Integrating Lightroom and OSX Photos

[happygun]

Hi all,

Does anybody use these apps side by side?
If so, what workflow(s) do you have? How do you manage both systems?

 

[Roelof Moorlag]

I don't use OSX photo's so i can not answer your first question.
However, i think it's best to use one application only for managing your files.
When that application is Lightroom (it is more powerfull in this task) then it's possible to export files for external use (like OSX Photo's).

 

[clee01l]

The is no reason to use both apps. LR is capable of exceeding anything that the Photos app can do. Concentrate on creating a workflow that is exclusively LR.

 

[happygun]

Hi both.
Most of my family use iOS photos app and i use that app for sharing.
Appreciate the argument of using one application to manage photos - Lightroom is my 'main' management application, but was wondering if anybody who regularly uses their iPhone has developed a workflow where there is no (or minimum) duplication of effort while still using iOS photos as a virtual memory card, and also using iCloud photo sharing to share their photos with family.

 

[LouieSherwin]

Hi,

It is unfortunate that Apple Photos is such a closed system. Also living in a family that is invested in the Apple eco-system I have not yet come up with a satisfactory solution. With my wife's and my own iPhones I periodically download all new images and movies to my main computer via PhotoSync. Then importing these into Lightroom. Then I share with the rest of my family usually through DropBox using Jeffery Friedl's Collection Publisher. If I want something from another family member then I can usually get them to post on DropBox as well.

Recently I have also published and shared collections to Lightroom Mobile. I initially had high hopes that the new Lightroom CC Mobile might be able to solve this problem but it doesn't seem to be going that way. For me the single AdobeId tied to cloud based catalog limits the usefulness to individuals with multiple mobil devices.

Additionally as a matter of privacy protection I am loath to simply hand over all my private photos to any "free" or even nominally priced cloud based storage solution, no matter what the convenience. It seems that all the big players (Apple, Google, Amazon, etc.) are trying to glom on to as much of our data as possible and not let go. And not one of them, including Adobe, being honest or forthright about what they are doing with all that "free" metadata.

So for now it is acceptable if frustrating to continue as I do.

-louie

 

[happygun]

Hi Louie, i am feeling your frustration!

I wish either system offered everything i need, but as they dont i need to work out the best way to manage the two. Some thoughts / observations / ideas.

Lightroom is my master database. I use it for:-
- Importing images / videos from my 'proper' cameras
- importing occasional exports from apple photos
- importing scanned images
- cataloguing my images
- collections
- managing metadata
- lightroom specific methods, e.g. flags, colours, ratings
- managing the folder structure of images
- developing.
- exporting / publishing

Apple Photos is secondary database. I use it:-
- As a virtual sd card for importing to iPhone photos and videos into lightroom.
- Share to iCloud family sharing
- Occasional editing.
- basic management / cataloguing.

So thinking about a Photos > Lightroom workflow. In Lightroom i want all the originals, edits of edited photos, and to be able to identify the 'favourites'.

Create the following smart albums in Photos: -
- photo is edited, (export with edits)
- all photos
- everything that is not included in the above 4 collections

Create an AppleScript to
1 - add keywords to identify: -
- Selfies
- Panoramas
- Bursts
- Screenshots
- favourites
2 - add the date time and apple photos export, e.g. 2017-12-31-ApplePhotosExport
3 - export the above smart albums
4 - remove the exported photos from Apple Photos, excluding 'Favourites' (this allows me to keep my favourite family photos on my iOS devices)

This should bring all the information i need to catalogue the imported photos in Lightroom, bring in the edited photos where i have edited, the unedited versions of the edited photos, and everything else.

Some things i will need to check: -
1 - Will Lightroom recognise the duplicates in future exports (the favourites that remain in Apple Photos)? I could add a keyword 'exported_to_lightroom' and exclude this from future exports.
2 - Will all metadata be imported into Lightroom?
3 - How can i retain location data for videos?

Issues i need to resolve: -
- There also appears to be an issue in keywords that are held in xmp sidecar files exported by apple photos not being imported into Lightroom
- There is an issue that not selecting export original when exporting videos sets the time stamp as export. Must remember to export videos as originals

 

[apdapd]

Hi Happygun, Louie, and everyone else on this thread.

