Ask Tim Grey

Today’s Question: A while back it became popular to create a “tilt-shift” effect for photos. Is there a way to create this type of effect in Lightroom Classic?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes! You can create a tilt-shift blur effect by using two (or more) Gradient Filter adjustments, using a negative value for the Sharpness slider for the Graduated Filter.

More Detail: A tilt-shift lens enables you to effectively tilt the angle at which the area of depth of field falls across an image. Among other things, this enables you to position a blur across a central area of a photo, with the top and bottom edges being out of focus. This creates a type of miniaturization effect, which can produce a unique impact in a photo where the scene almost looks like a toy model rather than an actual scene.

The effect became popular as a post-processing effect, in part because a tilt-shift blur filter was added to Photoshop some time ago. It is possible, however, to create this type of effect in Lightroom Classic as well.

The key is to use two (or more) Gradient Filter adjustments. Start by selecting the Gradient Filter adjustment from the toolbar below the Histogram on the right panel in the Develop module. Then drag downward from near the top of the image toward the bottom, holding the Shift key on the keyboard to make the gradient perfectly vertical. Release the mouse button to create the gradient, and then reduce the value for the Sharpness slider to the desired effect. In general I find reducing to the minimum value of -100 works well.

Repeat this process for the bottom of the image, dragging from near the bottom upward, again holding the Shift key for a vertical gradient. Reduce the Sharpness setting for this edit as well.

You can click on the applicable edit pin (grey circle) on the image to select one or the other adjustment. The gradients can be moved by dragging that edit pin, and you can adjust the distance of the gradient by dragging the top or bottom line associated with the center line for the edit pin.

If the effect is not strong enough, you can drag on the image again to draw another gradient on top of one of the existing gradients, so that you could increase the strength of the blur with an additional application of a negative value for Sharpness.

Today’s Question: I have a Lightroom Classic catalog of about 30,000 images and am thinking of splitting it into two Catalogs: One for my small photography business and one for images of my family and relatives. How does one go about this?

Tim’s Quick Answer: You can split a single Lightroom Classic catalog into two by first exporting with the “Export as Catalog” command, and then removing the exported photos from the initial catalog. This will result in two catalogs without the loss of any information from the original catalog.

More Detail: As many of my readers are already aware, I generally recommend using only a single catalog to manage all of your photos in Lightroom Classic, using various metadata options to identify images in different categories, such as commercial work versus personal photos.

That said, if you decide you do want to divide images into two catalogs, the process is reasonably straightforward. The key is to stay organized through the process to ensure you aren’t, for example, accidentally removing photos from the primary catalog that were never exported to the secondary catalog.

I recommend exporting as a single process for all photos you want to split into a separate catalog. It is best if you can identify the photos you want to export based only on folders, rather than needing to select individual photos from within various folders, for example.

You could then select multiple folders from the Folders list on the left panel in the Library module. After clicking on the first folder you want to select for export, you can hold the Ctrl key on Windows or the Command key on Macintosh while clicking on the other folders you want to select.

Once you have selected all folders you want to split to a separate catalog, go to the menu and choose File > Export as Catalog. Navigate to the location where you want to save the new catalog, such as the location that contains the folder for your current catalog. You can then click the New Folder button at the bottom-left of the dialog, and create a folder for the new catalog. Then enter a name for the new catalog in the Save As field at the top of the dialog.

In this type of scenario, at least in the short term, you’ll want to keep all of the source image files in their current locations. Therefore, you don’t need to make new copies of all of your existing photos. So, turn off the “Export negative files” checkbox, so that new copies of your source images won’t be created. Also turn off the “Export selected photos only” checkbox if it is turned on, since in this case you are selecting folders for export rather than individual photos.

Click the “Export Catalog” button at the bottom-right of the dialog, and a new catalog will be created for the folders of photos you have selected. This process will be very fast, because you are only creating a new catalog rather than copying a large number of photos.

Next, you’ll want to remove the selected folders from the current catalog. Since the folders are already selected at this point you can simply right-click on any of the selected folders and choose “Remove” from the popup menu. Click the “Continue” button in the alert dialog, and the folders will be removed from the current folder, leaving the actual folders and photos within those folders on your hard drive.

