Today’s Question: I only use a laptop with my [Lightroom Classic] catalog on the laptop and my photos stored on an external hard drive. When I travel it would seem like I could use the same catalog and store my travel photos on my laptop and then transfer the photos via Lightroom [Classic] to the external hard drive when I return home. Does this make sense?
Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, if your Lightroom Classic catalog is on the internal hard drive of the laptop you’re traveling with, you can simply import photos captured during your travels into that catalog. You can then move the photos to their permanent storage location once you return home.
More Detail: Quite some time ago I abandoned my desktop computer, opting to use a laptop as my only computer. This was an easy decision to make, since I am typically traveling more than six months out of the year. (This year, of course, has turned into an exception.)
When you have your Lightroom Classic catalog available while traveling, you can of course make full use of that catalog when you are away from home. That enables you to, for example, browse your entire catalog of photos, even if the external hard drive containing your photos has been left back at home.
While traveling with your Lightroom Classic catalog, you can of course import new photos into the catalog. If you don’t have your external hard drive with you, then you can simply copy the photos onto the internal hard drive of your laptop when importing those photos into Lightroom Classic.
When you return home, you can connect the external hard drive to your laptop so you can transfer the photos captured during your travels to their permanent storage location. You could, for example, drag the entire folder containing the photos from your travels to the external hard drive in the Folders section of the left panel in the Library module in Lightroom Classic.