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Adobe Lightroom - Importing Files into Lightroom
Article
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The
Import command window for Adobe Lightroom allows you to make
one very important File Handling decision that should be available
in all file cataloging systems. Should you let Adobe Lightroom
keep all your images in the applications database or should
you keep your images separate from the application database
and only let Adobe Lightroom reference your existing image
files?
Reference
files in existing location - means you get
to be the master of your own file management system and you
can even keep your image library on a series of external hard
disk drives that can be removed from your computer and locked
up at night or easily moved to another location. Lightroom
will leave your files where they are and only store thumbnails
and indexes, which can be accessed even when your file library
is offline. Although your files will need to be online for
any major editing.
Copy
files to Lightroom Library - this process
copies files from their storage location to the Lightroom
Library database. If you do not already have a backup of your
files and want your images to reside in the Adobe Lightroom
database this is a wise choice.
Move
files to Lightroom Library - this process
moves your files from their existing location to the Adobe
Lightroom library database, be very careful that you have
an external backup of your files before you use this method
of storing your files within the Adobe Lightroom database.
Copy
photos as Digital Negative (DNG) - In the
future I think I might lean towards this method but at the
moment Adobe Lightroom (Beta 2) only supports one database
(Adobe is working on supporting more than one database), so
the idea of building a large library of 30 MB images on one
hard disk drive is a little frightening.
My
personal preference is for Reference
files in existing location, it allows me to
use my existing file storage system and to keep the Adobe
Lightroom Library database as small as possible, in theory
keeping the application running faster, but we will see what
the future (of Adobe Lightroom) brings.
As
you can see from the grayed out buttons and dialog boxes,
renaming of your files is not possible when you reference
your existing files, but a lot of renaming choices are available
if you decide to use the Adobe Lightroom Library database
to store your images.
The
Segment by:
box acts somewhat like a file browser, if you decide to import
a folder that contains folders. You can either import all
the files in one go or segment them by folders and make decisions
about what folders you want or don't want to import. Individual
folders can also be renamed before they are imported by giving
them a Shoot Name.
Keywords
and Metadata
can also be assigned to the contents of a folder before it
is imported.
Please
remember that Adobe Lightroom is still a Beta application
and that now is the time to experiment with this application,
not to make decisions regarding your valuable image database
that can not be reversed later.
P.S.:
Please do not get upset if your personal experience and views
are different from my own. These opinions are mine exclusively
and do not reflect the views or policies of any of the manufacturers
mentioned in this article...... George
Mann |