At this point you can switch between your two catalogs using the File > Open Catalog command from the menu. Just be sure to maintain an awareness of which catalog you’re working in at any time, to make sure, for example, that you always import new photos into the correct catalog.

Today’s Question: How can I save different edited versions of a photo back to Lightroom Classic? If I try “Save As” I don’t have the option to go back to Lightroom, only back to my hard drive.

Tim’s Quick Answer: You can actually use the Save As command to create multiple versions of the image in Photoshop, which will generally then automatically be added to your Lightroom Classic catalog. It is important, however, to only use the Photoshop PSD or TIFF file formats when using “Save As” in Photoshop with this workflow.

More Detail: In the early days of Lightroom Classic (before it was called Lightroom Classic) using the Save As command in Photoshop for an image you sent from Lightroom was generally problematic, with the resulting file not being added to your Lightroom catalog. At some point in the recent past, this issue was resolved, as I’ve found that you can use the Save As command in Photoshop reliably for images sent from Lightroom Classic.

However, you must save the image as either a Photoshop PSD or TIFF file in order for it to be added to the Lightroom Classic catalog. If you save the image as a JPEG in Photoshop, for example, it will not be added to the catalog.

So, the workflow is relatively straightforward if you want to create multiple derivative versions of the same source photo. Start by selecting the photo in Lightroom Classic. Then go to the menu and choose Photo > Edit In > Edit in Adobe Photoshop. If the source image is a raw capture it will simply be opened in Photoshop. If you selected a different image type (such as a JPEG) you’ll be prompted for how you want to process the image, in which case you should generally select “Edit a Copy with Lightroom Adjustments”.

Once in Photoshop, you can apply any adjustments you’d like to the image. When you’re finished, you can simply choose File > Save to save the updated file in the same location as the source image, with an updated filename based on the settings in Preferences in Lightroom Classic.

Before closing the file in Photoshop, you could create an additional derivative version. After saving the first version, apply additional adjustments and choose File > Save As. Make sure you save as either a PSD or TIFF file, and you can otherwise save the image in any location and with any filename you’d like. You can repeat this process for as many derivative variations as you’d like to create. Then close the image, and when you get back to Lightroom Classic you should find all of the derivative versions you created.

If for any reason one or more of your derivative images didn’t show up in your Lightroom catalog, you can simply synchronize the applicable folder where the derivative files are saved (presumably in the same folder as the source image). To do so, right-click on the folder name in the Folders list on the left panel in the Library module and choose “Synchronize Folder” from the popup menu that appears. Click the Synchronize button in the dialog that appears, and the new images will then be added to your catalog.

Today’s Question: If I have a camera body which has been converted to infrared capture and the sensor filter that was installed allows only black & white. Am I only getting use of 1/3 of the RGB pixel sites? If so, would I be better off converting a camera body with an overall resolution of 45 megapixels or getting an infrared (IR) filter conversion that allowed color IR for a 24-megapixel body?

Tim’s Quick Answer: You are indeed getting the full resolution of your image sensor when a camera is converted for digital infrared. The only thing that is changing is the range of light wavelengths that are recorded by the image sensor.

More Detail: Converting a digital camera to infrared capture generally involves two steps. The first is to remove the infrared cutoff filter that is installed in front of the actual image sensor on most cameras. This filter ensures that the sensor will not record infrared light, which could cause artifacts and other issues with a color photo. In other word, the camera is only able to capture light within the visible spectrum based on human vision.

Once the infrared cutoff filter is removed, the image sensor is capable of capturing light within the visible spectrum as well as the infrared spectrum. For infrared photography, you generally don’t want the visible spectrum included in your captures. Therefore, an infrared filter needs to be added for infrared photography.

Some infrared conversions include the addition of an infrared filter to the front of the image sensor, so that the camera is only capable of infrared photography. Alternately, that infrared filter might be left off, which would then require that you use an infrared filter on your lens in order to capture infrared photos. The benefit of the latter approach is that you could use the camera for both color and infrared photography.

As noted above, however, all of the pixels (photo sites) on the image sensor are still being used to capture the infrared information. Therefore, you should select a camera for infrared conversion based on the resolution you want available for the final file size. If you’ll be producing large prints, for example, you’ll want to opt for a camera with a relatively high resolution, all other things being even.

