Managing Lightroom Cloud Storage: How to Empty out space without deleting files.

[reidthaler]

Lightroom Version

current

Operating System

1. Windows 10

Connected to thread https://www.lightroomqueen.com/comm...oom-into-my-lightroom-classic-workflow.47646/ is the issue of managing icloud storage. I've used the Lightroom on the iPad successfully when traveling. I loved editing images on the beach in Bali on my iPad mini and when I was done, to just close the iPad and order another drink (stay away from their beer, it was light that in made Corona seem like an ale...)

My questions are, (and it's important I get it right since I advise students..) is managing Lightroom cloud storage. After I let my images magically download into my Lightroom Classic catalog complete with development edits, flag, and star ratings. It's my understanding that the full rez images are still taking up cloud space. If they synced to may hard drive, I would expect that I could delete images from the cloud, but would not impact images on my hard drive. Adobe "Support" tells me otherwise:

"If you'd delete the files from cloud and sync is still on, it will try to delete the files for Lightroom classic. The purpose of the sync is to keep the same files on the cloud as well as locally. So if you're planning to delete the cloud files and use those files in Lightroom Classic. Please download those files and then import in Lightroom classic, instead of using sync."

This doesn't make sense and wouldn't be the first time I've heard incorrect advice from Adobe. This would suggest that you could never remove image from the cloud because they'd be deleted off your hard drive.

So, please clarify:

• Is Adobe wrong? How do I clear out cloud space but not delete local images
  • It looks like you can reduce storage by deleting cache on Lightroom (Desktop)
  • How do you delete cloud storage in Lightroom Classic?
• Can I remove images that have synced by simply clearing cache on iOS devices?

You can buy additional ITB of storage for travel since 20 GB isn't enough for $14.99/month. Adobe makes it difficult and cryptic. You have to contact them and they'll walk you through the process and apply a code on their end so you can't do it yourself.

Thanks, I think this is the last Lightroom puzzle.

 

[prbimages]

"If you'd delete the files from cloud and sync is still on, it will try to delete the files for Lightroom classic."

This is completely wrong advice from Adobe. As you surmised.

If you are using Lightroom Classic, it treats your images as if it is in charge. You can delete them from the cloud, but this will have NO EFFECT on the images managed by Classic. (Of course, make sure that they have successfully synced down to Classic first.)

Using Lightroom Classic you can delete images from the cloud, by deleting them from the special "All Synced Photographs" collection. Deleting images from the cloud will reclaim the online storage space they were taking up.

 

[reidthaler]

Thanks! I thought that Adobe was screwed up. I copied the chat I had, so I know I didn't make it up in my mind...

Will deleting "All Synced Photographs" also also impact my Synced Collections? I would think so.. It looks like it'll take them out of synced collections. What if I only want to remove the high res images uploaded during travel with my ipad?

 

[prbimages]

Will deleting "All Synced Photographs" also also impact my Synced Collections? I would think so..

Yes. Deleting an image from "All Synced Photographs" will raise a dialog box (unless you've previously ticked "Don't show again" on that dialog) which states that "your photo will be removed from all synced collections and from Lightroom photos on Creative Cloud, but will not be deleted from the desktop catalog". You then have the choice to either confirm the deletion, or cancel it.

 

[clee01l]

Yes. Deleting an image from "All Synced Photographs" will raise a dialog box (unless you've previously ticked "Don't show again" on that dialog) which states that "your photo will be removed from all synced collections and from Lightroom photos on Creative Cloud, but will not be deleted from the desktop catalog". You then have the choice to either confirm the deletion, or cancel it.

To this I would add, If your image is in a syncing collection, then Lightroom Classic will resend the image using the smart version of the image (long edge
I have found that the camera card being imported is larger than the 20GB photography plan. So my subscription is the 1TB Photography Plan at $20USD/mo


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[reidthaler]

If you delete images from All Synced Photographs, then the photo would be removed from the synced collection, correct? How then to clear space in the cloud, but keep the photo in the collection? Turn off sync, the delete from All Synced Photographs, then re-sync the collection?

