Today’s Question: Your new Lightroom CC video was, as usual, very helpful. I am a current subscriber to Adobe’s Creative Cloud Photography Plan. Today I received a notification from the Adobe Creative Cloud application advising of updates available for my installed software. I notice that the updates include the installation of the new Lightroom CC and an update to what is now called Lightroom Classic. Can I install the new Lightroom CC and not worry about it automatically importing all my current catalog into it rendering it inaccessible to Lightroom Classic? I’d like to follow your suggestion of importing copies of a few select folders into the new Lightroom CC from my existing catalog for a “test drive”.
Tim’s Quick Answer: The new Lightroom CC will not automatically migrate your existing Lightroom Classic catalog, so you don’t have to worry about that in the context of taking Lightroom CC for a test drive.
More Detail: Lightroom CC includes the ability to migrate a Lightroom Classic catalog, so that you can transition from using Lightroom Classic to Lightroom CC without losing any of the information about your photos in the process. This process will not initiate without you specifically issuing the command within Lightroom CC.
Furthermore, in order to complete the migration process, your Lightroom Classic catalog will be analyzed for any missing images or metadata mismatches. Those issues will need to be resolved before you can fully migrate your Lightroom Classic catalog to Lightroom CC.
I do highly recommend taking Lightroom CC for a test drive before making a decision about possibly transitioning to this new platform. For that text, I highly recommend making copies of a group of your photos (including raw captures), and placing them in a clearly designated “test” folder. You can then add only those photos to Lightroom CC, and text the platform to see if it will meet your needs.
Note that we do have a video course covering the new Lightroom CC that is available through the GreyLearning library here: