• Welcome to the Lightroom Queen Forums! We're a friendly bunch, so please feel free to register and join in the conversation. If you're not familiar with forums, you'll find step by step instructions on how to post your first thread under Help at the bottom of the page. You're also welcome to download our free Lightroom Quick Start eBooks and explore our other FAQ resources.
  • Stop struggling with Lightroom! There's no need to spend hours hunting for the answers to your Lightroom Classic questions. All the information you need is in Adobe Lightroom Classic - The Missing FAQ!

    To help you get started, there's a series of easy tutorials to guide you through a simple workflow. As you grow in confidence, the book switches to a conversational FAQ format, so you can quickly find answers to advanced questions. And better still, the eBooks are updated for every release, so it's always up to date.
  • Dark mode now has a single preference for the whole site! It's a simple toggle switch in the bottom right-hand corner of any page. As it uses a cookie to store your preference, you may need to dismiss the cookie banner before you can see it. Any problems, please let us know!

LR randomly rasterising files

Status
Not open for further replies.

zooey

Member
Joined
Nov 1, 2019
Messages
53
Lightroom Version Number
Lightroom Classic version 8.4.1
Operating System
  1. Windows 10
I'll try and be brief. Every time I think I have LR sorted and I begin to trust it, I find something else to worry about. Only four days ago I made the decision to import everything into LR and abandon efforts to correct all the corrupt keywords in Bridge. (I've been using CS5 and Bridge for the past ten years or so). I only check a handful of parent keywords, but on every file save it wrote the entire flattened hierachy back to Bridge and I was getting nonsense with all the parent keywords checked. It isn't important now. I had a lot of things to correct in LR and almost all my files were changed. The back up I did the following day took about two hours.

So I thought I would pick up and start using LR as part of my normal work flow today. I've been scanning some old film recently, tweaked a bit in LR, but removed all the dust and scratches using smart objects in Photoshop. The file tweaked in LR remained as imagename.tif and my finished file saved as imagename.psd. I mark newly created images as "revisit" with a blue label, a reminder to go back, do one final check a bit later before rasterising and making jpg files for web site, photography forum etc. These scans were way smaller than my normal digital files, so I had already decided to leave the smart objects intact. I just needed that final check and to make jpg files. Imagine my shock today to find several edited last week had been flattened. I haven't opened them since I last worked on them, but my massive tidy up of keywords since has saved the files again. I have never opened a psd file from within LR - I was already scared it might flatten my layers if I brought it back again. I never thought it would flatten any other way.
 
I'm not sure from your story what you did, but Lightroom does not save files again. Lightroom is a non-destructive editor and doesn't even have such option. The only way Lightroom can/will rasterize a file is when you export a copy, or when you send the file with edits to Photoshop again.
 
I'm not sure from your story what you did, but Lightroom does not save files again. Lightroom is a non-destructive editor and doesn't even have such option. The only way Lightroom can/will rasterize a file is when you export a copy, or when you send the file with edits to Photoshop again.

Thank you for that. I don't know if it's good or bad, but I did neither. I'm still at the wary stage with LR, so I have neither exported, nor opened a psd file from within. If I want to take a dng (or tif from scanned film) further, then I open it from Bridge.

If anyone else is interested, I had a set of three - all shots taken on B&W film of some of our cats. I decided to do them all in Photoshop, made smart objects, removed a few scratches on the psb layer and did a tiny bit with Nik in the form of a subtle vignette. All three were saved as psd files and I did nothing more after those first edits. It was my husband who spotted it last night. I had all three opened to show him. On one, the smart object had gone. On another the smart object was there so I could still access the psb layer, but the Nik filter had gone. On the third everything was present, so psb layer and Nik filters.

I need to go through everything today, but at the moment I have only found problems with scanned black and white film.
 
Write down what you did, step by step. Like I said: I can't tell you what happened, but I can tell you that Lightroom did not do that all by itself.

