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Archive 2012 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.

  
 
Dennis M 1064
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


I watched a couple videos on LR4, and Downloading RAW images seemed straight forward.

I have a new iMac with a second internal drive. I want that to be where my RAW images live, until I get external storage. I want to be able to divide that file as well. Let me put it more simply by example.

Main file on HDD2:

Photo Vault:

------RAW Images: (Contains only folders):

-------- (sub folder) Event 1 and date
-------- (sub folder) Event 2 and date

-------- etc.

I am hoping to have an organized means of being able to find master files of images by event and date. Or Subject and date. I may even categorize them by type of photography, i.e., Nature, Landscape, Editorial, Portrait so on and so forth.

When I downloaded my first card, it didn't seem to give the the option for creating subfolders, or establishing any sort of system. It just sent them to the 'Main' file. If I get out of LR and go to the "Finder" under HDD2 Photos, there is a subfolder, with every photo in it. Not so easy at that point to move around. I had hoped that the images would show up in LR, then I select which images I want, and send them to a file of my choosing. Then do the next batch.

If I go to "Finder" outside of LR, and add subfolders, and move images to the folders as I desire, will LR not see those files?

Am I making this harder than I need to? Is this not intuitive in LR, or am I really that dumb.

Ok, skip the last question.







Sep 30, 2012 at 07:59 AM
howardm4
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


You are given the opportunity to construct a hierarchy when you 'Import' the images. It's in that panel where you select thee images to be read off the card, add keywords, create subdirectories/folders, etc etc

For example, in my hierarchy it looks like....

Vault
-- year
----year/month
------year/month/date
--------year/month/date/*{.nef,.jpg}

some people add a descriptive word or two to the folder and/or they rename their images (I do, my images get renamed like: 20120930_1035_xyz.nef where 1035 is the 24h time and the xyz is whatever the camera image frame # is.

All this is doable from inside LR. Find and watch any number of video's on how to Import into LR (tip & tricks etc) and at some point it'll click for you.




Sep 30, 2012 at 09:37 AM
Dennis M 1064
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


Great. I'll keep watching, and hope for the 'click'. For some reason, I find Windos OS to be easier to understand. New Software on a new OS is a bit more confusing. I really don't get the catalog thing. I'll keep digging.

Thanks.



Sep 30, 2012 at 09:51 AM
SeverianTL
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


Dennis M 1064 wrote:
... I really don't get the catalog thing. I'll keep digging.


Some things to keep in mind:

  1. The most important thing to remember in terms of file organization is that Lightroom is definitely not a file browser and should not be thought of as such. Your file system should be set up however is convenient to you and LR adapted to fit (which it can easily do).
  2. There is no reason to couple the file download and import processes. In fact, importing just slows things down while LR does tasks unrelated to dumping images from the card, like rendering previews, applying presets and keywords, etc. I find it more convenient to offload using the Canon memory card utility then use a folder synch in LR to import (note that's a synch not a file import from disc, which would result in unneeded file duplication)
  3. The LR catalog is a database of file locations, metadata, develop settings and history, and settings used in the various LR modules. Photo organization is not directly tied to file organization. This allows great flexibility. This along with totally nondestructive editing means you don't have to worry over much about actual files (beyond export and backup, of course).




Sep 30, 2012 at 04:00 PM
Dennis M 1064
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


Ok, so if I understand you correctly;

I can set up my file hierarchy in my Hard Drive 2, use, say, EOS Utility to download and select images to keep, file them, and then direct LR to those files and images to import them on an as needed basis? So, skip the LR down load from the camera or card bit?

All the images I have are still available on the memory cards. I want to clean out the LR files and catalog and start over. Seems like it would be easy but there seems to be a legacy issue. Files and images may be deleted, but not necessarily forgotten. What is the easiest way to get a clean slate with Light Room?

I just ordered the Lexar Pro Dual Slot memory card reader. That should make things easier as well. Instead of going through the camera.



Sep 30, 2012 at 10:37 PM
Dennis M 1064
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


So, the catalog is just a file, or storage for the adjustments/metadata for your image file(s), in this case, my RAW files, but not the image file itself. As you call up that image file, e.g Clown0001 that you had post processed in LR previously, it applies the catalog info as it opens in LR, e.g. Clown0001.adjustments/metadata , it then combines the two on your monitor and then you can either re-adjust, resize or determine how you want to use the image (export to web/print/email etc. or just admire it).

Being Non-destructive, when you are finished with the image and your exporting, as you close the program, or move on to another image, it separates the new adjustments/metadata (assuming you made changes)from the the RAW file, and the Raw in-its-entirety, goes back to its file for storage, and the adjustments/metadata for that image go back to the catalog for storage, until called upon again.

