Lightroom 5 Guidance/help

Everyone has their own way of working in Lr Jennifer, but here is what I do:

1. I use only 1 (one) catalog. I found using multiple catalogs a pain in the butt
2. After I import images into Lr, I "remove" not delete images I don't want to work on This is to keep things cleaner and less cluttered
3. A common mistake many make is backing up their catalog, but not their images. If your images are gone, Lr cannot and will not ever find them again.
4. I use Lr to change file names while importing them. In the Import Module you can set it up any way your wish to. I normally use yearmonthday-numberLrsequensicallyUses i.e. 20150930-1844.arw
5. I have 5 copies of all original / edited images (NOTE: If you don't copy and paste your working libraries, you'll not have .psd, .tiff, etc. or Lr virtual copies saved on all drive copies)
6. I don't bother any longer with keyword list. After I import images, I type in the keywords and only use ones that best describe the image. Then when I edit and want to upload an image I add some more keywords.
7. I dump all my images into 1 folder per year. I'm working with 2015 folder now. Since I use keywords and Smart Collections I don't need a zillion folders, but some prefer having a lot of folders to go by. So it's up to the individual how they wish to set theirs up.
8. You need to go to File and click on New catalog if you want more than one catalog. It's really hard to give detailed info here, cuz of too much typing. Yep I can be a lazy typist. ;)

NOTE: As long as you have a copy of every image in Lr catalog on some drive, somewhere you can retrieve them into your 1 working catalog by finding the missing image part of Lr.

I'll see if I can find the PDF I created for working with just 1 and not multiple Lr catalogs that I gave out during a Photo class lecture/demo I was asked to do. I'm out of town and only brought one EXHDD with me, so it might be at home. Sorry to say...

~ Charly

Thanks for the info and tips. For my FAA photo's, I've just been going through the SD card or external drive and only moving what photos I'm interested in into a folder using File Explorer. Then when I'm ready to work on that photo, I go to LR import, etc. I didn't know you can rename a file in import. I've only been renaming the file in export. Now I'm running into duplicate import file names because my camera has rotated through the numbers. Does renaming the file during import protect the last file that had the same name?

In all reality, Lr prefers doing everything and doesn't like you doing anything behind its back. It's a wonderful program to edit and organize images, as long as you do everything within Lr so you and Lr can find anything. It also prefers having images you throw over to another program to just be saved so Lr can pull it back into the catalog. That's another mistake many make. If I'm following you properly, you sure are doing more steps than you would if you solely used Lr.

Well yes usually, but not sure how you have everything setup so it could be no. Normally Lr will only change those images you tell it to. It would really behoove you to import "all" your images from now on, into Lr and have it rename your files. Then when your camera starts repeating numbers, it will have a different name. I ran into this myself and that is why I rename all my images; every single one, whether I edit it, sell it or not. Less confusion imho and I never put one single image on my Mac's internal hard drive; only on external hard drives

I would suggest getting a free trial to Lynda.com when you have a weekend to 7 days to watch hours and hours of videos. On there are wonderful workshops step-by-step, from beginner to advanced on Lr. Every single thing you'd want to know about using Lr efficiently and to your advantage.

~ Charly

and just remember, and you may know this Jennifer but others reading this ,ay not, when you backup your LR catalog that is all you are backing up.... Where LR stores your photos, not the actual images themselves. I made that mistake when I first started using it.

Jennifer, if I'm remembering correctly (been almost a year since I've been out shooting) with Nikon you can rename your file names in camera. Example, mine were _DSCxxxx and I changed it _SLNxxxx.

I'm pretty technical but for some reason the back part of LR confuses me. I'm self taught & still learning. Sometimes I edit my photos in Gimp & then open in LR (wish I had Photoshop so the 2 programs communicated), but I try to do everything in LR.
I back up my photos but I use File Explorer for everything. Guess I need to start using Lightroom more. I've watched videos but get confused. Probably because I do things so much differently. I know I really need to get my catalog backed up.
As for the keywords, I try to enter everything in there so I don't have to add more when uploading. I don't have internet at home (other than phone) so I have a slim window (during lunch) to upload photos & I don't have time to add keywords. I found some videos for that but didn't look simple to organize.
Thanks for the advice. I'll set down & experiment with your advice The rename during import should help a lot.
I'm one of those that doesn't want to flood my computer so I typically move my edited files into my external drives with the originals then remove from computer. Then if I need to do another touch up, I move the original back into the folder it was edited from & LR recognizes it so I can then retouch. Even though it's simple to me, I think I'm making it more difficult for myself.

