Single or Multiple Lightroom Catalogs

[markstothard]

Lightroom Version Number

Lightroom Classic v9.2.

Operating System

1. macOS 10.15 Catalina

I'm looking for Community Members feedback;

Adobe Photoshop Lightroom is no longer that slow clunky piece of software, been using LR from v2 and as computers and internet connections get faster and faster, I'm considering changing my LR workflow.

Currently operating THREE Catalogs, syncing via Adobe Cloud Folders across two Macs, laptop and desktop, the desktop also has NAS drives, for archive images, work in progress images are stored on internal drives.

As Lightroom Classic only supports syncing images from device to classic within one catalog, I'm considering merging all three catalogs.

I'm interested in your opinion, Thank you

Regards

Mark

 

[Victoria Bampton]

I generally recommend the fewer catalogs you need, the better. So unless you really need multiple computers, I'd merge them.

 

[Paul McFarlane]

Personally, I keep two: one for work items (professional images) and one for home. The home one includes everything - holidays, family,.. and is the one that I sync. This way it means I can search for anything that's related to me in one place (excluding work, but that's good to be able to close off!!!!)

This blog was helpful (and the ones that followed for merging):

https://www.lightroomqueen.com/one-or-multiple-catalogs/

 

[markstothard]

Personally, I keep two: one for work items (professional images) and one for home. The home one includes everything - holidays, family,.. and is the one that I sync. This way it means I can search for anything that's related to me in one place (excluding work, but that's good to be able to close off!!!!)

This blog was helpful (and the ones that followed for merging):

https://www.lightroomqueen.com/one-or-multiple-catalogs/

Thank you Paul.

This is similar to what I do, one catalog for my commercial images (sync), one for family images and the other for my academic work.

Regards

Mark


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[markstothard]

I generally recommend the fewer catalogs you need, the better. So unless you really need multiple computers, I'd merge them.

Thank you Victoria, I value and appreciate your comments

 

[Linwood Ferguson]

I have not really found anything I cannot do with keywords and collections and searching that drives me toward separate catalogs. I get the home/work thing, but I think back through and there are SO many shots that fit both categories. I think the same would be true, over time, with any delineation.

Old database designer mantra: Have one version of the truth.

Note: Classic only use so considerations of Cloudy not ... considered.

 

[Zenon]

I prefer to use only one. You can create subfolders - one for work and one for play. When it comes to separating work and play having two catalogues is not a bad idea. If I did used more than one catalague I would only have two.

 

[markstothard]

I prefer to use only one. You can create subfolders - one for work and one for play. When it comes to separating work and play having two catalogues is not a bad idea. If I did used more than one catalague I would only have two.

thank you, now looking into merging my three catalogs, drawing a map, before jumping in.

 

[markstothard]

I have not really found anything I cannot do with keywords and collections and searching that drives me toward separate catalogs. I get the home/work thing, but I think back through and there are SO many shots that fit both categories. I think the same would be true, over time, with any delineation.

Old database designer mantra: Have one version of the truth.

Note: Classic only use so considerations of Cloudy not ... considered.

Thanks for your time in replying, I really appreciate your views

 

[clee01l]

Mark, usually there is no need for more than one catalog. However, your have mentioned the one reason — "Business Rule". I can see that yo might want to separate a teaching catalog and a Professional catalog from a personal catalog. As long as you know and accept the search limitations to one catalog at a time and can accept the keyword limitations , the multiple catalogs with only one syncing to the clouds is a perfectly acceptable workflow.

 

[Zenon]

I think Victoria posted or stated there are catalogues that have over a million files out there without any known adverse effects. Following Adobe's guide for Optimization which includes some simple basic maintenance really helps.

 

[Victoria Bampton]

I think Victoria posted or stated there are catalogues that have over a million files out there without any known adverse effects.

Yup. I’ve used a 13 million-strong catalog that got a bit slow with lots of smart collections... but that was fixed by closing the Collections panel and restarting. Took a while to back up!

 

[Zenon]

You take a lot of pictures. How many shutters have you worn out?

 

[Victoria Bampton]

LOL it wasn’t my catalog. It was photos captured by the space station! I was testing it for performance issues.

 

[Zenon]

Oh I see. NASA wears put the shutters. That would have been fun to do, for me anyway. Too bad you couldn't have done that on the station. Free ride with good views.