Category: Ask Tim Grey

Today’s Question: Can I back up an external RAID drive to a different external drive?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes! A RAID drive can be backed up to any other hard drive that has adequate storage capacity.

More Detail: A RAID (redundant array of independent disks) drive consists of two or more hard drives that appear as a single drive to the operating system. This can provide various benefits, including faster performance in a RAID-0 configuration to automatic data redundancy through other (and more common) implementations.

As I explained in a previous edition of the Ask Tim Grey eNewsletter, a RAID configuration with redundancy provides what is effectively an automatic backup of the data on that drive. However, if that drive is lost or destroyed the backup won’t do you any good. Therefore, I strongly recommend backing up a RAID drive to another drive, rather than depending on the redundancy of RAID as your only backup.

Since a RAID drive appears as a normal hard drive through the operating system, you can back up a RAID drive just like any other hard drive. That includes backing up to an external hard drive, to an online service such as Backblaze (https://timgrey.me/cloudbackup), or any other type of backup you use in your workflow.

Today’s Question: When you say that your backups make exact copies of your drive, are you saying you are making a mirror copy of the entire drive? In that case you would end up with one compressed file of the entire drive. Is this what you mean?

Tim’s Quick Answer: No, my backups are not compressed, but are instead an exact copy of the primary drive I’m backing up, which makes recovering from a failure remarkably easy.

More Detail: I use GoodSync software (http://timgrey.me/greybackup) to create a synchronized backup of each of my primary external hard drives. With this approach, each backup drive is maintained as an exact copy of the primary drive that is being backed up. That means the entire folder and file structure from the primary drive is created and regularly updated on the backup drive.

In other words, if you were to browse my primary drive and one of the backup drives side-by-side you would see that the backup is an exact match of the primary drive, with no compression or other alterations.

One of the significant advantages of this approach is that if the primary drive fails, I can recover by simply using one of my backup drives in place of the failed drive. No restore process is necessary, because the backup was maintained as an exact match of the primary drive.

Today’s Question: In one of your presentations on targeted adjustments in Adobe Camera Raw I saw that there was a Curves adjustment available when masking. I don’t see this adjustment in the Develop module in Lightroom Classic, but I thought they were supposed to be the same. Am I missing an update or something?

Tim’s Quick Answer: You’re not missing anything. The Tone Curve adjustment is not currently available for targeted adjustments in Lightroom Classic, while it is available in Camera Raw in Photoshop.

More Detail: In general, the adjustments available in the Develop module in Lightroom Classic and Camera Raw in Photoshop are identical. Adobe has overall done a good job of keeping the updates synchronized between their various applications that use the same engine for optimizing photos, which includes the cloud-based version of Lightroom.

However, with a recent update the masking features did get out of sync, with a Curves adjustment being added to the subset of adjustments available for targeted adjustments in Camera Raw, while the same adjustment is not available for targeted adjustments in Lightroom Classic.

I expect Adobe will resolve this issue with an upcoming release of Lightroom Classic, hopefully soon. I do find the Tone Curve adjustment can be very helpful in general for applying targeted tonal or color adjustments based on tonal values in the image. It would be nice, however, to have that same capability available in a more targeted way by having it added to the masking feature in Lightroom Classic. Perhaps more important, it would be helpful if Adobe ensured that these applications were once again synchronized in terms of the adjustments available.

Today’s Question: Is there any harm in removing the card after each shoot in order to download photos using a card reader, rather than connecting my camera to the computer via USB?

Tim’s Quick Answer: As far as I’m concerned it is actually much better to remove the media card from the camera and use a card reader to download photos, rather than connecting the camera to the computer for this purpose.

More Detail: There is certainly some degree of risk involved in removing a media card from the camera to download photos with a card reader. You might inadvertently lose the card, or potentially damage it if you’re not careful. But with reasonable care I don’t consider this to be a significant risk.

More to the point, there are advantages to using a card reader rather than connecting your camera to the computer. In most cases the download will be faster (in some cases much faster) using a card reader rather than connecting the camera to the computer. In other words, most cameras aren’t the best card readers available, and are often among the slowest at transferring photos to your computer.

I also prefer not to connect the camera to the computer because in my view it puts the camera at greater risk. I’m sure this is biased a little by the fact that I can be a little clumsy at times. But I don’t like the idea of the camera sitting on my desk connected via cable to my computer, where I might accidentally snag the cable or otherwise knock the camera to the floor. I’d rather keep my camera safely in my camera bag, while I use the media cards in a card reader to download photos to my computer.

It is worth noting that some cameras do support transferring photos via a Wi-Fi connection. This would generally be slower than using a card reader, but it does to some degree reduce the risk of damage to the camera or memory card during the download process.

Today’s Question: Regarding backups, why don’t you recommend the use of RAID drives? I have used one for several years with no issues.

