Another Explanation for the Mystery

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Today’s Question: There is another possibility here [with respect to Monday’s question about not being able to move a file into a folder because Lightroom Classic thinks the image is a duplicate when it isn’t]. A file may have been removed from Lightroom Classic but not deleted from the hard drive. As a result, the photo is still in the folder but not visible through the Lightroom Classic interface.

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, indeed, if photos had been removed from the Lightroom Classic catalog but not deleted from the hard drive, it could create a situation where you can’t move a photo into a folder, even though in Lightroom Classic it doesn’t appear there is a conflict.

More Detail: When you remove a photo from your Lightroom Classic catalog, you have the option to only remove the photo from the catalog, or to both remove the photo from the catalog and delete the source image from your hard drive.

If you only remove the photo without deleting it (which is the default option), the file will remain in the folder even though you can’t see the image in Lightroom Classic. This would prevent you from moving a photo with the same filename into that folder, even though in Lightroom Classic there doesn’t appear to be a conflict.

In this case, you would probably want to delete the photo that had previously been removed from your Lightroom Classic catalog from your hard drive. You could also rename the photo to remove the conflict, or even add the removed photo back to your Lightroom Classic catalog by right-clicking on the folder in question and choosing the option to synchronize the folder.

While I wish I hadn’t overlooked this issue in my original answer, I’m grateful to my readers (thanks Bob!) who let me know when I missed a detail.

Hard Drive Migration

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Today’s Question: I am a long-time user of Lightroom Classic. I would like to move the image files (catalog as well) to an external hard drive. In the past I have moved folders/files through the operating system and suffered the consequences (missing files in Catalog). I thank you up front for any assistance you can provide in terms of how to approach this task.

Tim’s Quick Answer: In this scenario I would make use of the “Export as Catalog” command, which enables you to effectively copy all of your photos and your catalog to a new storage location.

More Detail: You could certainly use synchronization software to copy the photos to the external hard drive, and then move your existing catalog. But Lightroom Classic includes a feature that can perform this work for you as well.

You’ll first want to select every single image in your Lightroom Classic catalog, which actually requires a few steps to make sure you don’t miss any photos. Start by clicking on “All Photographs” in the Catalog section of the left panel in the Library module.

Switch to the Grid view (“G” on the keyboard) if you aren’t there already, and make sure “None” is selected from the Library Filter bar, so that no photos are hidden based on filters. Then go to the menu and choose Photo > Stacking > Expand All Stacks, so that no images are “hidden” in a collapsed stack.

You can then choose Edit > Select All from the menu to select all photos. Then choose File > Export as Catalog from the menu to initiate the export.

In the Export as Catalog dialog, navigate to the desired location for the catalog and photo storage, which in this case would be your external hard drive. Enter a name for the catalog in the Save As field, which will become the name of the folder containing the new catalog (and your photos) as well as the catalog file itself. Make sure the “Export negative files” checkbox is turned on, which is necessary to ensure the photos are copied along with the new catalog. Click the Export Catalog button to start the export. This will take considerable time, depending on how many photos are involved.

When the process is finished, go to the new catalog folder on the external hard drive, and double-click the catalog file, which will have a filename extension of “.lrcat”. This will open the new catalog in Lightroom Classic, and all of your photos and metadata will be there, including the original folder structure. Note that the new folder structure will now be within the folder that also contains the catalog.

Once you’ve confirmed that everything appears to be in order with your new catalog and photo storage on the external hard drive and made a new backup of that external hard drive, you can of course delete the original photos and catalog from the original location.

Just be very careful that after the export is completed you only use the new catalog, and don’t accidentally open the old version of the catalog.

Mystery of Duplicate Photos

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Today’s Question: I have been trying to get more organized. This has involved moving some photos to different folders. I have sometimes been getting a notice that I can’t move a photo because it already exists in the folder I wish to move to. However, I check to be sure and find that the photo I want to move there is not in that folder already. Am I doing something wrong, or not finding a photo that is already there? Any thoughts?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Unless there is a very weird software bug at play here, I suspect the issue is that you have a different photo with the same filename in the destination folder. Renaming one of the two files to have a unique name should therefore enable you to move the photo to the destination folder.