Is that a pretty accurate LR4 for dummies explanation?

Now, if that is correct. . .

If I move the image from LR, into Photoshop, do some editing, and then move it back to LR, export my image, then close file (Close LR) is my RAW image altered by photoshop, or is the Adjustment file for that image the only thing altered? Do I maintain lossless editing of my original?

I am pretty sure that, if I open my RAW image file directly in CS6 via ACR (Adobe Camera RAW) and edit the image, that, I am actually adjusting the Raw image itself, and with out steps to protect it (working and saving in layers, or duplicating the original and working only on the duplicate) that this will be lossy, and I will permanently be altering the base RAW image file.

Am I on the right track?



Oct 01, 2012 at 08:58 AM
Dennis M 1064
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


http://www.slrlounge.com/guides/lightroom-4-training-198-25

So, yesterday, I watched all of these videos. Learned a ton, and it was FREE. So, I post this for all new LR users, so you have a great place to get info. SLR Lounge has about 14 hours of training videos available, either for free with some commercials and searching around, or for $99 delivered in its entirety. Well put together, and nicely presented.

That being said, I still haven't really had my question answered, and am thinking I am going to be on my own as I sit here conversing with myself. I do thank those of you who took the time to post your help. At this point, I guess I just need to experiment and make use of the delete feature until I know what import and file control I actually have, and when I actually have it.

Cheers.



Oct 02, 2012 at 08:00 AM
Alan321
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


Dennis, first get used the term "folder" in which files are placed. You see to use the term "file" instead and that in itself will be confusing.

The Lr catalog looks like a single file but is actually a complex database full of many files. You don't really need to know that, but you do need to know that your image files are not in the catalog. You keep control of where those image files are stored and whether or not they are "imported" into the catalog. When they are imported the catalog still does not contain the images but it does contain and subsequently maintain information about those images. i.e. metadata. It also builds image previews and stores them in the Lr preview cache.

So long as you work within Lr to "edit" your imported images those edits are stored as instructions within the catalog and are applied on the fly when you view the images inside Lr, but they are not visible to most other software.

You cannot send these edited versions of files to Ps or other software without exporting them first - either directly or behind the scenes. Lr does its own raw file conversion and applies the edits and creates a brand new image file (not raw) that is sent to Ps or saved to disc for editing. Every time you export you get another brand new file. Therefore exporting should be avoided unless necessary. Most of the time your edits are done within Lr and does not involve the creation of an updated image file - just the creation of new edit instructions and probably a new preview image in the preview cache.

When you do export from Lr to edit in another program, the edited version is or can be returned to Lr where it is treated as a brand new image file that is imported into the catalog. Everything Lr knows about this new file is quite separate from what it knows about the original, and although the two may be stacked together in Lr they are totally independent. Any changes you now make to the original image will not be reflected in the new image, and changes made externally to create the new image will remain secret to Lr's view of the original. Future changes to the newly imported externally edited image are lossless if they are done in Lr but you will have to weigh up which image to edit - the original or the modified one, or both.


To my way of thinking you are better off doing everything you can within Lr so that Lr can track all changes and so that you maximize your chances of locating any image that want to look for. One exception is when you need to do lots of very speedy culling - Lr is a bit too slow for that.


Be aware that a raw file can be changed in Lr, but generally only for things like the capture time and so on. The raw image data is never changed but the ancillary public data can be changed. The camera-maker EXIF data is also not changed by Lr but can be changed by the camera makers own software or some other programs.


ACR also generally does not change the raw image data in the raw files but it also usually creates brand new data for subsequent editing by Ps. If you save that data as a new file then that new file is not a raw file. The original raw file has probably not been altered at all but the new one will be a psd or tif or jpg. Further edits to the new file - whether or not you have yet saved it as a new file on the drive, it could just be living in RAM or on the scratch disc - are generally lossy. Ps can work special layers that are "live" in that they reflect any changes to whatever file was in them but the other edits are then applied to the new version. In that sense they are also lossless edits.


One thing I still do not know about Lr is whether or not its edits are ever consolidated before being applied. e.g. If you make a bundle edits including say six changes to sharpening as you home in on what you like, does Lr apply six different sharpening steps that all take time, or does it combine them into one equivalent sharpening step and apply it just the once to speed things up ?

- Alan



Oct 03, 2012 at 02:19 AM
Dennis M 1064
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


Thanks for taking the time to explain that Alan.