Tim’s Quick Answer: I’m not opposed to RAID drives in general. However, I would never depend on a RAID drive in place of a backup to a separate physical drive.

More Detail: RAID stands for Redundant Array of Independent Disks (or Drives) and refers to what is effectively one housing with two or more drives inside that are interconnected. There are a variety of different RAID implementations, but many of them include redundancy. To oversimplify, you can think of RAID as representing what looks like a single hard drive but where your data is being written to two drives at the same time.

A RAID drive configured for redundant storage provides an efficient solution for a real-time backup of your data, considering that all files you save or update are automatically saved to two different drives. However, those two drives are contained within the same housing, so if that housing is damaged or destroyed you could lose your primary and backup storage all at once.

If you’re using RAID in addition to backing up to another local drive and ideally another remote drive (perhaps via an online backup solution such as Backblaze, https://timgrey.me/cloudbackup), then I have no problem with the use of RAID.

However, I often find that photographers who use a RAID drive think they’re safe, and don’t perform any other backups. I don’t consider this to be a good approach to keeping your photos and other important data safe.

Because of these issues, I simply prefer not to spend the extra money on a RAID drive, and instead put that money into additional backup drives, so I have even greater redundancy. This involves a little more effort to maintain, but I feel that is time worth spent in the interest of a backup workflow that provides greater confidence.

Today’s Question: Do you backup, using GoodSync, to two external drives running two backup jobs simultaneously or to each drive separately running each backup job one at a time?

Tim’s Quick Answer: I perform each backup job individually, even though it is possible to queue multiple backup jobs with GoodSync (http://timgrey.me/greybackup). This is out of an abundance of caution, not wanting to have the primary drive and all backup drives connected to the computer at the same time.

More Detail: As I’ve mentioned before, I use GoodSync software (http://timgrey.me/greybackup) to back up my photos and other important data. This software creates a backup that is a perfect match of the primary drive, which makes recovering from a failed drive remarkable simple.

With GoodSync only a single backup job can actually run at one time, but you can queue multiple backup jobs and they will run in series. For example, if you have several backup jobs and the drives for each are connected to the computer, you can right-click on each job in turn and choose “Analyze and Sync” from the popup menu to initiate the backup job.

When you queue multiple backup jobs, the first job will start immediately, and the others will be put in the queue. As soon as the first job finishes, the next job in the queue will start.

I would certainly be comfortable with backing up two different source drives with this approach. For example, I could connect my primary photos drive and my primary data drive, along with a backup drive for each, and then queue the jobs for both of those drives.

However, I personally would not take this approach for backing up to both the first and second backup drives for a single primary drive. The reason is that I prefer not to have all three of those drives connected to the computer at the same time, out of an abundance of caution.

Admittedly, the risk of something happening, such as a lightning strike, that might destroy the primary drive and both backup drives all at once just because they were all connected to the computer at the same time is quite low. But I try to maintain very conservative practices when it comes to backing up. I have, after all, lost data to a failed drive a very long time ago, and that taught me to be particularly paranoid when it comes to backing up my important data.

Today’s Question: I’ve seen you demonstrate how you can search the list of folders or collections in Lightroom Classic. However, while I have the search field for folders, it is missing for the collections list. Am I missing something, or is there a way to get it back?

Tim’s Quick Answer: It sounds like you’ve just inadvertently hidden the search field for Collections, which you can bring back by clicking the plus (+) icon and choosing “Show Collections Filter” from the popup menu.

More Detail: There are search fields available for both the Folders and Collections lists on the left panel in the Library module in Lightroom Classic, which enable you to perform a text search to filter either list. This can make it much easier to quickly navigate to a particular folder or collection.

You can also click the magnifying glass icon at the left side of the search field to bring up a popup with various filtering options, such as to filter folders or collections by color label.

The search field is always present within the Folders section, but the field for the Collections section can be hidden. If you tend not to use collections very much you might prefer to hide the search field, for example.

Of course, if you’ve accidentally hidden the field, it can be a little confusing. Fortunately, you can reveal (or hide) the search field by clicking the plus (+) icon to the right of the Collections heading and then choosing “Show Collections Filter” from the popup menu.

Today’s Question: I’ve decided I am long overdue to create a system to better back up my photos. Can you provide an overview of the workflow you recommend?

Tim’s Quick Answer: My primary local backups are created using GoodSync (http://timgrey.me/greybackup) to synchronize each primary storage drive to two backup drives. I also use Backblaze (https://timgrey.me/cloudbackup) as an online backup solution, which provides an offsite copy of my data.

More Detail: I was asked this question a couple weeks ago, but since today is World Backup Day I decided to hold the question for today’s newsletter.