Sharon, I haven't figured out if I can do that with my Sony. I looked into it a couple times vbefore but had no success. Guess I'll look again. That would be nice.

I guess to sum it up, I should start using LR as my file explorer & organize everything through there.

Lynda.com has some excellent tutorials on LR. You will get back your time invested in the tutorials very quickly.

You will speed your workflow by not only renaming during import, but adding your keyword tags at import. Another is to setup your copyright profile to be spplied during import. Almost all of my imports I automatically process lens correction, noise reduction (with a mask to protect edges) , sharpening and saturation adjustments. The presets are easy to set.

My titles, captions and other metadata are added in the library module.

Once processed, I export the raw files as "original sized" jpegs to an upload folder. All of the metadata is included in the jpeg export. The jpeg is uploaded and I have only a field or two to FAA.

Thanks Bill. I will definitely look up import presets. That would save a lot of time. That's awesome. I love Lightroom & it sounds like I'm going to love it even more.

Very nice photography, btw.

Often times, I don't have time to mess with changing file names within my Sony, so I just do it using Lr. I literally do everything using Lr. Here's an article I wrote that may help you out a bit Jennifer:

Best Place to Store your Photos

If you'd rather not spend hours watching workshops on Lynda.com, as I and Bill suggested, I'd be happy to show you the basics free of charge. Just shoot me an email if you're interested.

~ Charly

Thank you Bill! FAA has really helped me in growth with my photography, just by looking at some of fabulous artists on here.

Thank you Charly! I played around in Lightroom this morning with import settings, but was having a hard time. I found the auto import keywords and copyright info but I guess it only works with auto import and not standard import. I haven't done auto imports yet so something else to read on. I read half way through your article and decided I needed to have my computer with Lightroom to finish it so I could experiment as I read it. Thank you so much for your guidance. I think once I figure this out and get out of my current habits, this is going to help a lot. Hopefully this helps others too.

I still have LR3, using it as my main point of import to process my images. I also do all of my title changes, cropping, and exporting to a folder destined for loading to FAA from there. Additionally, any home printing I do, 8.5x11 max, I also do from the LR print module.

Most cameras will have a setting so that they do not re use file numbers.have a look in your manual

When you do a LR Backup, you are backing up the LR catalog and nothing else. The backed up catalog is placed into a Backups folder in the same folder that your LR catalog occupies. Every backup you make gets put into its own folder. The folder names are are based on the date you made the backup. Your LR preferences should tell you where your LR catalog is located, so you can use your file finder to view your backup files there and/or move them.

Two things to note here.

The backups are cumulative. That means every back up gets a new folder and the old folders don't get removed. It's a good idea to delete old backups periodically. You can't do this from within LR -- you need to do it with your file finder. I usually keep the last three backups.

The WORST place to keep you backups is where LR puts them! If your hard disk dies, your LR catalog AND its backups are gone! Make copies of your backups and put them on other drives, just like you do with your photos... preferably with your photos!

There are free videos out there that will help you better learn and understand how LR works. B&H (the photo mega store in NYC) has a YouTube channel where they archive all their in-house lectures and demonstrations. Tim Grey is one of their best guest speakers and he has quite a few 1+ hour presentations regarding LR. Just go to Youtube and search for "b & h tim grey lightroom" or simply "b & h lightroom" to get some perspectives from other presenters. There is a wealth of information in the B&H channel, so be prepared to spend a LOT of time there. :-)

Roy - I've looked into it before but had no luck. I've gone through all my settings and have searched the internet. I get aggravated that after 09999 it goes back to 1. To me it would make since to go all the way up to 99999 since there's a 0 in front. I'm going to research it again to see if I'm missing something.