Today’s Question: I’ve been trying to get more familiar with the various adjustment options in Lightroom Classic, including with the Crop tool. For the life of me I can’t figure out what the “Constrain to Image” checkbox does, as it doesn’t seem to impact my cropping whether it is on or off. Does this checkbox do anything?

Tim’s Quick Answer: The “Constrain to Image” setting for the crop tool in Lightroom Classic ensures that the crop only includes the actual image area of your photo. It only actually applies if you have applied an adjustment (such as a Transform adjustment) that causes there to be white space outside of the original image area.

More Detail: If you haven’t done anything to alter the actual shape of a rectangular photo, the “Constrain to Image” checkbox won’t have any impact on the behavior of the Crop tool. In other words, if you don’t see any “extra” white space around your photo, the “Constrain to Image” feature doesn’t apply.

If you had, for example, applied some of the adjustments found in the Transform section of the right panel in the Develop module, the overall shape of the image may have been altered to the point that some white space appears around portions of the edge of the image.

For example, the Vertical slider allows you to tilt the image toward or away from you, to correct for perspective issues. With even a small adjustment, you’ll see white triangles appear at the top or bottom corners of the image, depending on whether you apply a positive or negative value for the adjustment.

If such white space appears around the edges of the image, turning on the “Constrain to Image” checkbox for the crop tool will ensure that the crop box can never extend beyond the actual image area, causing any of those white boundary areas to be cropped out of the image.

You can, of course, simply manually make sure that the crop box remains inside the actual image area, but the “Constrain to Image” checkbox makes it easy to ensure you don’t miss a small area, creating what would effectively be a blemish along the edge of the photo.

Today’s Question: To see the contents of a Lightroom Classic User Preset you find it by using the “Show Lightroom Develop Presets” command in Preferences, and then open the applicable preset file in any text editor. You can even modify the commands and save the modified preset using the same name or a different name.

Tim’s Quick Answer: It is true that you can review the changes applied by a Develop module preset in Lightroom Classic by reviewing the XMP file that represents the saved preset. However, it can be a little tricky to interpret the information in the XMP file.

More Detail: This is a follow-up to the Ask Tim Grey eNewsletter from April 15, 2020, where I answered a question about reviewing the contents of a Develop module preset. I suggested switching between a “before” and “after” view of an image while watching the adjustment controls on the right panel. However, as noted above, it is actually possible to review the contents of the preset with a text editor outside of Lightroom.

As noted in today’s “question”, you first need to navigate to the location where your presets are stored. You can select “Preferences” from the Edit menu on Windows or the Lightroom Classic menu on Macintosh to bring up the Preferences dialog. Then go to the Presets tab and click the “Show Lightroom Develop Presets” button. This will bring up a window in your operating system showing you the parent folder where the presets are stored. Double-click on the highlighted folder and locate the specific preset you want to review.

When you find the applicable preset, you can open it in any text editor, or a word processor that supports plain text files. There will be a fair amount of information that won’t be especially readable or useful, but you can also find details about the various adjustments included in the preset. For example, in the text from a sample XMP file below you can discover that the Clarity adjustment has been increased to a value of +17 with this preset.

This certainly provides an option for reviewing the information included in a Develop preset, though it can be a little difficult to interpret some of the details. You can get a sense of what is involved with this sample from an XMP file for one of my Develop presets:

