external drive and work on them with both devices? Probably not possible since the catalogs will be different

It rather depends on exactly what you're trying to achieve.

I was mainly talking about beginning work on one computer, my laptop, and then moving it over to the desktop. If you want to work on some images on both computers, frequently switching back and forth, then one possible workflow is to have one catalogue and keep it on the external drive.

Another way would be to repeat the Export As Catalog and Import from Another Catalog, with a slight twist. So you'd keep those separate catalogues, the main or master catalogue on the desktop and the laptop catalogue, both pointed at the same folder of images on the external drive. Let's say you've done work on some of them on the desktop, but now want to make further adjustments/metadata on the laptop. I can think of a couple of alternatives:

• On the desktop, select the files and Save Metadata to Files writes xmp sidecars into the image folders, and on the laptop Read Metadata from Files brings the adjts/metadata into that catalogue. Repeat on the way back to the desktop. Quick and keeps most work - not History steps, VCs, collections, stacks.
• On the desktop, select the files and Export as Catalog - but not including the files ("negatives"). On the laptop you could open this temporary catalogue and do the work in it, or use Import from Another Catalog to bring it into the laptop catalogue. Again, it's a similar path to get the work back into the desktop catalogue, but in this case all your LrC work is preserved.

Hopefully that's not too much detail.

 

[JVMiddleEast]

Great, thanks. You’ve just solved my puzzle: store images and catalog on external drive and bingo. It’s like a portable private cloud you carry with you then.

Thanks

 

[Johan Elzenga]

DNG proxy image file with a maximum long edge of 3560px

It’s 2560 px.

 

[prbimages]

Basically that would result in one set originals in the cloud for Lightroom plus a set on internal or external storage for LRC. I assume it is not possible to sync the edits. Almost certain not if only due to the fact that the key wording structure is completely different.

This comment stood out for me, and I'm not sure that it's been fully addressed so far in the replies (or maybe you've figured it out in the meantime), but just in case:

YES, the edits DO sync between the cloud and Lightroom Classic. They sync both ways - you can edit in one of the cloud apps, and those edits will sync down to your local Classic catalog; or you can edit in Classic, and those edits will sync up to the cloud, where they will appear in all of the cloud apps. And this applies whether you have originals in the cloud or just proxy images. As noted, keywords don't sync, but edits and many other metadata items (e.g. captions, titles, ratings) do. It's a very versatile and useful system, once you've got a good grip on where the exceptions lie.

 

[clee01l]

It’s 2560 px.

Yes, typo


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