Al - Thanks. I have watched pieces of some BH videos but haven't had the time to watch them all the way through. I've also watched several youtube videos but most of those provide info I already know. It's challenging when I don't have internet at home and have 0 extra time. lol. Now that I know what I need to search for that I didn't know about, maybe that will help.

Greg - Thank you. I'm seeing that I need to start using LR as my explorer and get away from File Explorer.

regarding the file name issue, I use an old-fashioned batch file to keep my archived files from having the same name, and risking overwriting.
Each file is named yyyymmdd_hhmm_(OriginalFileName.ext)
Each file is stored in a directory e:gjsyyymmdd. (e:gjs is my archive drive and directory)
My brain seems to be pretty good at finding files on a chronological basis, and given the additional search capabilities of lightroom, if you are faithful to tag photos appropriately, it can make finding a particular image or category of images pretty easy.

If you check the lightroom import functions, you may find ability to import to a date-named directory, perhaps based on the image creation date. I suspect lightroom has some of the abilities that I use in my batch files.

In my method, I use the batch file to copy the images to directories named for the date when the photo was taken.
Then I import those directories into the lightroom catalog.



here is an example of the batch file. If you want to use it, you should obviously change the drive letter for your memory card reader, the hard drive where you store your archive, and the archive subdirectory you use.


@echo off
for /R H:\dcim %%F in (*.jpg,*.cr?,*.m*) do call :Parse %%F %%~tF
echo End of Files to process
pause
goto :EOF

:Parse
set src=%1
set dt=%2
set ts=%3
set ampm=%4
set hr=%ts:~0,2%
set hr24=%hr%
if _%ts:~0,1%%ampm%_==_0PM_ set hr24=%ts:~1,1%
if _%ampm%_==_PM_ set /A hr24=%hr24%+12
if _%hr24%_==_24_ set hr24=12
set yyyymmdd=%dt:~6,4%%dt:~0,2%%dt:~3,2%
set dst=e:\gjs\%yyyymmdd%\%yyyymmdd%_%hr24%%ts:~-2%_%src:~-12%
if not exist e:\gjs\%yyyymmdd% md e:\gjs\%yyyymmdd%
if not exist %dst% echo %src% %dst%
if not exist %dst% copy %src% %dst%

Jennifer, I took a few screenshots with explanations that I thought might help you out.

Lr Examples

I will try to get up how to preset your Metadata as soon as I have a chance. Bit busy this afternoon

~ Charly

Following.

My apologies that the link I provided with Lr examples no longer works; had a glitch with site. I cannot edit the link in previous post, but will post a new one shortly to this one.

Here is the working link:

Lr Examples

~ Charly

Thank you so much. I was hoping to get some time this last weekend to go through all the info but didn't get to. I have a big show this weekend. Will do some reading up during the slow time (hopefully there won't be many of those - hope to be super busy). I did finally find where to embed the Metadata copyright and keywords this morning during import. For those of you who don't know, when you click import, it's on the right side. Saves time. Now if I can just get into the system of using LR to organize vs File Explorer. Old habits (especially long ones) are hard to break.

I can tell you being self-taught, I had a hot mess for years. It wasn't until this year I straightened it all out; tho still have to get rid of some folders, I at least am working with just 1 catalog now and can always find what I'm looking for. :)

I strongly suggest either watching workshops on Lynda.com or having a person who really knows Lr well, to learn all you can about Lr before you start doing everything. In the long run, you'll lessen your frustration levels and more work for yourself down the road. I really wish I had done that from the start....

~ Charly

I just wanted to thank everyone for their tips and advise. The last 4 portrait sessions, I've been been using several of the suggestions. It took me a little bit on the first one to get into the new routine, but now I see how it's make my work so much easier and even faster. I really like the importing directly to LR from the card. I was moving files over to computer, then importing groups at a time. It's been so much easier importing directly to LR. There are so many more import options when you do this and the file renaming has been so nice. I still have a lot to learn and more tips and suggestions to try. Just wanted to say Thank you!

Travel - That's awesome. Hope you like it. I haven't seen 6 yet. I wonder what new features it has. I have 5. I often wonder what I did with out LR a couple years ago.