{"id":2237,"date":"2011-10-29T16:30:00","date_gmt":"2011-10-30T00:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/?p=2237"},"modified":"2012-01-10T20:30:21","modified_gmt":"2012-01-11T04:30:21","slug":"mastering-lightroom-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/2011\/10\/29\/mastering-lightroom-home\/","title":{"rendered":"Mastering Lightroom – When You Get Back Home"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post may fall in the category of what you might call \u2018mundane.\u2019\u00a0 It doesn’t have the creative thrill of a new and exciting photograph.\u00a0 It\u2019s more under the category of \u2018Things-I-Should-Do-But-Haven\u2019t-Gotten-Around-To-Them-Yet.\u201d\u00a0 Actually, this is really under the category of \u201cMaking-My-Life-Easier.\u201d\u00a0 So, what is this all about?<\/p>\n

I usually take my laptop with me when I go out on a workshop or a shoot.\u00a0 There are several good reasons besides the fact that I\u2019m always eager to see what I got during the day and want to start working on my photographs before I get home.\u00a0 What are the other reasons?\u00a0 Well, primarily I want to back up the files.\u00a0 I like to have three copies of each \u2013 one on the memory card, another on the laptop and a third on an external drive.<\/p>\n

So, back in my hotel room I back up the files, import them into Lightroom and start the selection process.\u00a0 I\u2019ll delete files I know I won\u2019t work on and give stars to those that I find interesting.\u00a0 And usually I\u2019ll get started on them.\u00a0 If I need to do HDR I\u2019ll do that too.\u00a0 And if the photograph is really inspiring I\u2019ll edit it in Photoshop.<\/p>\n

But back to Lightroom.\u00a0 I\u2019m in the habit of creating a virtual copy of the images I work on, maybe several virtual copies if I\u2019m trying different things with them.\u00a0 But here\u2019s the rub.\u00a0 All the metadata, stars, virtual copies and adjustments are captured in the Lightroom Catalog.\u00a0 So the big question is how can I keep from loosing everything I did on the road when I transfer the files to my desktop computer back in the studio?<\/p>\n

DNG<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The answer in part lies in the DNG raw file format.\u00a0 If you’re not familiar with DNG, it is an open raw file format for which Adobe is the custodian.\u00a0 Unlike the proprietary raw file formats of Canon, Nikon, et al., any sort of metadata can be added to DNG files – like Lightroom adjustments.<\/p>\n

In fact, many of the things you do in Lightroom besides adjustments like creating virtual copies, rating your images with stars or flags and things like that can be stored in the DNG file.\u00a0 These are things the camera manufacturers do not store in their proprietary formats.<\/p>\n

Now, if you use the manufacturer’s raw file formats Lightroom can store the metadata in sidecar files.\u00a0 But the rub comes when you want to transfer your now photo files and all the adjustments and other things you did with them to your desktop computer.\u00a0 If you use the manufacturers’ raw file formats you have to transfer both the raw file and its sidecar file.\u00a0 But if you use DNG files you can save all of that Lightroom stuff to the DNG file and then just have to worry about one file.<\/p>\n

Transferring\u00a0Your Files to Your Desktop Computer<\/h2>\n

So here’s what you have to do.\u00a0 There are a couple of steps involved but they are not complicated.<\/p>\n

When you return home from the shoot…<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Launch Lightroom on your laptop (connected to your home network of course).<\/li>\n
  2. In Library<\/strong> mode, expand Folders in the left panel and select the folder that contains the files you want to transfer.<\/li>\n
  3. Make sure you are displaying the Grid (press G<\/strong>).\n

    \"\"<\/a>
    Select Lightroom Folder<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/li>\n
  4. Expand any stacks you my have by right-clicking on one and selecting Stacking | Expand All Stacks.<\/strong><\/li>\n
  5. Select all the files in the folder by pressing Ctrl-A<\/strong> (Command-A on the Mac).<\/li>\n
  6. Now, here’s the crucial step.\u00a0 Save all of the Lightroom metadata to the files by pressing Ctrl-S<\/strong> (Command-S on the Mac).<\/li>\n
  7. Now export the files to your desktop.\u00a0 Click Export…<\/strong>and complete the Export dialog\n

    \"\"<\/a>
    Export Dialog<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/li>\n
  8. In Export Location<\/strong> select the drive on your desktop where you want the files to reside.<\/li>\n
  9. In File Naming<\/strong>, leave Rename To:<\/strong> unchecked.<\/li>\n
  10. In File Settings<\/strong>, select Original<\/strong> in Format:<\/strong>.<\/li>\n
  11. Make sure the rest of the options are unchecked.<\/li>\n
  12. For Post Processing<\/strong>, I like to Show in Explorer<\/strong> after export.<\/li>\n
  13. Click Export<\/strong> and your files will be exported to your desktop computer with all of the Lightroom metadata in tact.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    The coll thing about this is that if you’ve created virtual copies of any of the files Lightroom will export one file for each copy.\u00a0 It appends a -2 suffix on the first virtual copy, -3 on the second and so on.<\/p>\n

    Now the only other thing you need to do is import the files into your Lightroom catalog on your desktop.<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Launch Lightroom on your desktop.<\/li>\n
    2. Make sure you are in Library<\/strong> mode.<\/li>\n
    3. Click Import…<\/strong>.<\/li>\n
    4. Navigate to the folder where the exported files reside.<\/li>\n
    5. All you need to do is Add<\/strong> the files to the catalog.<\/li>\n
    6. Add any keywords you may like and click Import<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      So it’s pretty simple.\u00a0 Using this procedure allows you to start working on your photographs while you’re still on the road and retaining all the work you’ve done when you move them to your desktop computer.<\/p>\n

      Yep, this isn’t as exciting as creating that really terrific image.\u00a0 But it’s very practical.<\/p>\n

      You may have your own way of dealing with this situation. If so, let’s hear from you.\u00a0 I’ve tried several different ways of solving the problem and this is the one that works the best for me.\u00a0 But if you have something different I’d like to hear about it.\u00a0 There’s always more to learn.<\/p>\n

      Thanks for reading this.\u00a0 And may your journeys always be blessed with great light.<\/p>\n

      (4537)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      This post may fall in the category of what you might call \u2018mundane.\u2019 It doesn\u2019t have the creative thrill of a new and exciting photograph. It\u2019s more under the category of \u2018Things-I-Should-Do-But-Haven\u2019t-Gotten-Around-To-Them-Yet.\u201d Actually, this is really under the category of \u201cMaking-My-Life-Easier.\u201d So, what is this all about?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,273],"tags":[298,338,47,339],"class_list":["post-2237","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-how-to-articles","category-lightroom-how-to-articles-articles","tag-backup","tag-dng","tag-lightroom","tag-metadata"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9Nl7-A5","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2237","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2237"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2237\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2294,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2237\/revisions\/2294"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2237"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}