More Detail: It is not possible to have two files with the exact same filename stored in the same folder. This isn’t an issue with Lightroom Classic exclusively, but with the operating system in general (for both Windows and Macintosh users).

If there is just one file that is causing this issue, you could simply rename the image using the File Name field at the top of the Metadata section on the right panel in the Library module. So, for example, you could add “-2” to the filename there, and then drag-and-drop the image to the intended destination folder.

If you have a larger batch of photos that have conflicting filenames, you could use the Rename Photo command instead. Simply select all of the photos you want to rename, and then choose Library > Rename Photo from the menu. In the dialog that appears you’ll see an indication of the number of photos you’re renaming in the title bar of the dialog.

Select a template from the File Naming popup. In this case, for example, you might consider using the “Filename – Sequence” option, which will add a sequence number to the existing filename. You could also choose Edit from the popup if you want to define your own custom template for renaming. If you’re using a template that includes a sequence number, be sure to update the Start Number value as you prefer. Then click OK to rename the selected photos. All of those photos can then be dragged to the intended destination folder.

Value of Presets

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Today’s Question: I often see promotions for Develop presets for Lightroom Classic that promise miraculous improvement for my photos. What do you think of these preset bundles, which often include hundreds if not thousands of presets?

Tim’s Quick Answer: While presets can be helpful for streamlining your workflow and getting some creative inspiration, in general I don’t feel there is significant value in purchasing presets for Lightroom Classic. That’s especially true when the bundle includes a particularly large number of presets.

More Detail: I get asked about presets in Lightroom Classic on a somewhat regular basis, and of course I also see the promotions offering hundreds of presets with promises of revolutionizing your workflow and magically making your images stunningly perfect.

Part of my frustration with these claims is that presets in Lightroom Classic really just represent saved settings for the adjustments applied on the right panel in the Develop module. In other words, any preset you obtain represents something you could have created with the exact same result working on the right panel in the Develop module in Lightroom Classic.

To be sure, presets can be very helpful. Presets provide a quick way of getting to initial settings for your adjustments and creative effects. For example, I tend to use the same basic settings as the starting point when applying a sepia tone effect to a photo, and so a preset is great because it ensures I’m using consistent settings for that effect.

It is important to keep in mind, however, that in many cases a preset that works wonderfully well for one image won’t provide a pleasing effect for another image. This is part of the reason I recommend using presets as starting points in most cases, with refinement of the adjustments on the right panel. In other words, it is rare that I would apply a preset and leave the image with those settings without applying refinements to the effect.

Presets can also be helpful when you’re trying to figure out which direction to take a photo, since you can preview the effect of presets by simply moving your mouse over the list of presets on the left panel in the Develop module.

If you find a set of presets that have effects that you find appealing and think will work well for your photos, by all means you should take a close look at those presets. Over time, however, I think you’ll find it more valuable to gain familiarity with the adjustments in Lightroom Classic, and create your own presets over time to preserve good starting points for adjustments and creative effects.

Ink Wasted by Nozzle Cleaning

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Today’s Question: I ran out of ink while doing the nozzle and head cleaning and had to wait for new inks to arrive. After about six cleanings, I still have the gaps in the purple portion of the test print. Shockingly, I completely used up some of the brand-new ink cartridges with this half dozen cleanings (and as you know, this stuff is not cheap!). Any idea why the cleanings are not fully getting the job done? Recommendations?

Tim’s Quick Answer: There’s no question that nozzle cleaning consumes a considerable amount of ink. Therefore, I recommend trying to minimize the number of cycles needed to resolve clogged nozzles.

More Detail: As any photographer who owns a photo inkjet printer is well aware, printer inks are somewhat expensive especially when considered the total price per gallon. For example, I found an 80ml cartridge with a price of $75. It would take about 47 of those cartridges to get a gallon of ink, which translates to a price of more than $3,500 per gallon.

When you have clogged nozzles, the print quality and color fidelity can suffer significantly, so it is important to make sure the nozzles are clear when making a print.

One of the reasons nozzles get clogged is due to residual ink drying out. You can help prevent this by making sure you’re printing on a somewhat regular basis. If you make a small print about once a week, for example, you’ll more than likely avoid clogging in the first place.

