Ask Tim Grey

Today’s Question: In earlier versions of Photoshop I had dozens of simple shapes I could draw like stars and hearts. Now, in Photoshop 2023, when I click the Shape dropdown, all I have is four folders of not-so-useful shapes like Wild Animals. Is there a way to get the original shapes back?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, you can load the shapes from earlier versions of Photoshop by enabling the ” Legacy Shapes and More” group.

More Detail: With a relatively recent update Adobe completely overhauled the shapes available for the Custom Shape tool. Granted, this isn’t a tool that photographers tend to use all that frequently, but it can be very helpful for adding things like symbols and arrows or other simple shapes for things like slideshows or other presentations.

Fortunately, you can get those shapes back relatively easily. Start by bringing up the Shapes panel by selecting Window > Shapes from the menu. In the Shapes panel click on the panel popup menu, which has an icon showing three horizontal lines at the top-right of the panel. From the popup menu that appears choose “Legacy Shapes and More”.

When you select this command, you’ll see a “Legacy Shapes and More” group on the Shapes panel as well as on the Shape popup on the Options bar for the Custom Shape tool. Within this group you’ll find a variety of subfolders containing the many different shapes that had been included by default in earlier versions of Photoshop.

Today’s Question: I recently got my Mac with the M1 chip set and upgraded to Photoshop 2023. I thought that I had everything under control until I wanted to Save As a JPEG file, but that does not seem to be there anymore. How can I send my photos to friends if Adobe does away with the option to save JPEG files?

Tim’s Quick Answer: You can still save photos as JPEG images from Photoshop. The solution in this case is to use the “Save a Copy” command from the File menu, which will enable you to save a copy of the current image as a JPEG file, or any other supported file format.

More Detail: Adobe recently updated Photoshop with a “feature” that prevents you from saving an image in a file format that does not support all the features you’ve used for the image. The aim here is to prevent you from losing important image data, but of course the way it is implemented can lead to some confusion.

JPEG images, for example, don’t support layers, saved selections, layer masks, high bit depth, and more. Let’s assume you opened an image in Photoshop and then added some layers, for example, and then wanted to save a JPEG copy to share with a friend. In earlier versions of Photoshop, you could choose the Save As command, and save a JPEG. If you then closed the layered image, you would be prompted to save the file. Having saved a JPEG, you might assume you don’t need to save again, so you don’t save the updated file. As a result, you will have lost layers and any other features not supported by the JPEG version you saved.

To prevent you from accidentally discarding the special features you may have used for an image, the Save As dialog now only allows you to select among file formats that support the features for the current image. For example, if the image includes layers you could save as a Photoshop PSD or TIFF file, but not as a JPEG or PNG file.

Thus, the addition of the Save a Copy command. When you want to save another copy of the image in a file format that doesn’t support all applicable features for the image, simply choose File > Save a Copy from the menu. This will enable you to save a copy of the source image in any file format you want. For a JPEG image, for example, that means the additional copy would be flattened without any layers and would be in the 8-bit per channel bit depth, for example.

You would still want to be sure to preserve the original image in a format, such as Photoshop PSD or TIFF, that supports all the features you’ve used for the image, but with the Save a Copy command you can still save another copy of the source image in any file format you’d like.

Today’s Question: Is there a way to ‘share’ Camera Raw edits, especially masking edits, between Lightroom Classic and Photoshop? When I open an image from Lightroom Classic into Photoshop (right click, open as smart object) it comes in with all the existing edits but Camera Raw has been reset. Similarly, when I save a Photoshop image it comes in as a fresh image into Lightroom Classic.

Tim’s Quick Answer: While Lightroom Classic and Camera Raw use the same adjustments, and those adjustments are therefore interchangeable, in the context of a workflow that includes both Lightroom Classic and Photoshop you would generally be using one or the other without the ability to see a full history in both applications.