 

[Johan Elzenga]

If you delete images from All Synced Photographs, then the photo would be removed from the synced collection, correct? How then to clear space in the cloud, but keep the photo in the collection? Turn off sync, the delete from All Synced Photographs, then re-sync the collection?

Yes. That will remove the originals from the cloud, and then replace them by smart previews, while keeping the collection (and so the album in the cloud).

 

[reidthaler]

Great! Thanks so much!

 

[prbimages]

Just to be clear - two ways to achieve this in Lightroom Classic:

• If you delete an image from the All Synced Photographs special collection, it will be removed from the cloud AND from any synced collections. This will clear the space in the cloud that was occupied by that image.
• If you want the image to be in one or more synced collections, then you will have to add it back again to those collections.
• If you add it back to one or more synced collections, then a so-called smart preview (with reduced resolution) will be uploaded to the cloud, and the smart preview version will appear in the online albums/collections. These smart previews do NOT count against your online storage space quota.
• If you wish, you can add a smart preview version of an image to the cloud without adding it to any synced collections, by adding it to the All Synced Photographs special collection.
• There is no need, in this sequence, to turn sync on or off, or to un-sync and re-sync any collections.

Alternatively:

• Turn off sync on the collection(s) you want to preserve.
• Removed the image from the All Synced Photographs special collection. This will remove it from the cloud, and clear the online space that was occupied by the image.
• Re-sync the collection(s) which contain the image. This will cause a smart preview version of the image to be uploaded to the cloud.

 

[TR5642]

The facts above by @prbimages are right to my experience (Contrary to Adobe's wrong info).

But in terms of recommending a best practice, I have found this article to be a great help in explaining how it is possible to manage small LR Cloud space when using LRc as primary. https://lightroomkillertips.com/managing-adobe-cloud-storage-space-classic-users/

The TL;DR version is basically to purge from 'all synced' before you organize into collections in LRc. Yes, you can work around this as noted above. But I find two scenarios where doing it upfront works very well.

1) I'm trying to get RAW or HEIC from my iPhone into LRc. As far as I've discovered, there is no way in iOS to SEND them to LR. (It wants to send JPGs) But LR can import the RAW or HEIC versions into LR and then they magically appear in LRc at my Windows computer (yes I know there are other methods using a Mac). But this starts to fill the cloud budget. So, as soon as they are downloaded to LRc, I move them from the "Lightroom Cloud" folder to somewhere in the "Lightroom Library" hierarchy. Then I go to "all synced photographs" and delete them. Done.

2) I'm doing a cull and preliminary edit/organize on my laptop which is not my LRc home. I used to do this with new Libraries and then import the library and this isn't a bad solution in many cases. But instead I've found I like to use LR on the laptop to import, cull and begin to edit while I'm sitting comfy on the couch . This is extra true when I've shot a sports event where there are hundreds of discards to be culled. The process is the same as above. Let them sync to main library LRc, move them into the Lightroom Library hierarchy and delete immediately from All Synced.

Note: If you import to your main library computer and THEN edit in LR cloud elsewhere, do NOT delete them in LR Cloud. This will leave all of the masters disconnected and you'll have to do it again (or do some fancy selection games). Just flag them for deletion and delete them when you return to the main library computer.

It is a real shame that Adobe doesn't simply give us a function to clear cloud storage for those items in our LRc library. But they clearly don't want to support that use case.

Maybe there is somebody more clever than I with LUA and LRc who could (or has) write a plugin that would clear the full size images in the LR Cloud for everything selected in my LRc?

 

[clee01l]

1. You can not share to anything using the Photos app as this always sends JPEGs (for compatibility) If you use Lightroom to sync mobile photos from your phone, you get the file stored by Lightroom.

I auto sync from the CameraRoll to a Lightroom Album. This send the original file (RAW o HEIC) to the Adobe Cloud and down to the LrC catalog.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[TR5642]

1. You can not share to anything using the Photos app as this always sends JPEGs (for compatibility) If you use Lightroom to sync mobile photos from your phone, you get the file stored by Lightroom.