Yup, I have a tendency to use the term file instead of folders. It comes from having worked in an office in my younger days and having things like paper and file cabinets, not computers. Pre- Apple II-E days! cripes! Stacks of papers, "files" were kept in manilla "folders" which were stored in drawers of a "file" cabinet. So, my head sees this kind of system in a computer database, as a means of trying to figure out the computer. I can see that it is going to make things more confusing, so I will make an effort to be more careful about terminology. Thanks for correcting that. Now we add in 'catalog' and lets not forget about 'collections' and it gets to be a bit more fun.

I think I pretty much understand this part now, but, everything on the videos and even in the posts bumps into my original question, but does not actually answer it.

----------------

If you import from your CF card directly into LR, the RAW image files are stored outside of LR, onto your hard disk wherever LR assigns it. A thumbnail of that image and a link to it stay in LR. If you import that image into Deveolp, and modify it, then you can save the edit into a catalog, and can/should save the image itself in a separate folder along with the folder that contains the edits, within that catalog. Correct?

Here is what I am trying to work out. I have a card with 300 RAW image files. 100 of a Clown, 100 of a Dog, 100 of a Cat.

There are going to be a large number of them that I will discard. Who needs 80+ images of the same clown? If I import them from the CARD into LR, will I forever have these thumbnails of every single image on my film strip? Without individually copying them into the Develop Module first, how can I separate the RAW Images on my Hard Drive, (actually HDD 2) by RAW unedited: Dog 2012 file, Clown 2012 file, and Cat 2012 file, with out individually pulling them into develop module first?

I did two previous imports, one from an iPhone and one from the camera and it wants to put everything together in one giant folder.

What I would like to do, and maybe I am just not getting this (obviously) is import my CF card into an image software, dump the culls, as in the "true death", take the keepers, maybe even flag them for consideration of different uses (snapshots, print, portfolio etc.) then put all the Cat photos together in one folder, the Dog with the Dog and the Clown with the Clown. That way, if I decide I want to forward my Clown file to a thumb drive, or the recycle bin, I can just go to my 'finder' and see it on my HDD2. If I import a few of the clown files into the Develop Module, then they will be saved into a new file that would indicate that they have been edited, and this will be done via LR. The Image and Catalog file will live together, so that I can then locate them easily, and export them together if I want or need to work on them on a different machine.

It is getting control of that initial import from a card, culling, and storing them, as they await editing that I want to have a real firm grip on, so that I don't end up with a completely messy hard drive, and images that I cannot find without calling in the Cyber Search and Rescue team, or one single RAW folder that eventually ends up with100,000 images in it.

Obviously, I do not fully grasp that initial phase of Light Room or I would not be having so much difficulty with it. My first attempts were the exact mess I was trying to avoid, and it was a pain in the butt trying to delete all the image files and various catalog files. Fortunately, I didn't clear my CF Cards, I did get everything deleted and I can start again.

If I use Digital Photo Pro, EOS Utility, or Image Browser EX, to bring the images in from the camera, sort, cull, organize and store them into folders on the Hard Drive, will I be able to still find and import select images to LR4, edit, catalog and assign a 'finished' home? Can't LR handle this job by itself? If it is faster and or better to do it with one of the above mentioned programs, which one should I use? Am I making this way to hard, or over thinking it? Maybe I don't really see the later part of the workflow, and am trying to do what will happen naturally if I just 'go along with the program', no?

I really want to get working on some images, but this first threshold seems to be a real doosey. This first step will be the foundation for the organization of my image files on a clean machine. Just want to get it right the first time. Some of you have been doing this a very long time and have seen the good and bad of your systems. If I am struggling with it, there will be others, can you share some advice?

Thanks.

Dennis






Oct 03, 2012 at 08:24 AM
Alan321
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


Dennis M 1064 wrote:
If you import from your CF card directly into LR, the RAW image files are stored outside of LR, onto your hard disk wherever LR assigns it.


At the stage where you are importing files into Lr you get to tell Lr where the file lives. Unless you tell it to move the file somewhere then it can stay wherever it is - including on the card, but that would messy to manage. The file is not part of Lr but Lr already has preview images and certain data about the image, including where the original image file lives.

A thumbnail of that image and a link to it stay in LR. If you import that image into Deveolp,

There's a flaw here - you do not import the image into the develop module. The image has already been "imported" into the current library in Lr and you can go into the develop module to work with it. Or not. You might tweak it while in the Library module. Even if you do nothing at all then Lr already has that image in its library catalog. The "catalog" in effect is the "library". There is one catalog for each library but each library can refer to image files in multiple folders and on multiple drives, so in theory there is no need to have more than one library to "hold" all of your images.

... and modify it, then you can save the edit into a catalog, and can/should save the image itself in a separate folder along with the folder that contains the edits, within that catalog. Correct?