More Detail: As I’ve noted in the past, Camera Raw in Photoshop and the Develop module in Lightroom Classic are essentially the same thing. They provide the same interchangeable adjustments, but with a different approach to workflow. This generally means you would be choosing between one workflow or the other in the context of processing a raw capture.

To illustrate the concept of interchangeability, if you were to process a raw capture using Camera Raw you could later import the raw capture into Lightroom Classic and your original adjustments from Camera Raw would appear thanks to the settings preserved in the associated XMP sidecar file.

Similarly, if you applied adjustments to a raw capture in Lightroom Classic and then exported the raw capture using the “Original” option for the file format, you could then open that raw capture via Camera Raw in Photoshop and all your adjustments from Lightroom Classic would appear in Camera Raw.

However, while you can send images from Lightroom Classic to Photoshop, there isn’t support for a full roundtrip workflow for a raw capture. Instead, when you send an image to Photoshop from Lightroom Classic you’re creating a new derivative image, which means that image will no longer retain the previous editing history.

You could then use the Camera Raw filter in Photoshop to apply the same adjustments you would otherwise find in Lightroom Classic or Camera Raw, but once the image gets back to Lightroom Classic you once again won’t preserve the original history for that derivative image, but instead would be creating a new history from that point forward.

Of course, if you’re using Lightroom Classic to manage your photos, you really shouldn’t be opening a raw capture directly in Photoshop to begin with, as doing so will result in adjustments that aren’t reflected at all in Lightroom Classic for the raw captures.

In general, my recommendation is to use Lightroom Classic to optimize your raw captures as close to perfection as possible. When there are features you need to take advantage of in Photoshop, you can then send that raw capture to Photoshop to create a derivative Photoshop PSD or TIFF file that you can optimize in any way you’d like using Photoshop. When you’re done, you can save and close the image, and it will appear alongside the original in Lightroom Classic.

Admittedly, it would be great if we could bounce back and forth between Lightroom Classic and Photoshop without having to create a derivative image in the process, so that the workflow was much more seamless. However, that is impossible based on the very different approach to image processing used by Lightroom Classic and Photoshop.

Today’s Question: I would like to apply a watermark to images before syncing them with a collection to the cloud from Lightroom Classic. Is there a way to add a watermark to photos without exporting first and then importing the saved photo back into Lightroom Classic? I also don’t really like the Print module option to print to a JPEG file.

Tim’s Quick Answer: I would say that the best solution in this case is to add the watermark via the export feature, but you can save a step by using the option to add the exported photos back to the catalog. Those copies can then be added to synchronized collection that you share with clients.

More Detail: While Lightroom Classic includes an option for adding a watermark to photos easily when sharing photos such as via an export, by creating a gallery in the Web module, or when printing from the Print module, there isn’t an option to add that watermark automatically to collections of photos you synchronize to the cloud for sharing with others. Fortunately, there is a bit of a workaround that works reasonably well.

While this process does involve exporting photos to create copies with a watermark applied, you can automatically add those photos back to the catalog so they can be easily added to a collection and synchronized to the cloud for sharing with others.

Start by selecting the applicable photos and clicking the Export button at the bottom of the left panel in the Library module. From the Export To popup in the Export Location section at the top of the dialog choose “Same folder as original photo”. I also recommend turning on the “Put in Subfolder” checkbox so the images will be separate from the originals. Then enter a name for that folder, such as “Share”, in the textbox to the right of the checkbox.

Be sure to turn on the “Add to This Catalog” checkbox as well, so the photos will be added back to the catalog, so you don’t need to import them through a separate process. Configure the preferred settings for the images, including the options for a watermark in the Watermarking section, and then click the Export button to create the watermarked copies of the photos.

You can then create a collection that includes these images to synchronize for sharing with your client. A quick way to create a collection that includes these photos is to drag the folder (such as the “Share” folder in this example) down into the Collections section on the left panel in the Library module. You can then right-click that collection and choose “Rename” to give it a more meaningful name.

