While the weather has been terrible just lately with storm Eunice, I’ve been taking the opportunity to do some photo admin that I’ve been putting off for far too long.
Each time I ignore this admin, the walls of shrinking storage capacity and lost files/increased costs close in on me.
My editing process
I upload my Raw images to Lightroom Mobile on my iPad and those files then sync to my computer and attached storage next time I switch it on.
This means I can start my editing on my iPad PDQ after a shoot and get a decent first output suitable for that Instagram gratification fix. The long awaited masking tools now available in Lightroom Mobile mean that most editing can be done on the go.
Because I’ve been editing like this for 2-3 years, my cloud storage allowance has been getting close to the max recently and I’ve been worried about running out.
Not wanting to run out and then pay double more per month on my subscription, I read up about it to learn what I need to do.
It’s worth confessing here that my wife is constantly asking me if I’ve RTFM, knowing full well that I haven’t.
Storage
Firstly, I’ve expanded my NAS (Network Attached Storage) by more than double than I had before. I’ve got a 2-bay Synology NAS which I’ve set up to be mirrored.
Secondly, I purchased a Thunderbolt external drive to be my primary storage for my photo library and more careful edits, for example for website, shop, competitions, exhibitions and printing.
It’s not that shots edited on Lightroom mobile aren’t ready to go, it’s just sometimes they need refining, or there’s something I spot on the large monitor that I didn’t notice on the iPad.
I then backup this data to the NAS box. There are various ways to do this from Apple’s own Time Machine, Synology services and apps, and third-party backup/replication software.
I found a freeware app called FreeFileSync which helps you compare files on two different locations, enabling you to backup or mirror/sync files across your storage devices. It’s really good, and I like being able to initiate this at the moment I want to.
FreeFileSync has a compare option to so you can run that and the view on-screen the files in the two locations with prompts to change which folders/files take precedence and the ability to exclude things too.
I backup all my files to the cloud too as a third layer of protection.
Lightroom catalog
My Lightroom catalog and folders have been in a mess for a while. Having changed my storage configuration twice in the last few years, I now realise I’ve broken the links between the folders and the files.
I’ve started reorganising the folders and ensuring the Raw images are in the right place.
The punishment for not doing a RTFM approach is that I’ve lost some of my historical editing.
It’s not a huge loss though as I’ve got some of the output files for many of them, and it’s also not a bad idea to revisit some shots with my latest editing process/style.
Adobe cloud storage
Firstly, I had to check to make sure that the Adobe cloud files were copied locally and that the only reason copies were on the cloud was for synchronising between iPad and local storage.
Adobe do not make it obvious what’s on your cloud area. A cynic might say they want you to be unsure of things and continue to rack up your cloud allowance to tip you into the next tier of subscription payment.
After ensuring that I had all my Raw files and they were backed up, I removed all my Lightroom mobile folders and went ahead and deleted what was on the Adobe cloud.
This has reset my cloud storage allowance so I’m starting from scratch with plenty of capacity to sync my photos.
Mac
I switched from PC to Mac almost three years ago.
When you start looking into PCs and suitable quality monitors, there’s not much difference in the end.
I have to say I do like Macs, they just work and it’s a pleasure to use them.
Yeah, Apple are a pain in the butt for increasingly soldering stuff in and trying to prevent people doing upgrades (a lot of other manufacturers have been at it as well, for example Samsung). However, the recent right to repair movement means Apple and other manufacturers will be forced to produce more upgradeable products in future.
I had also been worrying about my Mac’s internal drive running out of space as I had got the 500Gb drive at the time off purchase.
As a side benefit of the admin tidy up above, I managed to free up some space which was being consumed by the Lightroom catalog and preview files such that I now have half the drive free. Pretty good, especially with all the apps I run these days.
Apps
I’ve got Microsoft Office, Adobe Lightroom and PhotoShop (courtesy of the monthly subscription to Adobe photographers plan), Topaz suite including Denoise, Sharpen and Gigapixel.
The Nik collection which I acquired at sale price and used to use years ago. A few other apps such as Apollo for previewing photos and reading the full Exif data. Adrenalin is a good little app for keeping the Mac on while you’re waiting for a lengthy backup of something doing its thing.
Investing time now for later gains
Sorting out my photo files and catalog will also be useful as a way of revisiting older photos in my collection to see if any are worthy of a website/shop/competition entry and with the benefit of my latest editing knowledge and the up-to-date capabilities of the software at my disposal.
Onwards and upwards.