Re: Backing up - how and where does Lightroom store changes to raw files?

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Triggaaar

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Backing up - how and where does Lightroom store changes to raw files?

Hi
I downloaded a trial version of LR2 yesterday and I've been having a play with the help of some excellent online tutorials. If (I think that's when) I buy LR (hopefully 3 rather than 2) I'll also be getting a good book or two, but as I check it out I'm having to search forums for answers, so sorry for starting with what must be a very basic question.

Up until now I've not used a DAM and I've always managed my files myself. With LR I believe I import my existing files, and in the future import files directly from my memory card, and allow LR to keep backups. I'd like 2 of my internal drives keep copies of all of my photos, and I also backup photos and other important data to an external drive. SO...

Once using LR can I still backup data to my external drive in the old fashioned way?
When making photo adjustments in LR, do you have to export the changes in order to back them up?
Are all the changes you make to a raw file stored in an XMP file (unless you export as jpeg or tiff etc)?

While the idea of treating my photos as data within a database and forgetting about files sounds nice, I constantly access files directly for everything else I use the PC for, so I need to understand things better to stop myself making a mess of things.

Thanks
Mike
 
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Welcome to Lightroom Forums Mike!

All adjustments are kept in Lightroom's Catalog(s) or database if you prefer. These are named with an .lrcat (LRCAT) suffix. Beside backing up your original as you always did (no change there), the most important thing to backup is those .lrcat files! I strongly recommend that copies reside on different drives than the one you open your catalogs from. So, you can either set the backup dialog box to backup on a secondary drive or safer yet, backup on the same drive as the catalog and sync those backups to another drive.

And as you are new to Lightroom, I invite you to give a look at our tip titled: The Starter Kit
 
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[quote author=Denis de Gannes link=topic=9123.msg61456#msg61456 date=1265366437]
Have a look at the tutorial. "Finding your pictures in the Lightroom Catalog"[/quote]Watched that, very helpful thanks. So I know about lrcat and lrdata, and also xmp files. Now that I'm moving to a DAM like LR I'm also wanting to re-organise my file structure. I'm not sure how you go about moving and renaming folders once they're loaded into a LR catalouge, I guess there's an option within LR to allow you to do it (as doing it in Win explorer would lose the association between file and catalogue).

[quote author=Denis Pagé link=topic=9123.msg61458#msg61458 date=1265379826]
Welcome to Lightroom Forums Mike![/quote]Thanks :)

All adjustments are kept in Lightroom's Catalog(s) or database if you prefer. These are named with an .lrcat (LRCAT) suffix. Beside backing up your original as you always did (no change there), the most important thing to backup is those .lrcat files! I strongly recommend that copies reside on different drives than the one you open your catalogs from. So, you can either set the backup dialog box to backup on a secondary drive or safer yet, backup on the same drive as the catalog and sync those backups to another drive.
Click to expand...
All understood thanks. I'll put the catalogues in same root folder as the photos and back them all up together.

And as you are new to Lightroom, I invite you to give a look at our tip titled: The Starter Kit
Click to expand...
That looks great, thanks. I'll get started.
 
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[quote author=Triggaaar link=topic=9123.msg61466#msg61466 date=126539499']
Watched that, very helpful thanks. So I know about lrcat and lrdata, and also xmp files. Now that I'm moving to a DAM like LR I'm also wanting to re-organise my file structure. I'm not sure how you go about moving and renaming folders once they're loaded into a LR catalouge, I guess there's an option within LR to allow you to do it (as doing it in Win explorer would lose the association between file and catalogue).
[/quote]

The best way is to make sure you will get a top level folder as explained here by our own Victoria Bampton. Also, you can move folders and images by dragging in the left pane and files/folders will follow on disk if you happen to have to move.

Most move files at import and use a dated structure when importing by using "Organize by Date" 2'1'/2''1-'2-'5. At this time, you can double click the suggested folder(s) and add a simple note for example like in 2'1'/2''1-'2-'5_James_Wedding.
 
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[quote author=Denis Pagé link=topic=9123.msg61468#msg61468 date=1265396'68]Most move files at import and use a dated structure when importing by using "Organize by Date" 2'1'/2''1-'2-'5. At this time, you can double click the suggested folder(s) and add a simple note for example like in 2'1'/2''1-'2-'5_James_Wedding.
[/quote]A folder organization is unimportant to LR. Using Collections (especially Smart Collections) and Keywords are the most effective means of finding and grouping images. The relationship between a file and folder is 1:1 while the relationships between a file and keywords and collections is 'Many' to 'Many'. I would suggest strongly that you choose one of LRs suggested date named folder import options. This is advice that I wished had been stated more clearly to me 8 months ago when I was first starting out. Instead I chose to import my existing images 'In Place'. with future images taking one of the date named folder schemes. And while that pre-LR folder structure is OK, it is cumbersome anytime in need to use the Folder Panel or move older folders into my Archive drive. There is little reason to visit image files outside of LR and a very important reason not to move images outside of LR. LR stores pointers to the physical location of your images and only LR can keep those pointers upto date. If you move the images outside of LR, then LR's pointers are out of sync and it can be difficult correcting LR to reflect any move made outsid of it.
 
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Hi Mike, and greetings from a few miles up the A23...

Plenty of good advice here, and would like to reinforce the last message about your pictures file/folder structure. Find something you like, but date-based is very simple and effective. Reorganise before you import into LR, that will save you much hassle when trying to do it after import, then enjoy the benefits of LR’s library management tools to ‘organise/view’ your pictures in a myriad of different ways.

A few other thoughts:

As you will by now have realised, backups of your pictures is your responsibility, LR doesn’t do that (apart from the option to create a copy during import, which I personally do not use). Multiple copies of your pictures is good, though not certain that keeping multiple copies on internal drives buys you a great deal, especially if something catastrophic should happen to the computer. I keep 3 backup copies of my pictures, one on a NAS, one on a USB external HDD, and the third on a USB portable HDD (which I can then get out of the house when I remember!). Hopefully just about to replace my desktop and will go eSATA for the external HDD and will upgrade my router to gigabit to improve the NAS backup performance.

Catalog backups: once you have started to make extended use of LR for develop adjustments, collections, keywords, etc., backing up the catalog(s) becomes just as important as backing up the actual pictures. As well as backing up the catalog to the same three places as my pictures, I additionally use LR’s own process to create a backup (which, being in the same folder as the catalog, also gets backed up!). LR does not overwrite its previous backup, each run creates a time-stamped version which is great....but worth keeping an eye on from a housekeeping perspective as you might one day find the LR backup folder has a couple of hundred backup files in it.

Final thought, I notice you said in an earlier post that you were going to keep your catalog(s) and your picture files in the same root folder (for backup simplicity). My understanding is that this is not the best idea from a performance perspective....certainly when you have several thousand pictures being managed within LR it sounds logical (if possible) to keep the catalog and the source images on separate drives. Given that you have several internal drives in your computer, it might be something you want to think about or do some research into.

Good luck, and enjoy using Lightroom!
 
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Sorry, one more backup thing to think about....your Lightroom settings. Things like Metadata Presets, Develop Settings, Keyword Sets, etc. are not stored in the catalog (I believe, no doubt I'll be corrected if I'm wrong! :)), but are instead stored in your Application Data folder: path in XP is C:\documents and settings\user\application data\adobe\lightroom. It would be a good idea to back this folder up as well if you start to make extensive use of LR's capabilities.
 
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