Working with read-only folders.

[aistomin]

Hi,

I want to use LR as catalog for my backed up photos.
Now, my intention is that every file that is on backup disk should not be altered in any way at no circumstances. I.e., if I want to work on some image from backup, I'll copy it to some work directory on regular disk and edit it there. Just to be clear: when I say should not be altered, I mean that every single bit of the file should not be changed - not the image itself, neither any part of metadata.

The question is - how do I create a catalog in LR so that I can be sure that the files in it won't be changed. I looked for some "readonly" property in catalog, but didn't find any.

Any ideas ?

Thanks a lot,

 

[dj_paige]

Lightroom doesn't write anything to your files unless you tell it to do so. You could uncheck Catalog Settings->Metadata->automatically write changes into xmp. If unchecked, then all of your editing information and metadata stays in the Lightroom catalog file, and doesn't get written to your photos. So ... there it is.

I'm not sure you're thinking about Lightroom in the right way, however. Lightroom was designed to be non-destructive in its edits. The workflow you have proposed, only copying photos somewhere when you are ready to edit them, seems to me to be a lot of extra work for you making copies, and an inefficient way to use Lightroom. You could edit the originals, and not do any copying, and because Lightroom is non-destructive, your criterion of not changing your originals will be satisfied.

Lastly, you call your photos "backed up photos". People don't usually call their collection of photos that phrase and use those same photos as the photos you will be editing, so I don't know what you mean by "backed up photos". When I think of "back-ups", you need to have copies of every photo on separate physical media. If you are so persnickety about not changing your originals, you ought to be just as persnickety about having proper backups, but your write-up doesn't really tell me that you have valid backups.

 

[Denis de Gannes]

Would be a good idea to have a look at this article.

http://www.mulita.com/blog/?p=42

 

[Brad Snyder]

I tend to agree strongly with Paige, and Denis provides a good reference.

I understand what you're asking for, and while I'm sure you have your reasons, it's not how Lr was designed to work.

While the catalog doesn't have a read-only property, the OS does. You can set your files to read only there, in Windows or Mac.

 

[aistomin]

Thanks a lot, all, you were very helpful and clear.

I am using te word "back-up", because I'm using 3 locations for photos storage:
One is the "My Pictures" folder for all incoming images. Usually it contains images of up to two years back.
Second, of course, burning images DVD's.
And finally, lately, I realized that DVD's is not very convenient way to store images because it takes too much time to find needed file. So, I put all my images on separate hard disk. This way images are on separate media, which is not in daily use, but are much more accessible. Here comes the LR part.

And as I understand, it is completely what I need. I edit original in LR and then export it to needed location, original file on disk remains unchanged, right ?

Thanks again

 

[Brad Snyder]

I edit original in LR and then export it to needed location, original file on disk remains unchanged, right ?

Fundamentally true. If the file is raw, (CRx,NEF,etc,) the file will remain completely untouched. (There is a single exception, you can optionally enable a write-back of a Lr altered capture date/time. )

If the file is an RGB (JPG, TIF, PSD), then it's safe to say that the 'image data' will never be touched, but there are two optional situations where non-pixel metadata will be written to the file. 1) You can manually ask for saving of this metadata to the RGB file, by pressing ctrl/cmd-S, or choosing the same function from the menu. 2) You can enable automatic saving of this metadata.

So, you can configure Lr to *Not automatically* save the metadata, but nothing is protecting you from accidentally pressing ctrl/cmd-S, which could defeat your purpose.

 

[aistomin]

Brad, thanks a lot.
Could you point me to relevant menus regarding options you mentioned:

optionally enable a write-back of a Lr altered capture date/time

automatic saving of this metadata.

- Did you mean Catalog Settings->Metadata->automatically write changes into xmp ?

Thanks

 

[Brad Snyder]

Autowrite XMP: Yes, that's what I meant.

The capture date option is the setting just below the Auto XMP option.

EXIF panel : 'Write date or time changes in proprietary raw files.'