I wish I could write it down. The problem is that when I started with LR a couple of months ago, I thought I wouldn't import all my older images. Then I had the problem with the keywords and I thought it best to abandon the corrupt keywords in Bridge, import all my files and keyword/label in LR. I did these images just over a week ago and imported the remaining images last weekend. So a lot happened.

I've gone through them all and only have three files where either the entire smart object has been rasterised, or just the Nik filters have gone. If that's all then I can live with it.

Another interesting "feature" I discovered just now is that I can delete keywords in Bridge and yet they still exist in LR. Say I took an image a few weeks ago, keyworded in Bridge, lived with it for a bit and then decided to make a jpg for my web site. Those keywords show up on my site, so I've always deleted them in Bridge at the time I make the jpg file. I've just done that, imported the image into LR (I keep those files just in case) and the keywords are still there. I thought I spotted this when I imported the other 1,000+ jpg files a few days ago. I selected the lot and deleted a long string of keywords in LR. Later I started to doubt my memory, but it's clearly happened again. I don't understand why Adobe products aren't talking to each other a bit better...
 
Lightroom stores all its edits and keywords in the catalog. It does not change the files. That is why things you do in Bridge, such as writing keywords to the metadata of the file, or deleting them from the file, will have no impact on what you see in Lightroom. Unless you force Lightroom to also write keywords into files and read from them (which is possible). For this reason it may not be a good idea to use Lightroom and Bridge together. I’m not saying it cannot be done, but you are making life more difficult for yourself, especially if you do not have very good understanding how these two applications work and where they are different.
 
For this reason it may not be a good idea to use Lightroom and Bridge together. I’m not saying it cannot be done, but you are making life more difficult for yourself, especially if you do not have very good understanding how these two applications work and where they are different.
Lightroom is to me a combination of two Adobe Products. It replaces Bridge in that it is an image organization app. Bridge is limited to organizing in file folders which are limited to the constraints of the file system (in your case NTFS). For instance a file can exist in one and only one folder So Descriptive folder names to categorize images is restricted Lightroom uses collections where a single image can be assigned to many collections and the file behind that image stays always in the original folder (no Moving files around). In Lightroom Keywords are assigned to images and stored in the catalog file. You do not have to update a file to assign keywords .
The Second product that Lightroom replaces is ACR. All of the functionality of ACR available in Photoshop is available in LR with a better user interface.
Lightroom is what Bridge and ACR should have been.
Most of the time you can work entirely in LR and create derivatives when you need to send a completed file to another destination (web or print or third party) For PS functions not available with Bridge or ACR, like layers, you need to create an intermediate file where the original unedited file is merged with the LR edits and sent to PS. On returning to LR that intermediate file can have layers and other PS attributes. What comes back to Lightroom should be a finished product. Your workflow should never need to have additional LR processing and return to PS for PS work.

LR is always non destructive. Although LR does not work with layers, it always preserves them. So a PS file imported into LR with Layers can have further edits in PS by Editing the Original and not a LR derivative.

I think understanding these principles will go a long way to increasing your comfort level with LR and less reliance on PS.
 
I have to agree with Johan. Lightroom can't really do that - Photoshop can do anything, including rasterising smart object and other layers.

I wonder if the problem relates to not understanding Lightroom or how it opens files in Photoshop. My guess is that you or your husband may have sent a second - flattened - copy of the image from Lightroom to Photoshop.
 
Lightroom stores all its edits and keywords in the catalog. It does not change the files. That is why things you do in Bridge, such as writing keywords to the metadata of the file, or deleting them from the file, will have no impact on what you see in Lightroom. Unless you force Lightroom to also write keywords into files and read from them (which is possible). For this reason it may not be a good idea to use Lightroom and Bridge together. I’m not saying it cannot be done, but you are making life more difficult for yourself, especially if you do not have very good understanding how these two applications work and where they are different.

