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Library module Saving changes to disk

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Yigal

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Mar 16, 2019
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Lightroom Classic version: 9.0
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  1. Windows 7
After editing photos, when kliking on the Metadata Status I get a note that enables to"Save the changes to disk". Are there any disadvantages by this executing this? Thanks for clarifying.
 
First ask yourself why you would want to do this in the first place. This does not save the edits like you save edits in Photoshop, it only writes the edits to an XMP file. That is extra, because edits are already saved in the catalog. If you do want to do this, then it’s a lot easier to enble it in the preferences, so Lightroom automatically writes all changes to XMP.
 
Thank you Johan for your prompt answer, I consider doing this to ensure that in case of using/viewing the photos directly from my disc (not by Lighroom) I will have edited photos. I'd like to note that all my photos are converted to DNG when imported so I have no RAW files and no XMP.
 
Thank you Johan for your prompt answer, I consider doing this to ensure that in case of using/viewing the photos directly from my disc (not by Lighroom) I will have edited photos. I'd like to note that all my photos are converted to DNG when imported so I have no RAW files and no XMP.
You will not have edited photos. You will have original photos and a sets of instructions (XMP) telling Lightroom or Photoshop how to process the instructions into a renders derivative,

I do not recommend doing anything to images that are being managed by Lightroom. Too many mistakes are made that way.

If you want to see your edited image, you need to export a derivative JPEG file using the Export function or the Publish service to the local disk
 
As stated above, LR does not alter your original images. Rather it saves a list of changes you made to your image in the catalog. You can see this list in the History Panel of the Develop module. In other words this list is a recipe of changes to make to the original file to give you the resulting look of the changes you have made. That's all you really need if everything goes well.

However, saving changes to XMP offers two benefits. One, as mentioned, is the ability to open the image in something other than LR and if that program is designed to look for the XMP data it will show you your edited version (to the extent that the non LR SW interprets things the same way as LR intended). Along with Clee, I consider this a risky workflow and would recommend against it.

A 2nd benefit of XMP files is if something terrible happens to your catalog rendering it unusable. Yes, this does happen.
Sometimes through operator error, sometimes through SW or HW failure, but it does happen. This is why it is extremely important to have twice as many backups of your catalog as you think you'll ever need. But, even so disasters happen. Talk to folks in the path of a hurricane or tornado. Talk to folks in Paradise California. Many such folks thought they had backups up the kazoo until they discovered that all the backups met the same fate at their house. One of my clients even remembered to grab the external disk containing all his images as he ran out the door, but without the catalog and without XMP those images are the originals as they came from the camera. 10 years of work up in a cloud of smoke. Had he saved XMP files, once he got his new computer, plugged in the saved EHD, and imported the images into a fresh new catalog LR would show him the images as he last saw them (not the steps that got him there, but the final position of the sliders and targeted adjustments).

In project management, risk mitigation is a major component. In a nut shell there are 3 things to consider. 1) Likelyhood of the bad thing happening, 2) effect on the project if it does, and 3) cost to either prevent the event or to mitigate the effect. So, for me, saving the XMP's is "little cost" in time and disk space. The likelihood of me having no usable catalog quite low as I have both local and cloud based backups of my catalog and images). And, 3rd should such a disaster hit (e.g no usable catalog) it would be catastrophic. So, I auto save XMP for the same reason I have an insurance policy on my house and car.
 
Thank you Califdan, appreciate your detailed and helpful answer.
 
I have a Macbook I travel with running LR 6 (old Macbook). Sometimes, I will make changes in LR 6 I want to continue with in LR Classic on my home desktop. When you import a RAW file with a XMP, LR will read the XMP and load my settings into LR Classic. I lose the history stored in LR 6 but can continue editting in LR Classic.
 
A third benefit of automatically saving changes to XMP: If you accidentally remove a file from the catalog but don't immediately notice (when you can still Undo), you can re-import it and get your edits and metadata back (perhaps after restoring the file from backup). Similarly, if you accidentally change the edits or metadata of a photo, you can restore the photo from backup and re-import it. While you can also restore an entire catalog backup, you may lose recents edits to photos that weren't subject to accidental change.

And to build on Califdan's reply, it's well known in IT that backups that aren't tested regularly are unreliable. Too many times users go to recover a file from backup only to find they can't -- the backups had been failing, they were accidentally deleted, etc. So saving changes automatically to XMP is a wise backup to the backups.
 
To my understanding when importing as DNG the XMP is embedded in the DNG and there is no separate XMP file like with RAW. So what do you mean by "automatically saving changes to XMP ", Does it mean when using DNG the metadata is saved automatically? Thank you for clarifying.
 
To my understanding when importing as DNG the XMP is embedded in the DNG and there is no separate XMP file like with RAW. So what do you mean by "automatically saving changes to XMP ", Does it mean when using DNG the metadata is saved automatically? Thank you for clarifying.
Yes. It means the edits are automatically saved into the metadata header of the DNG file itself.
 
To my understanding when importing as DNG the XMP is embedded in the DNG and there is no separate XMP file like with RAW. So what do you mean by "automatically saving changes to XMP ", Does it mean when using DNG the metadata is saved automatically? Thank you for clarifying.
XMP is a section of the file header for most nonproprietary file formats like DNG, TIF & JPG. Proprietary RAW file formats do not allow editing and adding an XMP section, so Lightroom creates a sidecar text file and gives it an extension of ".XMP"
 
With DNG - and similar formats where the XMP data is embedded in the image file - The XMP data is not automatically updated unless you have you have "Automatically write changes to XMP" turned on in the catalog settings or you manually force the metadata to be written to disk on the specific image(s) (e.g. with the write "Save Metadata to disk" menu or the down arrow icon on the image).
 
Thank you Califdan adding clarification, I'm just a little bit confused as the "Include Develop settings in metadata inside JPEG, TIFF, PNG and PSD files" (why DNG in't mentioned?) was always turned on in my Catalog Settings and all my changes in my DNG files are always included when the "Automatically write changes to XMP" was never turned on, how come or do I miss something.
 
Thank you Califdan adding clarification, I'm just a little bit confused as the "Include Develop settings in metadata inside JPEG, TIFF, PNG and PSD files" (why DNG in't mentioned?) was always turned on in my Catalog Settings and all my changes in my DNG files are always included when the "Automatically write changes to XMP" was never turned on, how come or do I miss something.
"Include Develop settings in metadata inside JPEG, TIFF, PNG and PSD files" means that the develop settings are included in metadata if you write metadata to files. If this option is not checked, then 'write metadata to files' will only write metadata such as keywords and IPTC metadata to these files.

In case of DNG the develop settings are always included if you write metadata to files.
 
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