Turn on the synchronization checkbox to the left of the collection name within the Collections section, and then in the grid view display click the “Make Public” button at the top-right of the grid view. This will generate a link you can then share with clients, so they can review the photos complete with your watermark.

Today’s Question: I have the red frame [color label] on images when I import them [into Lightroom Classic], so I can tell which ones are not edited. How do I remove that color from the frame once I did in fact edit it?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Once you’ve reviewed a batch of photos that were marked with the red color label in Lightroom Classic, you can select all those photos, switch to the grid view display, and press the number “6” on the keyboard to remove the red color label.

More Detail: I use a metadata preset in Lightroom Classic to assign a red color label to all new photos as they are imported into my catalog. That signifies that I’ve not yet reviewed the photos to decide on favorites versus outtakes, which helps make sure I don’t overlook any photos in my workflow.

Of course, once I’ve reviewed the photos that means I don’t need the red color label anymore, so it can be removed. To do so I simply select all photos that have been reviewed in the current folder, switch to the grid view display so I can update the metadata for multiple photos at once, and then press the number “6” on the keyboard, which is the keyboard shortcut for the red color label.

It is important to note that the keyboard shortcuts for color labels are toggles, meaning if you press “6” on the keyboard it will assign a red color label to the current photo, and if you press “6” again that color label will be removed. So you need to be sure you know the current color label status for the selected photos before you use the keyboard shortcut. And, of course, if you’re using a color other than red, you’ll need to use the appropriate keyboard shortcut, such as “7” for yellow or “8” for green.

If you’ve finished reviewing all photos in the current folder, you could simply use the “Select All” command to select the images, by pressing Ctrl+A on Windows or Command+A on Macintosh. If you haven’t gotten through all the photos, you can quickly select photos from the current back to the first image that you need to remove the label for. With the current image selected, simply scroll left on the filmstrip (or up in the grid view) and hold the Shift key while clicking on the thumbnail for the first image you want to select.

So, you can use a metadata preset to assign a color label on import, and then use a keyboard shortcut to remove the color label from selected photos once you’ve reviewed the images.

I discussed the workflow I use to assign red color labels to photos on import into Lightroom Classic in an article called “Red Labels for All!” in the January 2021 issue of my Pixology magazine for photographers. If you’re not already a subscriber, you can sign up and get the back issues, including the January 2021 issue, on the GreyLearning website here:

https://www.greylearning.com/courses/pixology-magazine

Today’s Question: You mentioned that hard drives fail periodically. I’m curious to know how often you experience hard drive failures, and if you think this is just something we should expect from time to time.

Tim’s Quick Answer: I typically experience a hard drive failure about once every few years. This is based on having more than a dozen hard drives in active use, including primary drives and at least two backup drives for each primary.

More Detail: Hard drive failures are a fact of life, and so really it is not a matter of if a hard drive will fail but rather when. Fortunately, today’s hard drives are overall very reliable. However, failures do occur. I experience a failure about once every three years on average, though sometimes I go longer without a failure and sometimes I experience more than one failure in a single year.

I have also “retired” hard drives that hadn’t yet failed but had given me reason to distrust them, such as if a file fails to copy or gets corrupted, or the hard drive fails to mount through the operating system.

It is difficult to gauge hard drive reliability based on a small data set. I often hear from photographers who say they have had a very bad experience with multiple failures from a single hard drive manufacturer. However, overall industry data supports that failures are relatively rare.

I have actually gotten to the point where I don’t worry about hard drive failures. To be sure, I consider them a minor annoyance, but they don’t generally cause me to lose any data. That is because I maintain a consistent backup workflow that ensures when a hard drive fails I have a backup I can recover from quite easily.

When a hard drive does fail, I’m able to recover from a synchronized backup created using GoodSync (http://timgrey.me/greybackup), which means the backup is an exact copy of the original drive. Therefore, the biggest issue I face when a hard drive fails is that I need to purchase a replacement for the failed drive and create a new backup, so that I’m back to having a primary drive and at least two backup drives.

