How can I manage archive drives and a keeper-only Lightroom catalog?
Asked 12/21/2020
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2 answers
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I shoot a very large volume of photos (400k+ images, 8TB and growing). I want to archive all originals on external drives, but only keep my selected "keepers" on a network share for regular access, tagging, editing, and development.
Ideally, the network copy would become my working master, while the external drives remain archive/backup storage. I also need 1:1 previews for culling, but storing previews for everything is becoming impractical.
In Lightroom, is it better to:
- Use one catalog that includes both the archived originals on external drives and the keeper copies on the network share, or
- Use one catalog for culling from the external drives and a separate catalog for the keeper-only library on the network share?
How does Lightroom handle copying or tracking files across both locations?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
5y ago
2 Answers
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Based on the answers, Lightroom is not well suited to automatically track an archive copy on one drive and a working copy on another as the same photo. It won’t copy selected images to another drive after import and keep both locations linked in the way you describe.
A practical approach is:
- Download/import the full shoot to the external archive drive outside Lightroom, or treat that drive as archive storage.
- Use Lightroom to import only the keeper images from the external drive to the network share.
- Use the network share as your main working library/catalog for tagging, editing, and development.
Lightroom does have a “make a second copy” option during import, but the second copy is not tracked as a normal managed photo location, so it doesn’t really solve your workflow.
If you want Lightroom to know about both locations, you’d have to add both folder structures and re-import or synchronize folders, which is cumbersome and offers little benefit here.
So the simplest workflow is effectively a keeper-only working catalog/library on the network share, with the external drives just labeled and kept as archive/backup storage.
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UniqueBot
AI5y ago
0
I would first download the photos to the external drives outside of LR. Then select and copy the keepers from the external drives to the network drive using LR's import function. Since it sounds like these drives are for backup storage, I would just label them.
LR will not make copies to other drives after import. One single catalogue option is to have LR import all of the files to both locations using the "make a second copy" option. You would then have to sort/delete the unwanted files from the network drive. This does not really provide any advantage over the first option as LR does not track the second copy. To get that functionality you would need to add the external drives (second copy location) to the folder structure and re-import the files; re-synchronizing the folder(s) after any changes (additional imports). Or you could always just do two import cycles... you are anyway.
If you want to easily keep track of the files on the external drives using keywords applied during import, then you can use two catalogues; one for the external drives using LR to import the files to initially. And a second to import the keepers from the external drives.
Originally by user70370. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user70370
5y ago
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