If you still end up with clogged nozzles, you’ll naturally need to use the printer’s nozzle cleaning feature. I recommend doing no more than two cleaning cycles. If that still doesn’t resolve the issue, let the printer sit for a day. This gives the anticoagulant agents in the ink a chance to circulate a bit, which can help get the nozzles cleared.

If waiting a day before trying the nozzle cleaning again still doesn’t resolve the issue you can clean the nozzles directly. For this you can use a paper towel moistened with isopropyl alcohol. In some cases you may be able to put the isopropyl alcohol on the sponge in the printer that comes in contact with the nozzles when the print head is parked.

With other printers you’ll need to put the paper towel with the isopropyl alcohol below the print head in contact with the nozzles. Let it soak for a little while and then perform another nozzle cleaning. This should resolve your clogged nozzles, and then you can focus on preventing the clogs with regular use of the printer.

Photoshop Panels Not Minimizing

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Today’s Question: When minimizing Photoshop, the panels do not minimize with the application. Can Photoshop be set up for a complete window to minimize including panels?

Tim’s Quick Answer: You need to make sure that all panels are docked in the Photoshop interface in order to have the panels minimize along with the application window.

More Detail: Photoshop includes a wide variety of panels that can be used to present information or perform various actions. For example, the Layers panel is helpful for adding adjustment layers and image layers to an image you’re working on and reviewing the layers that are currently included with the image.

If you have panels that are floating within the Photoshop interface rather than being docked, those panels will remain visible when you minimize the main Photoshop application window. In order to have panels get hidden along with the main Photoshop window you need to make sure those panels are docked.

You can dock a panel by clicking and dragging on the tab for the panel and dropping it along one of the edges of the Photoshop interface (or into an existing docked panel). When you hover while dragging a panel, a blue line or box will show you the destination for docking the panel if you release the mouse button at that position.

So, for example, you could drag a panel to the right edge of the Photoshop interface to dock the panel along that right edge. Once all panels are docked within the Photoshop application window, when you minimize Photoshop all panels will be minimized along with the main application window.

Back-Button Focus Flexibility

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Today’s Question: When using back button focus, do you recommend setting the camera to continuous or one shot autofocus?

Tim’s Quick Answer: I absolutely recommend using continuous autofocus in conjunction with back-button focus, so you have maximum flexibility.

More Detail: When you enable back-button autofocus rather than having autofocus connected to the shutter release button, you have a button that is dedicated solely to autofocus. To maximize the flexibility of this approach, I recommend using continuous autofocus rather than one-shot autofocus.

One of the great things about using back-button autofocus is that you are able to exercise better control over when autofocus is activated. When you want to focus, you press the back-button focus button. When you don’t want autofocus, you simply don’t press the button. Metering and capturing a photo are still controlled by the shutter release button.

With back-button focus enabled and your camera configured to continuous autofocus, you can actually switch between the equivalent of continuous autofocus and one-shot autofocus instantly.

If you want continuous autofocus, press and hold the back-button focus button. Naturally you might be tracking a moving subject while holding the back-button focus button for example.

If you want the equivalent of one-shot autofocus, start by pressing and holding the back-button focus button until focus is acquired on the desired subject. Then release the back-button focus button so the camera will discontinue autofocus. This provides the same behavior as one-shot autofocus. Keep in mind, of course, that after setting this one-shot type of autofocus you’ll need to maintain the same distance to your subject to maintain focus, or you’ll need to re-establish focus if you need to move.

Photoshop for Cleanup

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Today’s Question: In a post you said, “It is very rare for me to need to send a photo to Photoshop [from Lightroom Classic], and when I do it is generally to take advantage of the superior image-cleanup tools in Photoshop.” Which tools are those?

Tim’s Quick Answer: The primary advantage of Photoshop when it comes to image cleanup is the Content-Aware technology. In particular I take advantage of the Spot Healing Brush tool and the Content-Aware Fill command for this purpose, though other tools feature this technology as well.