I should add that in addition to my local backups I use Backblaze (https://timgrey.me/onlinebackup) as an online backup solution to provide yet another layer of redundancy.

Today’s Question: As one who solidly and consistently backs up his photos and catalog, how do you see losing your catalog ever becoming a reality?

Tim’s Quick Answer: I don’t. I’m confident that as long as Adobe doesn’t discontinue Lightroom Classic I’ll never be in a position where I lose my catalog and can’t recover from a backup.

More Detail: In the short term, I would say that the only real risk to my Lightroom Classic catalog is corruption or file loss caused by a hardware failure. I don’t consider either of these to be especially likely, though hard drives do fail periodically.

If my catalog were to be lost or damaged due to a hardware or software issue, I would simply recover from my most recent catalog backup. As I’ve outlined in previous answers, I retain several backup copies of my catalog, including multiple recent backups and a few backups going back as far as a few months or more.

Obviously if I had to recover from a backup of my catalog, I would lose any information that had been added between the date of the backup and when I lost my current catalog. That would be mitigated to some extent by having the “Automatically write changes into XMP” checkbox enabled on the Metadata tab of the Catalog Settings dialog. I would also need to re-import any photos that had been imported after the date of the catalog backup I was restoring from.

The greater risk in the long term, though I hope this is not much of a risk at all, would be if Adobe discontinued Lightroom Classic so that my catalog would no longer be accessible. This would be unfortunate, since Lightroom Classic forms the foundation of my workflow, but it is something I could still work around without too much difficulty.

Because I have the “Automatically write changes into XMP” checkbox enabled I would retain standard metadata such as star ratings and keywords with the source image files, so I could always use other software to access those details and manage my photos. I also try to minimize my use of features that are only preserved within the Lightroom Classic catalog, such as collections, virtual copies, and pick and reject flags.

Overall though, I don’t think Adobe is likely to discontinue Lightroom Classic anytime soon, and my backup workflow is such that I’m confident I could recover from any problems with my current catalog without too much difficulty.

Today’s Question: I have a new MacBook Air running the latest MacOS (Ventura) and Lightroom Classic 12. For years I have been copying my Lightroom catalog to my iMac and successfully printing on my Epson. My iMac will not update any longer and is stuck at Catalina and now I find that it will not upgrade to Lightroom Classic 12. How can I use my Lightroom Classic 12 catalog on my Lightroom 11 iMac?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Put simply: you can’t. Older versions of Lightroom Classic can’t open catalogs that have a different format from a later version. To print from the older computer you would need to export the source files from Lightroom Classic and use those files for printing.

More Detail: You can think of the Lightroom Classic catalog as being tied to the applicable “major” release of Lightroom Classic. A major release is generally signified by a whole number increase in the version number, such as from version 11 to 12. A minor release would be a decimal update, such as from version 12 to 12.1.

In this example the catalog would be compatible with either Lightroom Classic version 12 or 12.1, but that catalog could not be opened with Lightroom Classic version 11. Similarly, a catalog from version 11 could not be opened with version 12 unless it was updated, and the update would cause that catalog to no longer be supported by version 11.

Support for hardware and operating system versions changes over time, with support for older configurations dropping from time to time. For example, right now Lightroom Classic only supports MacOS Big Sur (version 11) or later for Macintosh users, and Windows 10 for Windows users.

Furthermore, as noted in today’s question, some hardware configurations will not allow an update beyond a certain operating system version, which creates a conflict in terms of software support.

In this case the only way to enable both computers to access the Lightroom Classic catalog would be to not upgrade to version 12 on the newer computer. Since you’ve already installed that upgrade, this would require you to roll back to an older catalog, which would mean losing any updates you’ve made within the Lightroom Classic 12 catalog.

The easiest solution in this situation would be to export the photos you want to print from Lightroom Classic 12 and then use those exported copies as the basis for printing on the older computer. Of course, if you can get the printer working with the newer computer, that might be an even better solution.