I, too, am feeling pretty overwhelmed in managing my iPhone photos and my Lightroom Catalogue in a streamlined way. I am a photo hobbyist who has been using Lightroom for many years and have several hundred thousand photos in that catalogue. But I am also just a regular person who is trigger-happy with my iPhone for everyday pics. Most aren't gorgeous, but they document everyday life, and I have been exporting them into Lightroom all these years.

But it has gotten messy. And iCloud drives me crazy. So does the Photos app. I want to be able to stop using the photos app and automatically get everything into lightroom classic without having to remember to do this manually every few weeks. Is there a way for me to use the new lightroom CC as a replacement to the photos app -- just to somehow get all my iPhone photos automatically into lightroom classic? I'm looking for streamlined workflows.

I'll also be starting to use dropbox or google photos or mylio or something as well as a NAS system to backup everything better (right now I have several external harddrives).

I'd love to see examples of the workflows of people who use both lightroom classic AND their iphones a LOT. How do you all keep it manageable?

 

[camner]

Hi,

It is unfortunate that Apple Photos is such a closed system. Also living in a family that is invested in the Apple eco-system I have not yet come up with a satisfactory solution. With my wife's and my own iPhones I periodically download all new images and movies to my main computer via PhotoSync. Then importing these into Lightroom. Then I share with the rest of my family usually through DropBox using Jeffery Friedl's Collection Publisher. If I want something from another family member then I can usually get them to post on DropBox as well.

Is there a reason you use PhotoSync rather than LRMobile to get the photos from the iPhones into LRCC, since LRMobile can be set to autosync photos from iPhones to Adobe Cloud (and thus onward to LRCC)?

 

[Jim Wilde]

I'd love to see examples of the workflows of people who use both lightroom classic AND their iphones a LOT. How do you all keep it manageable?

Simple. As @camner said, I have LRCC on mobile (phone and 2 tablets) set to auto-add new pictures taken with those devices to a specified album within the mobile app. Take a picture, start the mobile app, picture is automatically added and starts to sync to the Adobe cloud. Next time I start Classic on my desktop the picture automatically appears, in the appropriate dated folder (my Classic preferences are set to use the same dated folder system as my normal imports).

The only time I open the Photos app on my iDevices is to delete images from the Camera Roll after they've been synced to the Adobe cloud.

 

[happygun]

Simple. As @camner said, I have LRCC on mobile (phone and 2 tablets) set to auto-add new pictures taken with those devices to a specified album within the mobile app. Take a picture, start the mobile app, picture is automatically added and starts to sync to the Adobe cloud. Next time I start Classic on my desktop the picture automatically appears, in the appropriate dated folder (my Classic preferences are set to use the same dated folder system as my normal imports).

The only time I open the Photos app on my iDevices is to delete images from the Camera Roll after they've been synced to the Adobe cloud.

Hi Jim - once they are imported into your Lightroom classic desktop folders, how do you then remove those photos from lightroom on your iDevice to stop them taking up room?

How does lightroom handle videos metadata (inc location metadata) when imported this way?

PS, i have also discovered that exported 'slow-mo' videos just get appear as normal videos when played in most players. However, Quicktime recognises them correctly, not sure what is going on here.

 

[Jim Wilde]

Hi Jim - once they are imported into your Lightroom classic desktop folders, how do you then remove those photos from lightroom on your iDevice to stop them taking up room?

Several ways. In LR Classic, I could simply remove them from the All Synced Photographs special collection, that deletes them from the cloud but keeps them in Classic. Or I could delete them using any of the LRCC apps (desktop, mobile or web), again that deletes from the cloud but in Classic they are simply removed from the ASP collection, but are retained in the catalog and drive folder.

Can't really help with your video questions, as I don't shoot video. Hopefully someone who does will be able to respond.

 

[happygun]

Several ways. In LR Classic, I could simply remove them from the All Synced Photographs special collection, that deletes them from the cloud but keeps them in Classic. Or I could delete them using any of the LRCC apps (desktop, mobile or web), again that deletes from the cloud but in Classic they are simply removed from the ASP collection, but are retained in the catalog and drive folder.

Can't really help with your video questions, as I don't shoot video. Hopefully someone who does will be able to respond.

Thanks Jim,

So presumably, I need to remove them from 'All Synced Photographs' to remove them from my iDevices before adding those photos to any synced collections i may have in lightroom classic desktop (e.g. 'family favourites' collection?