More Detail: Over the years, Lightroom Classic has improved to the point that the Develop module provides the majority of the adjustments I need for most of my photos. In many cases, in fact, I don’t feel the need to use anything beyond Lightroom Classic to optimize my photos.

However, Lightroom Classic is still missing the Content-Aware technology that is available in Photoshop, and which provides superior quality when it comes to removing blemishes and other distractions from photos.

The Content-Aware technology is available with a variety of tools in Photoshop. For example, the Content-Aware Move tool makes use of Content-Aware technology, but I don’t tend to use this tool very often in my own image cleanup work.

The primary tool I tend to use for cleaning up blemishes and distractions in my photos when using Photoshop is the Spot Healing Brush tool, with the Content-Aware option selected for the Type option. For more complicated cleanup work, I generally make use of the Content-Aware Fill command, which among other things enables you to control which areas of the image can be used to collect source pixels to be used for cleaning up the selected blemish area.

Lightroom Classic includes a Spot Removal tool, which is basically on par with the Healing Brush tool in Photoshop. Lightroom Classic does not, however, include the Content-Aware technology, which remains one of the key reasons I still need to include Photoshop in my workflow from time to time. The other reason, by the way, is greater control over selections and targeted adjustments in Photoshop.

Time Zone Workflow

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Today’s Question: When traveling through multiple time zones on a single trip and you are using several cameras, do you change the time for each camera to the identical times for each time zone, or do you use your home time in all cameras and don’t reset in each time zone.

Tim’s Quick Answer: My preference is to change every camera to local time based on my current location, so that the metadata will show the local time of capture in case I need to reference that information. For example, this is sometimes helpful in terms of determining how close to sunset a photo was captured.

More Detail: In my mind there are two approaches to setting the time zone on your camera that make sense. The first is my preferred approach, which is to try to make sure that my camera is always set to local time.

Admittedly, it isn’t all that often that I really need to know what time a photo was taken. However, from time to time I do find this information helpful. That might be due to a celestial event, such as sunrise. Other times it might help determine details about the photo, such as the time I was able to learn which satellite appeared as a streak of light in a photo I had captured of the Milky Way galaxy. Again, this type of information isn’t generally critical, but it can be helpful and interesting.

Plus, I just like knowing that the capture time for my photos is an accurate reflection of when the photo was actually captured. Of course, this too can be confusing, such as on the several occasions I’ve been photographing on consecutive days that involve crossing the International Date Line.

The second approach to time zones is to choose a single time zone to keep your camera set to permanently, without changing that time zone no matter where you travel. To me the most logical time zone choice would be Coordinated Universal Time (UTC, often referred to as Greenwich Mean Time or Zulu time). This is a standard time zone reference, so I feel it is a good choice. You could also keep your camera set permanently to your time zone at home.

My opinion is that having accurate capture time information in metadata is preferred. However, I also appreciate the convenience of having a single time zone used for metadata for all photos. But if you use a single time zone permanently, it can be a little tricky to determine the actual time of capture for a given photo should you want that information at a later date.

Custom Sort Order Fails

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Today’s Question: I frequently shoot photos of my grandkids’ sporting events. After I select the ones I want to share with family, I try to rearrange them in order of tasks: batting, fielding, scoring, etc. But Lightroom Classic pops up with a message saying I can’t reorder them. How can I reorder their sequence?

Tim’s Quick Answer: In order to arrange photos into a custom sort order in Lightroom Classic you need to either be browsing a single folder or a “normal” collection (rather than a smart collection).

More Detail: In Lightroom Classic it is possible to arrange photos into a custom sort order by simply dragging the thumbnails for your photos around within the grid view display. You can even then switch to a different sort order (such as capture time), and then switch back to your custom sort order using the Sort popup on the toolbar below the grid view display.

However, the custom sort order is only available if you are browsing a single folder or a normal collection. So, if you have selected more than one folder to browse, you won’t be able to drag your photos around into a custom sort order. Similarly, if you are browsing a smart collection rather than a normal collection you won’t be able to arrange into a custom sort order.

Therefore, to deal with a situation where you’re not able to arrange the photos into a custom sort order in Lightroom Classic I recommend creating a collection for the applicable photos. You can then arrange the photos within that collection in any order you’d like.