Is it better to keep all my photos on my laptop? (i have a 500gb drive that i installed on my MBP)

Also, because I travel a lot and like to take my laptop with me, how do you deal with adding photos to your catalog while you are on-the-go?

I have used LR to develop and adjust photos for a little less than a year now, so I am somewhat familiar with it, but now I’m getting to the point where file management is becoming an issue for me. Any info you could give me would be great. Thanks! (and sorry for going off in tangents with my question)

Just found your website, in a word – AWESOME!! and that for a Brit is a word we don’t often use. I have alot of catching up to do!

I have a query and haven’t been able to find the answer. On importing I rename/number my images but I can’t seem to get lightroom to follow on from the last number unless a manually type in the last number. Is there a better way of doing this?

Kind regards

Chris

I have a supplementary questionwhich concerns transferring photos from a card to 2 or more subfolders (in your Photos folder), for example if you have shot two topics on the same card. What’s the best way to do this?

Thanks,

Tony

My computer, with 4,000 photos on it and days worth of lightroom editing, exploded. Fortunately, everything was backed up on an external drive.

Now, I have a new computer, and I just loaded lightroom on it – which instantly found all those photos, but not the editing…how do I tell my new version of LR where all my editing is?? Please?!?

Thanks, Sinjin

As a new LR user, here’s one feature I’m hoping for in the next version: a way to move photos into an existing directory that (so far) doesn’t have any LR photos.

Otherwise, it’s a little cumbersome to file photos (after processing them in LR) in an existing directory structure where many of the photos haven’t been imported into LR yet, since these directories won’t show up. (What I do is: import a photo from that existing directory, even if I didn’t really need it in LR, just so the directory shows up).

Again, thanks for the great web site !

xtexan

Great video on this subject and love all the comments, which are all very suitable for me!

I have a growing library in LR and arrange it like this:
Use import presets to number/name folder and files in a 4 digit accum. way_projectname, ex (heard that numbering instead of dates are more safe, you will always see where you are missing a folder): photos/000x_projectname/000x_projectname_filenumber.cr2
Now I am tired of the long pile of folders and I had to put the folders year and month in between photos and 000x_projectname folders. So my structure became hieratical eventhough I really tried otherwise Well it works.
But what I am more interested in, is the structures of edited photos.
After import, I reject and rate.
The best I make virtual copies of, as I in my work want to make at least 4 copies of the same photo. I have tried different solutions, and now I take the 3 virtual copies and move them to a similar folder in collections. That is because I cannot move the virtual copies to a folder beneath the main folder, without bringing the master there as well.
So I have 3 virtual copies in a folder in collections. I even put the 3 VC in a folder each, as I tone them differently.
So, to exporting. What I do is exporting them to folders beneath the main folder, always keeping the mainfolder in untouched raws. But they only live in LR in the collections.
Is this an ok workflow or could I be more efficient in any way?????
I really could delete the exported VC’s after delivery to save HD space as I will have them in my collections, only as “photo directions” ?????

Thanks again for this addictive site….

Charlotte

From your latest video tutorial, I noticed that you seems to be using Time Machine. Can you please comment on how you use this in conjunction with Lightroom, given the writings that this might lead to “unpredictable results”?

Have you simply discarded all Lightroom related files from your TM configuration, are you only backing up your Lightroom Database Backup files, or just making sure that TM isn’t running whenever you’re using Lightroom?

Thank you for sharing your extensive Lightroom knowledge with the rest of us.

Thanks, Christian

I know I can export the missing shoots as a catalog…im curious is there a better way to sync the two libraries.

Thanks Brad

One thing that a lot of the comments refer to is organising the folders after import. This is easier that a lot of the posts suggest. The library module works much like windows explorer or finder and you can rename folders create new ones and drag and drop photos and images into them. If you do this inside Library Lightroom keeps track of everything. No need to re-import track down red folders etc. You only start having issues if you move or rename stuff outside light room.