 

[Jim Wilde]

If you remove them from All Synced Photographs (or delete them from LRCC), they'll be removed from the cloud. But if you then add them into a synced collection in Classic, they'll get added back to the cloud again (and thus will re-appear in all the LRCC apps). If you know you want them in a synced collection, don't bother deleting them, just add them to the synced collection.

The only "advantage" of deleting from the cloud, then re-adding them by a synced collection in LR Classic is that the upload from Classic will be a Smart Preview only (thus lower resolution), but those smart previews don't count against your cloud storage allowance.

 

[LouieSherwin]

Is there a reason you use PhotoSync rather than LRMobile to get the photos from the iPhones into LRCC, since LRMobile can be set to autosync photos from iPhones to Adobe Cloud (and thus onward to LRCC)?

For a couple of reasons.

1. Completely independent of the "cloud", uses my local WIFI to connect. It is not clear to me what happens when you "delete" something from the "cloud". Everyone from Amazon cloud services and Google to the NSA are scouring the cloud for data. So why leave more of a trail than necessary.
2. PhotoSync copies the files to my hard drive to its own temporary holding area. Then I can use my normal Import process to bring them into Lightroom. By using the Move function in Import the holding area is automatically cleaned up.
3. Easily handles multiple devices AND multiple users. I am responsible for archiving my wife's iPhone images and videos.
4. Easily handle images and videos separately. PhotoSync has a filter for either so I can import each type with a slightly different process. Although I import my videos into my master catalog I put them into a separate folder structure with the intent to use a standalone video editor in the future.

-louie

 

[camner]

How does lightroom handle videos metadata (inc location metadata) when imported this way?

Video metadata is a pain in the {insert your region’s appropriate word here}! Since there is no standard (like EXIF) for video metadata, apps that deal with video metadata do whatever they want, which is rarely, I have found to my dismay, what I would want to have happen.

In my experience with iPhone video, LR correctly picks up the video capture date and time (it seems to pick it up from the QuickTime CreationDate tag (NOT the QuickTime CreateData tag!). Unfortunately, any app that I’ve used to edit video (iMovie is what I am using now) overwrites that data (it actually doesn’t rewrite a QuickTime CreationDate tag at all, but it sets the QuickTime CreateData tag to the date iMovie does the edit, and then LR uses the new QuickTime CreateData tag as the “capture date”). So, when you import the edited movie into LR, LR won’t have the correct capture date, and if that’s important to you (it is to me), one has to use some other technique to fix that. The easiest way is to edit the capture time in LRCC, but that info only resides in the LR catalog and won’t be permanently in the actual video file. I have a workflow that takes care of this, but it is beyond a “pain in the....”

 

[clee01l]

Simple. As @camner said, I have LRCC on mobile (phone and 2 tablets) set to auto-add new pictures taken with those devices to a specified album within the mobile app. Take a picture, start the mobile app, picture is automatically added and starts to sync to the Adobe cloud ...

This is the same method that I use. I have disabled the Apple Photos app on my computer and do not use iCloud for any photos from anywhere.

 

[sam9051]

somewhat related - how do i stop Apple photos from starting everytime I insert a memory card into my Macbook. ?
I only want to import my memory card photos into LR

thanks

 

[Johan Elzenga]

How to stop Photos from launching when connecting a device to your Mac

 

[happygun]

If you remove them from All Synced Photographs (or delete them from LRCC), they'll be removed from the cloud. But if you then add them into a synced collection in Classic, they'll get added back to the cloud again (and thus will re-appear in all the LRCC apps). If you know you want them in a synced collection, don't bother deleting them, just add them to the synced collection.

The only "advantage" of deleting from the cloud, then re-adding them by a synced collection in LR Classic is that the upload from Classic will be a Smart Preview only (thus lower resolution), but those smart previews don't count against your cloud storage allowance.

Good enough reason for me with my measly 20 GB!
How quickly do the photos move into lightroom mobile from the camera roll? I have had a clear out of Apple Photos so it empty, took a couple of photos and videos to test the transfer to lightroom on my desktop and nothing has yet appeared in Lightroom on my phone. I have auto add selected for photos and videos but nothing has yet appeared...

 

[Jim Wilde]

It should be pretty near instant....take a picture, open the LR app and it should be added almost immediately. Where are you looking? If you haven't yet enabled auto add on a specific collection, provided you have enabled auto add in the general app settings then the picture should appear just in All Photos.

 

[happygun]

Ive just enabled auto add, not specified a collection.
Shall try again (possibly in the morning...!)