I auto sync from the CameraRoll to a Lightroom Album. This send the original file (RAW o HEIC) to the Adobe Cloud and down to the LrC catalog.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Please reread. I did note that you cannot 'share to' aka send anything other than JPG to LR Mobile. But you can import from the camera roll.

As you note, there are ways to automate but I don't want all of the content from the phone.

 

[reidthaler]

Please guide me with this scenario:

Client wants to move photos from his iphone camera roll to computer. My recommendation is to import all into Lightroom iphone app and have them sync to the computer, as I do. BUT, he's now telling me that his Adobe storage is filling up, which as some point, will stop syncing.

How do I work through this? If I delete images from "All Synced Photographs" in the catalog, won't that screw things up if all images from the phone haven't uploaded to the cloud?

Please advise.

Thanks,

Reid

 

[Johan Elzenga]

Photos saved to the camera roll are like photos saved on a memory card. Connect the phone to the computer with its Lightning cable, and Lightroom Classic will see it as a camera.

 

[clee01l]

Please guide me with this scenario:

Client wants to move photos from his iphone camera roll to computer. My recommendation is to import all into Lightroom iphone app and have them sync to the computer, as I do. BUT, he's now telling me that his Adobe storage is filling up, which as some point, will stop syncing.

How do I work through this? If I delete images from "All Synced Photographs" in the catalog, won't that screw things up if all images from the phone haven't uploaded to the cloud?

Please advise.

Thanks,

Reid

The 20GB allotted to the Basic Photography Plan is not even sufficient to store one camera card full of image data. My iPhone13 came with 128GB storage. The newest iPhone15 starts with a minimum of 256GB of storage. Both easily exceed the 20GB Basic plan if filled with images.

If you are trying to use Lightroom to import the iPhone camera roll, you need to do this in small batches. After the 20GB Plan fills, some basic housekeeping will free up cloud space. Once the images have sync’d from the Adobe Cloud to the LrC catalog, Remove (not delete) the images from the Synched Photographs special collection AND and Static collections that might be also synching. This will empty the Adobe Cloud storage, freeing up space to import more camera roll images but keeping the originals on the computer running LrC.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[reidthaler]

Photos saved to the camera roll are like photos saved on a memory card. Connect the phone to the computer with its Lightning cable, and Lightroom Classic will see it as a camera.

Yes, you'd think that would work, and maybe on a Mac, but my client and I are on Windows and have usually found copying or importing by plugging in the phone (iPhone 15 Pro Max) is usually only partially successful. I will work for a while and then just stop.

 

[reidthaler]

The 20GB allotted to the Basic Photography Plan is not even sufficient to store one camera card full of image data. My iPhone13 came with 128GB storage. The newest iPhone15 starts with a minimum of 256GB of storage. Both easily exceed the 20GB Basic plan if filled with images.

Correct. I figured he has 70 GB of photos.

If you are trying to use Lightroom to import the iPhone camera roll, you need to do this in small batches. After the 20GB Plan fills, some basic housekeeping will free up cloud space. Once the images have sync’d from the Adobe Cloud to the LrC catalog, Remove (not delete) the images from the Synched Photographs special collection AND and Static collections that might be also synching. This will empty the Adobe Cloud storage, freeing up space to import more camera roll images but keeping the originals on the computer running LrC.

Thanks, that was my thinking as well, do it in batches, so when the 20 GB starts to get full, stop syncing on the phone, let the images download to the computer, remove from synced photos, the resume syncing on the phone.

 

[reidthaler]

So clearing the cache on the phone removes photos that have already synced to the catalog?

 

[Johan Elzenga]

The safest thing to do is remove these photos from ‘All Synced Photographs’ in Lightroom Classic. That makes sure you do not delete a photo from the cloud that wasn’t synced yet.

 

[reidthaler]

Thanks,