<x:xmpmeta xmlns:x=”adobe:ns:meta/” x:xmptk=”Adobe XMP Core 5.6-c140 79.160451, 2017/05/06-01:08:21 “>
<rdf:RDF xmlns:rdf=”http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#”>
<rdf:Description rdf:about=””
xmlns:crs=”http://ns.adobe.com/camera-raw-settings/1.0/”
crs:PresetType=”Normal”
crs:Cluster=””
crs:UUID=”F9006AD0CB864EA18BFA4B2ACCA68A56″
crs:SupportsAmount=”False”
crs:SupportsColor=”True”
crs:SupportsMonochrome=”True”
crs:SupportsHighDynamicRange=”True”
crs:SupportsNormalDynamicRange=”True”
crs:SupportsSceneReferred=”True”
crs:SupportsOutputReferred=”True”
crs:CameraModelRestriction=””
crs:Copyright=””
crs:ContactInfo=””
crs:Version=”11.4″
crs:ProcessVersion=”11.0″
crs:ColorNoiseReduction=”25″
crs:ColorNoiseReductionDetail=”50″
crs:ColorNoiseReductionSmoothness=”80″
crs:LensProfileEnable=”1″
crs:AutoLateralCA=”1″
crs:Clarity2012=”+17″
crs:DefringePurpleAmount=”0″
crs:DefringePurpleHueLo=”30″
crs:DefringePurpleHueHi=”70″
crs:DefringeGreenAmount=”0″
crs:DefringeGreenHueLo=”40″
crs:DefringeGreenHueHi=”60″
crs:AutoTone=”True”
crs:LensProfileSetup=”Auto”
crs:HasSettings=”True”>
<crs:Name>
<rdf:Alt>
<rdf:li xml:lang=”x-default”>Import Develop Preset</rdf:li>
</rdf:Alt>
</crs:Name>
<crs:ShortName>
<rdf:Alt>
<rdf:li xml:lang=”x-default”/>
</rdf:Alt>
</crs:ShortName>
<crs:SortName>
<rdf:Alt>
<rdf:li xml:lang=”x-default”/>
</rdf:Alt>
</crs:SortName>
<crs:Group>
<rdf:Alt>
<rdf:li xml:lang=”x-default”>Tim’s Import Presets</rdf:li>
</rdf:Alt>
</crs:Group>
<crs:Description>
<rdf:Alt>
<rdf:li xml:lang=”x-default”/>
</rdf:Alt>
</crs:Description>
</rdf:Description>
</rdf:RDF>
</x:xmpmeta>

Today’s Question: I must have some setting not correctly configured in Lightroom. When I edit a JPEG image in Photoshop from Lightroom Classic, the image is saved as a Photoshop file but does not appear in Lightroom’s Library in any collection. I’m not using the ‘Save As’ command. I have to import that PSD image manually into Lightroom. What is the setting (or workflow) that would allow me to accomplish an edited JPEG images as PSD directly into the library? Appreciate any advice you may have.

Tim’s Quick Answer: When you send a photo from Lightroom Classic to Photoshop, and then save and close the image, that image will be saved in the same folder as the original file. Note, however, that the new file will only be added to a collection that the original image is in if you sent the photo to Photoshop from within a collection.

More Detail: In this particular case, I suspect one of two things are happening. First, it is possible that the photo is being sent to Photoshop from a folder in Lightroom Classic, and then you are looking for the image in a collection that the original photo is contained in. In that case the PSD file created as part of this process would not appear in the collection. For the PSD to appear in a collection, you would need to send the image to Photoshop by first selecting it within the collection (not the folder) in Lightroom Classic.

The other issue I see somewhat frequently is confusion caused by the application of filters. For example, when you are searching for the original image in order to send it to Photoshop for additional adjustments, you might filter by file type, such as to locate a raw or JPEG capture. If you then send the image to Photoshop, when you are finished working in Photoshop and return to Lightroom, you won’t actually see the new derivative file that was created.

That is because the new derivative image would be a PSD (or TIFF, depending on the settings you’ve established in Preferences), which would not fit the current filter criteria. Turning off the filter would then cause the PSD file to appear.

Today’s Question: Is there a way in Lightroom Classic to ensure that when I open the software it will always open with the last filter setting? I generally have my filter set on a user preset I created called “Flagged and Unflagged.” Every time I open Lightroom it defaults to the “Filters Off” filter.

Tim’s Quick Answer: You can indeed ensure that Lightroom Classic will retain a selected filter setting by turning on the “lock” on the Library Filter bar.

More Detail: By default, when you apply a filter in Lightroom Classic, that filter is only active temporarily. However, it is possible to lock the filter so it will be retained until you turn it off.

For example, let’s assume you have set a filter so that only images with a three-star or greater rating are displayed. You can browse the current folder, and will only see images with a star rating of three stars or more. However, as soon as you navigate to a different folder, the filter is reset to “None”. The same holds true if you quit Lightroom Classic and then launch it again.

You can change this behavior, however, by clicking the “lock” icon to the far right of the Library Filter bar at the top of the grid view display in the Library module. If the Library Filter bar is not visible, you can enable it by pressing the backslash key (\) or by choosing View > Show Filter Bar from the menu. Note that the Library Filter bar is only available in the grid view in the Library module, so if you are in the loupe view for example the above options will switch Lightroom to the grid view.