My primary method of backing up my photos is to create exact copies of my primary hard drives used for photo storage to at least two other backup drives. By synchronizing photos to other drives, the backup drives represent an exact copy of the primary drive. I use GoodSync software (http://timgrey.me/greybackup) for this purpose, but there are other solutions available as well.

That means that when a primary drive fails it is very easy to recover. You basically just need to connect the backup drive in place of the failed drive, and the data structure will be the same. This is especially helpful when it comes to managing photos with Lightroom Classic, because it ensures the catalog won’t be confused by a different storage structure for your photos on the backup drive.

While I always maintain at least two backup drives (and often more) for my primary drives, I also want to have an offsite backup so I can still recover even if all my drives were lost at once in a disaster. I prefer to use an online backup service for this purpose rather than having to move hard drives back and forth to a remote location myself, and I have been very happy with the online backup provided by Backblaze (https://timgrey.me/cloudbackup) for this purpose.

As a side note, because I’m a Macintosh user, I employ the Time Machine backup for the internal drive on my computer, backing up to at least two external hard drives for this purpose. This doesn’t relate to my photo storage, since I store my photos on external hard drives, but Time Machine does make it remarkably easy to recover the internal hard drive if there is a failure.

Today’s Question: The term “fast glass” was common decades before autofocus lenses came on the market. Fast glass allowed faster shutter speeds for use in sports photography, to better stop the action of fast-moving subjects.

Tim’s Quick Answer: While my previous answer related to a “fast lens” or “fast glass” emphasized autofocus performance, a lens with a larger maximum aperture size would indeed enable faster shutter speeds, all other things being equal.

More Detail: Every now and then an installment of my Ask Tim Grey eNewsletter leads to a surprising number of responses from photographers, and the subject of “fast lenses” led to an especially large number of replies. It is certainly fair that a lens with a larger maximum aperture size would enable a faster shutter speed, but I would consider that a secondary factor in the context of today’s technology.

As many photographers reminded me, the term “fast glass” for lenses predates autofocus. I suppose that wasn’t as strong in my perspective because while I started out using only manual focus lenses, for most of my time as a photographer I’ve had the luxury of autofocus.

In addition, with the common availability of lens stabilization technology in lenses and camera bodies, it has become less important to choose a fast lens for purposes of achieving a faster shutter speed. For example, when a lens is available in models that feature a maximum aperture size of f/2.8 versus f/4, having image stabilization technology will provide a greater advantage than the additional stop of light via the aperture.

So, while I agree that the term “fast lens” or “fast glass” was in use before autofocus was available, I do think that autofocus performance is a more important reason to consider opting for a lens that has a larger maximum aperture size compared to the ability to achieve faster shutter speeds.

And, of course, as a photographer who tends to favor capturing photos with narrow depth of field, a wider aperture can enable you to create images with less of the scene in focus as well.

I very much appreciate the photographers who replied to my original email on the subject of fast lenses. One of the things I have always enjoyed about publishing the Ask Tim Grey eNewsletter is that readers are quick to respond if they find something I’ve left out, that I’ve stated incorrectly, or that they simply disagree with me about. The feedback is appreciated.

Today’s Question: For composite imaging in Photoshop, what’s the best way to select two images from two different folders in Lightroom Classic?

Tim’s Quick Answer: You can browse the photos from two or more folders at the same time, and then use filters to narrow down the list so you can more easily find the two photos you want to use. Alternatively, I would recommend using the Quick Collection to temporarily group the images together.

More Detail: You can browse the photos from more than one folder in Lightroom Classic by simply selecting multiple folders. This can be done in the same way you would select multiple files or folders in the operating system. You can click on the first folder and then hold the Shift key while clicking the last folder to select the full range of folders in between. You can also toggle the selection of folders on or off by holding the Ctrl key on Windows or the Command key on Macintosh while clicking on a folder.

Once you’ve selected multiple folders you can use the filter settings on the Library Filter bar to narrow the photos down, such as by star rating or other metadata values.

Another great option is to use the Quick Collection in the Catalog section of the left panel in the Library module to group the photos together temporarily. In general, I recommend that you first make sure the Quick Collection is empty. If you need to preserve the group of images currently in the Quick Collection you can save them to a normal collection by right-clicking on the Quick Collection and choosing “Save Quick Collection” from the popup menu.

You can clear the current images from the Quick Collection by right-clicking on it and choosing “Clear Quick Collection” from the popup menu. I then recommend making sure the Quick Collection is the current target collection, which you can do by once again right-clicking and choosing “Set as Target Collection”.

With the Quick Collection set as the target collection you can add images to the Quick Collection by pressing the letter “B” on the keyboard. You could then navigate among the various folders that contain images you want to work with, select a photo, and press “B” on the keyboard to add the selected image to the Quick Collection. You can then go to the Quick Collection to browse the photos you’ve grouped there, select the photos you want to work, and then send them to Photoshop to create a composite.