PS, am i getting old or is not totally obvious what toggle state is on / off in lightroom iOS settings?

 

[happygun]

I unchecked and checked the import box, took a couple more pictures and those taken since i re-checked the option in lightroom have been imported.

One thing i note is that they are imported into a folder "Lightroom Mobile". DO i need to manually move those photos to my 'normal' folder strucutre or is there a method to automate this?
Ignore me - i have found the relevant option in the preferences.

 

[HarrisonMG]

Hi,
I'm kind of new to Lightroom, generally, because I have used it a bunch of time and know how to do normal stuff, but I haven't necessarily gotten used to it. I want to use it more because its editing tools are better than Photos so I am trying to up my game a bit. I also want to start shooting RAW but don't have space for it on my disk (I have keep all photos on disk, but not keep all files on disk) -- so Lightroom is a great way to be able to manage+edit them without worrying about storage: I have 2TB in the cloud.

I have created a workflow for importing from my camera where they go in RAW to Lightroom for edits, and automatically to Photos as JPG when I am done using a custom export preset and shortcut of control+e

Because I use Apple Photos as my main photo manager, the other half of my workflow is editing images that are already in my photo library. For this, I hit command+option+enter (to "edit with" the last used app, usually Lightroom Classic CC and if not I have to manually select from dropdown) and it takes me to Lightroom where all I do is click "import". Then I make my edits and do the whole control+e for reimport, and I can choose whether or not to save the old file.

The thing that is slightly unclear about this is exactly what ends up happening with original files--because when you "edit with", Photos creates a copy of the image specifically for Lightroom to use and deems it as "in use" for editing elsewhere. However, Lightroom doesn't support what PS does where you can save the edits back into the original photo in Apple's app, so you are effectively leaving a loose end where Photos will forever think that the image you changed is "in use" UNTIL you try edit the photo in Apple's app and explicitly tell it that it is wrong. I hope this make sense. If not, it doesn't matter much, but my goal is to have a new regimen for utmost tidiness, storage-saving techniques, and higher quality in my images.

I hope this helps you, and I appreciate any questions, comments, or criticisms, as some things I just have no idea...

Thanks!
Harrison

 

[Victoria Bampton]

Hi Harrison, welcome to the forum! Trying to use Apple Photos alongside Lightroom is a recipe for confusion, so I'd strongly recommend picking one or the other. If you're low on storage, have you considered an external hard drive?

 

[HarrisonMG]

Thanks! Before I got a computer with more storage, I actually had a separate photos library for personal and for photography. But the reason I want to use Lightroom in conjunction with Photos is twofold:
a) I want to keep all of my photos (doesn't matter if they r jpg) on my computer, on my phone, in the cloud and accessible from anywhere. With Lightroom that doesn't really work, and I might have copies of the same photos if they are all in one place like a RAW+JPG. Also I don't like Lightroom's organization system compared to Photos.
b) I love Lightroom for one reason only: editing photos. I could very well use just Photos and carry on my merry way, but I like Lightroom's local adjustments and split toning, etc. BUT my raw pics come out at what, 30mb, 40, 50? When I go on a trip and come back with 800 pics, thats a problem for me, because it means that either they can't go in my photo library, or I have to let my library offload into the cloud (of which I have 2TB so no issues yet there). When in Lightroom, they can all just go to the cloud and I don't care because they are the HW og's and I have the LQs in my Photos.

The point is, I'm just one of those people who wants every single photo downloaded onto their computer and in the cloud at all times. And I love my setup in photos and have spent ages organizing it. So it is actually quite easy to set a couple automator workflows so that my pics go camera>Lightroom>photos now instead of straight in, and that when I want specific adjustments on other photos I hit one key and they are in my Lightroom library and another key when I'm done and they r back in my Photos.

When you speak of confusion, I can see how some people could get confused in the process. I think I'm just gonna keep a folder for imports from camera, and imports from photos in my LR library because then I can periodically erase the ones from Photos since they were reimported. And other than that....I mean you just have two key commands and a folder full of RAWs in LR and your normal photo library in Apple.

I don't think this system is good for most people, don't get me wrong. But I know there are a few who are stuck in the apple ecostystem and want everything a certain way so, here is I think a pretty good one!

Oh and btw I made and automator service to replace the "edit with" fn where it just imports to LR whatever photos are selected when you apply a key command.

Thanks and hope this finds you well