By default, the lock icon will have the shackle of the lock up, indicating that it is unlocked. You can click the icon to toggle between “locked” and “unlocked”. Admittedly, because of the design of the icon, it is a little difficult to tell the difference between the two, but the taller icon means unlocked, and the shorter icon means locked.

When you lock the filters, the current filter settings will remain in place until you turn off the lock. That includes the ability to navigate among different folders with the same filter settings, for example. It also means that when you quit Lightroom Classic and launch it again, the filter will still be in place.

Today’s Question: I have been using a custom User Preset [for the Develop module in Lightroom Classic] that I created one year ago to be applied to every photo upon import. After completing your first class in “Optimizing Photos in Lightroom Classic”, I wanted to see what this preset was actually doing. How do I look at the “content” of an existing User Preset to see if it is still appropriate, or if I need to modify some parts of this preset?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Lightroom Classic doesn’t provide a way to review a list of which adjustments and settings are actually included in a preset. So I recommend using a “before and after” approach to evaluating the differences applied by the preset.

More Detail: First I recommend finding a “test” image that you’re not concerned about the adjustments for. This could be an outtake from a recent photo shoot, for example. Click the Reset button at the bottom of the right panel in the Develop module to set the image to the default adjustment settings.

Next, apply the preset you want to evaluate by selecting that preset from the Presets list on the left panel in the Develop module.

To compare the “before” version of the image without the preset, versus the “after” version with the preset, you can use the History section of the left panel. Simply click back and forth between the Reset Settings step and the Preset step. As you do so, watch the change in adjustment settings on the right panel.

I recommend checking each section individually, so you can be sure to consider all of the various adjustments that are included in the preset, and the actual settings being used for those adjustments.

If you decide you want to make changes to the preset, first make sure you have the preset actually applied to the image, such as by selecting the “Preset” history state in the History section on the left panel. Then change any of the adjustment settings you want to update for the preset on the right panel. Then right-click on the preset in the Presets list on the left panel, and choose “Update with Current Settings” to save the updated adjustments for the existing preset.

Today’s Question: Recently I noticed the dreaded exclamation point appeared in Lightroom Classic on some treasured images. All I could find on my main drive and on my 1st backup were the XMP files. But after a bit of deep breathing, I found the RAW originals on my trusted 2nd backup drive–but only the RAW (CR2) files, no XMPs. Now need to reimport the RAW files into Lightroom Classic. Is it possible to reimport the RAW files so that they pair up with the XMP files and I can keep my ratings and edits?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, you can put the raw captures and the XMP files in the same folder, and then import the photos from that folder. As long as metadata updates were saved to the XMP files, upon import you would have all of your photos and most of the updates you had previously applied to those photos. However, in this case a better approach would be to simply copy the backup copies of your raw captures into the folder where they belong, so they are no longer missing in the context of your Lightroom Classic catalog.

More Detail: One of the reasons I highly recommend enabling the option to “Automatically write changes into XMP” in the Catalog Settings dialog in Lightroom Classic is that it ensures that most of the updates you apply in Lightroom Classic are saved to the source images, in addition to having those updates in the catalog. In the case of proprietary raw captures, the metadata updates are saved to XMP sidecar files that are co-located with the raw capture, with the same base filename and an “xmp” filename extension.

If your Lightroom Catalog became corrupted, for example, you could simply create a new catalog and import all of your source photos into the new catalog. Most of the metadata, which would have been written to XMP sidecar files for raw captures or to the source image file in the case of other supported file formats, would then be imported along with your photos into the new catalog.

However, some key features are not included in the metadata for XMP sidecar files. For example, Pick and Reject flags would not be included, nor would any collections those photos had been added to. The History in the Develop module would be empty for those images, and no virtual copies would be retained.

So, it is preferable to locate missing photos within Lightroom Classic rather than re-importing the raw captures, even if you have the XMP files that contain most of the metadata for the photos.

In this case, since the original raw captures have been located, they can simply be copied to the applicable folder. As long as the filenames are the same, that will cause the photos to no longer be missing. And the advantage of this approach is that you won’t lose any of the information about those photos from your Lightroom Classic catalog.