Thank you for your help. I do understand the catalogue. What I'm doing is creating the jpg files outside of LR. I open the psd from Bridge and create the jpg files for my web site. I then remove the keywords from the jpg files within Bridge. Only then do I import them into LR and it still sees previously deleted keywords. I've just made six new ones for my web site and had to go through the process as described. I'm learning though. On my next batch of images I will leave keywording to the very end. (Oh... and I do already have automatic save turned on). I'm trying to give up as much of Bridge as I can, but until I trust myself to open psd files from LR it will still be needed. A normal open I could cope with, but there seem to be three options. I don't want to lose my layers if I choose the wrong one :)
 
I have to agree with Johan. Lightroom can't really do that - Photoshop can do anything, including rasterising smart object and other layers.

I wonder if the problem relates to not understanding Lightroom or how it opens files in Photoshop. My guess is that you or your husband may have sent a second - flattened - copy of the image from Lightroom to Photoshop.

Yes - I've been rasterising most of my psd files for over a year now. Hubby never touches the PC - he wouldn't dare! So far I have never opened a file from within LR and at the moment I have no intention of doing so. For the moment I am now up to date with everything, so perhaps the next batch of scanning will go better :)
 
What I'm doing is creating the jpg files outside of LR. I open the psd from Bridge and create the jpg files for my web site.
I can't explain why what you describe is happening, but Why are you Doing anything in Bridge? I think your workflow is far too complicated and is in need of streamlining. Everything can be done in Lightroom or PS, including creating the keyword less Jpeg for the web.
Import your source file (Scan) into Lightroom. Do what ever you wish with it in LR and if necessary Photoshop. Export the derivative file as a JPEG in LR and send that to the web. This is where your original image data gets merged with LR adjustments and sent to the next step (intermediate or final)
The result is one scanned file in the LR catalog , Maybe an intermediate file that was returned from Photoshop (also Cataloged) and a derivative file sent to your website with no local file retained or cataloged.
 
I can't explain why what you describe is happening, but Why are you Doing anything in Bridge? I think your workflow is far too complicated and is in need of streamlining. Everything can be done in Lightroom or PS, including creating the keyword less Jpeg for the web.
Import your source file (Scan) into Lightroom. Do what ever you wish with it in LR and if necessary Photoshop. Export the derivative file as a JPEG in LR and send that to the web. This is where your original image data gets merged with LR adjustments and sent to the next step (intermediate or final)
The result is one scanned file in the LR catalog , Maybe an intermediate file that was returned from Photoshop (also Cataloged) and a derivative file sent to your website with no local file retained or cataloged.

I've used Bridge and CS5 for over ten years now. When I moved to Adobe CC a couple of months ago I was prepared to shift most things to LR. Only it corrupted all my Bridge keywords. Remember that I had been using that with no problem for a decade, so I had trust issues with LR. I thought it over and realised Bridge does very little, so I did make the change. There have been more problems though. I know now Windows Explorer doesn't display the image information I expect, but it only changed with LR. Now my smart objects have dropped off. I think I'm still confused about exporting and setting auto save to file. I do the latter, but I have never exported. I know what I'm doing in Photoshop - flattening, resizing, sharpening and converting the colour profile. I also run actions on some files and I wouldn't know where to start in LR. Time to watch some more videos I think :)
 
Earlier I said that Lightroom Classic is what Bridge and ACR should have been. I think you need to spend some time getting comfortable with the the LR edit parameters. These are the same as this found in ACR

Export is simply making a derivative. Meaning merge an Original image with LR adjustment and create a new derivative image. IOW "Save As" using different terminology . Resizing, Cropping etc take place in the Ex[port process. Lightroom processes only in the ProPhotoRGB Colorspace. Photoshop processes in the ProPhotoRGB Colorspace as a default but can do others as well. You should do all of your computational processing in the larger ProPhotoRGB Colorspace. It should always be your default working colorspace. You change color profile on output (i.e. Export) were sRGB is a generic display media colorspace and AdobeRGB is a generic print media colorspace. Print media might use a specific color profile for a particular printer and paper. You should create an output file with a specific color profile if you are going to send that image in that file to that printer and paper combination.