When you "modify" the image you tell Lr what changes you want to make. Lr stores those changes as an edit list and applies those changes to a copy of the image that lives in RAM for you to see on the display. It may or may not rebuild previews at this stage too.

You do not save the file into the catalog. Being imported into Lr already puts it in the current library catalog and you can only work with one catalog at a time. Chances are that Lr will make no changes to the original raw image file for any of these tweaks. It is simply working with a copy that it loaded into RAM and working with the metadata in its catalog.

Here is what I am trying to work out. I have a card with 300 RAW image files. 100 of a Clown, 100 of a Dog, 100 of a Cat.

There are going to be a large number of them that I will discard. Who needs 80+ images of the same clown? If I import them from the CARD into LR, will I forever have these thumbnails of every single image on my film strip?

You could if you want to keep them all but as you delete files within Lr - i.e. use Lr to do the deleting - the files will either be just removed from the library (and filmstrip) as if it was never imported, or at your discretion all that can happen plus the original image file will be deleted from the drive too.

Without individually copying them into the Develop Module first, how can I separate the RAW Images on my Hard Drive, (actually HDD 2) by RAW unedited: Dog 2012 file, Clown 2012 file, and Cat 2012 file, with out individually pulling them into develop module first?


I'll sat again - you do not import into the develop module. The images are either in the catalog or not, and those which are in it can be accessed via any of the modules. Apart from some capability that Lr has to create specific date folders for your images during the import stage, you can use Lr to create those folders and then drag the thumbnails of the newly imported images shown in the library module into whichever folders you want them to live. You can select one or more thumbnails at once so that you cab drag bundles of them at one time. Lr not only keeps track of the metadata while you do this, it also moves the original image files to those folders on the the drive(s).

I did two previous imports, one from an iPhone and one from the camera and it wants to put everything together in one giant folder.


If you choose to Add them to the library then the original image files continue to live where they are and while it seems that Lr is giving you no control that is pretty much what "Add" means. If instead you Move them into the library then you get a chance in the right-hand panel to specify where they will be moved to. The images will be relocated as part of the import process. It's equivalent to moving them first outside Lr and then doing an import/add.

What I would like to do, and maybe I am just not getting this (obviously) is import my CF card into an image software, dump the culls, as in the "true death", take the keepers, maybe even flag them for consideration of different uses (snapshots, print, portfolio etc.) then put all the Cat photos together in one folder, the Dog with the Dog and the Clown with the Clown.

Lr can let you do all of this within Lr and apart from being slower than some alternatives the results are probably better if you do use Lr for all of this. Consider that what you might delete as rubbish could come good with a bit of processing in Lr. By the time you've done enough tweaks in an external program to determine that you want to keep the file, the work has largely already been done and you would not want to have to repeat it again in Lr. So just do it all in Lr for now.

That way, if I decide I want to forward my Clown file to a thumb drive, or the recycle bin, I can just go to my 'finder' and see it on my HDD2.

Get used to doing everything that affects image files inside Lr and do not use the OS commands or other software to manage the files. If you work outside Lr then you risk breaking Lr's link between the image files and the data about the images. Not good. Fixable, but messy.

If I import a few of the clown files into the Develop Module, then they will be saved into a new file that would indicate that they have been edited, and this will be done via LR. The Image and Catalog file will live together, so that I can then locate them easily, and export them together if I want or need to work on them on a different machine.

Recall that it doesn't work that way, as I explained above. Further to what I've said earlier, the catalog file is a database that has info about your images. No matter where it lives or where they live they are linked via the database so long as you don't let external software shift or edit the images instead of using Lr to do that stuff.

Also, finding stuff in Lr is very easy. Apart from being able to group some images into collections or add keywords of your choosing to any images in the catalog, you also get to filter or home in on images using the metadata such as exposure settings, dates, times, lens data, etc., etc. The more images that are in the one catalog the more easily you can find exactly what you want. Lr cannot find what is not within the current catalog.

It is getting control of that initial import from a card, culling, and storing them, as they await editing that I want to have a real firm grip on, so that I don't end up with a completely messy hard drive, and images that I cannot find without calling in the Cyber Search and Rescue team, or one single RAW folder that eventually ends up with100,000 images in it.


I use the OS to copy my images files from the card to a specific folder on a specific drive. In fact, I already have Lr running and set up to automatically import any images that appear in that folder, but can work it manually for now. Copying with the OS gets the files onto the HDD as quickly as possible. By copying instead of moving you still have the originals on the card should anything go wrong before you get to create backups. I only process files from one camera at a time - not relevant for everyone but I keep my images from different cameras separated so that I can browse them with camera-specific software for features that lr does not have, such as showing me the focus points that were being used. From here they get renamed by Lr according to my requirements and then I use Lr to relocate them all to a folder called "unsorted". Then at my leisure I review/tweak/review/grade/whatever each one. Rejected images are deleted - show all those with the reject flag set and select them all and delete them. The rest are shifted to where they will live according to their grading so that I can always find the best images with any program.