It has been said by me and others that your can do 90-95% of all of your editing requirements using the editing tools in Lightroom alone. IOW Photoshop is unnecessary for most of your development workflow. Where PS does become useful is in those few images that require layers to separate the background for the fore ground (as example). Or where I am creating a surrealistic/artificial image from "whole cloth".

I used to spend a lot of time getting things like sharpening, NR tweaked just right. My cameras got better, Lightroom improved process version and camera controls. Now, I only shoot RAW so that LR creates the initial RGB image from my RAW data. Most of the time after importing, I create a Crop. Add a little Texture and my image is ready. I add a few keywords, Title and Caption and I have a finished image ready for export. The most difficult job that faces me in LR is deciding which images to keep and looking for an excuse to reject and delete 80% of what I have shot.
 
The most difficult job that faces me in LR is deciding which images to keep and looking for an excuse to reject and delete 80% of what I have shot.
What he said.
 
Earlier I said that Lightroom Classic is what Bridge and ACR should have been. I think you need to spend some time getting comfortable with the the LR edit parameters. These are the same as this found in ACR

Export is simply making a derivative. Meaning merge an Original image with LR adjustment and create a new derivative image. IOW "Save As" using different terminology . Resizing, Cropping etc take place in the Ex[port process. Lightroom processes only in the ProPhotoRGB Colorspace. Photoshop processes in the ProPhotoRGB Colorspace as a default but can do others as well. You should do all of your computational processing in the larger ProPhotoRGB Colorspace. It should always be your default working colorspace. You change color profile on output (i.e. Export) were sRGB is a generic display media colorspace and AdobeRGB is a generic print media colorspace. Print media might use a specific color profile for a particular printer and paper. You should create an output file with a specific color profile if you are going to send that image in that file to that printer and paper combination.

It has been said by me and others that your can do 90-95% of all of your editing requirements using the editing tools in Lightroom alone. IOW Photoshop is unnecessary for most of your development workflow. Where PS does become useful is in those few images that require layers to separate the background for the fore ground (as example). Or where I am creating a surrealistic/artificial image from "whole cloth".

I used to spend a lot of time getting things like sharpening, NR tweaked just right. My cameras got better, Lightroom improved process version and camera controls. Now, I only shoot RAW so that LR creates the initial RGB image from my RAW data. Most of the time after importing, I create a Crop. Add a little Texture and my image is ready. I add a few keywords, Title and Caption and I have a finished image ready for export. The most difficult job that faces me in LR is deciding which images to keep and looking for an excuse to reject and delete 80% of what I have shot.

Thank you for the detailed reply and sorry that this has gone off topic. Last night I set everything up to process RAW from within LR rather than in ACR as usual. I already had presets in the latter for my lenses and I was pleased to find they also showed up in LR. Next I looked at export and I've already set up what I need to "save as" for various purposes. The final stage for me will be to open an image into Photoshop and I feel pretty confident about it now. The sky is getting brighter and I have plans for a photoshoot with our cats on the bed. Hoping to spend the weekend taking images all the way through to the end, using just LR and PS :)
 
Thank you for the detailed reply and sorry that this has gone off topic.
It is your topic. We just follow... My goal is to help each user with a better understanding of LR and for them to be able to use it efficiently. It sounds like you are getting there.
 
It is your topic. We just follow... My goal is to help each user with a better understanding of LR and for them to be able to use it efficiently. It sounds like you are getting there.

I certainly am getting there. This afternoon I opened my first image into PS, created a smart object, made pixel changes, added an adjustment layer and saved. I was impressed to see my psd was stacked on top of the dng automatically. Later I opened it again, dealt with the warning message, made further changes and everything behaved perfectly. This is really going to speed up the way I work :)
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top