The system is not messed up. The images live where I want them to live in whatever drive and folder structure I choose. And yet because - and only because - all surviving images are in the one library catalog I can use that database to home in on anything that I want to find no matter where they live. That's the merit of the data management aspect of the Lr database. The more effort I spend adding ratings, labels, collections, keywords, etc., for my images the more easily I can subsequently find anything at all, but its a tradeoff between work now and speedy recall later on. I try to concentrate the most effort on the images that are worth the most effort (whether or not they are the best in terms of image quality alone).


One last thing about the folder structure in the Lr library catalog: It onitially only shows folders that contain images. Other folders are ignored but it:s those other folders that tie the image-holding folders into a structure that matches what you have on the hard drives. So if some folders appear to be floating about the folder list out of order then right click on them and add parent folder. As each parent folder appears all of the folder that belong to it will be put under it in the folders list. Eventually you have what mimics the actual folder structure - which is just as well because they are the actual folders - if you delete them in Lr then they are gone from the drive (but there is an intermediate stage called remove that gets them out of the library but leaves them on the drive).





Oct 03, 2012 at 12:38 PM
Dennis M 1064
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


Progress!

If I set up a file hierarchy in Hard Drive 2, have a master file (Image Vault, since that seem a popular term) with a Sub-folder e.g. Orchard Harvest 2012, I can open Lightroom 4, select import from the camera, on the lightbox I can deselect photos that I don't want, or are from a different event, then select my destination, HDD2: Orchard Harves 2012 and they import to that file, and LR sees them.

I didn't seem to be able to direct it like that from within LR. Also, if I minimized LR, and created the files in Mac's "Finder", I would not subsequently be able to select that location in LR. I would have to close LR and re-open it so that it picks up the newly created file on the hard drive. Then I could select the photos and import them.

Maybe that is the hard way, but it was ultimately the result that I was looking for. At least for now.

So, my monitor is now calibrated, or so Spyder says, I have some files in place, time to get to work! Finally.




Oct 03, 2012 at 12:40 PM
Dennis M 1064
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


Thanks Alan. I didn't see your post before making my last effort and post.

I had tried it straight from LR but I could not find anyway of copying them from the card to HDD2: to a specific folder. Without an existing folder for it to go to, I only saw the Hard Drive itself, and no place for a Parent folder and or subfolder. I could, however rename, re-sequence and add metadata. So, when I copied the image files to HDD2 via LR, and went to Finder: HDD2, there was just an expanse of image files. That just seem like a recipe for a mess. This is where the confusion lies.

As you can see from my last post, it is now the way that seem organized to me, but it was a circuitous way of getting there, and likely a bit inefficient. Seeing what I have done though, will this type of system create issues later?

Sorry for using "import" to Develop. I understand I should have said moved to the Develop module or viewed in or something. I completely get the catalog, 'edit data' thing, and it being separate from the actual 'image data'. I'm trying to learn a new language as well. I'm at the speaking Pidgin-Digital at this point. I'll keep working at it.



Oct 03, 2012 at 01:42 PM
Dennis M 1064
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · LR4 - Download from camera-Organization.


Finally!

I figured out why it was confusing. In Windows, the only OS I had used until about a month ago, when I import/download/upload (or whatever ) I begin the action and it prompts for a location. At that time, I designate a file and or sub-file.

In Light Room, before I import, I need to create a Catalog. Within that catalog I can create folders, and folders in my folders. However crazy you want to get. That is the step I had not performed. So, when I import from the card, to HDD2, it just dumped everything onto the drive. No prompt asking where or 'Save As' or 'Create Catalog' or 'Create Folder'.

On the last go around, I went into Finder, and created the catalog/folder hierarchy manually, but, thanks to SLR Lounge training, I figured out that I can create that in LR but do it before the import of the images.

This way, my catalog and my images are in the same file, so if I need to move them, they travel together and LR won't lose the link to the image, thereby creating a "broken Image" as designated by the (?) in the corner of the thumbnail.

On the right track now?

http://www.slrlounge.com/creating-a-lightroom-4-catalog

http://www.slrlounge.com/managing-catalogs-and-fixing-broken-images-from-the-lightroom-4-a-z-training-dvd-episode-22



Oct 04, 2012 at 07:56 AM





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