Ask Tim Grey

Today’s Question: When I shoot sports, I process the raw images in Lightroom Classic and will often crop the first one in a series of 15 or so images and synchronize the adjustments to the other images. I will sometimes find the crop on subsequent images could be improved upon, so I will highlight other images in that same string of 15 and re-crop and sync again. Because I am cropping some images twice, am I degrading the quality of those subsequent images that have had the second crop?

Tim’s Quick Answer: There will not be any degradation in the quality of the image in Lightroom Classic no matter how many times you refine the crop or any other adjustment.

More Detail: The adjustments available in the Develop module in Lightroom Classic are nondestructive, meaning the pixels in the source image are not altered. You can think of adjustments in Lightroom Classic as simply being metadata in the catalog. The preview you see is a result of the original image with the effect of the adjustments you’ve applied.

No matter how many times you refine an adjustment in the Develop module, whether directly or by synchronizing adjustments across multiple images, there is no degradation of the image caused by the refinements. In effect, no matter how many times you refine the crop settings, for example, the result is as though you had only ever cropped once to the current settings.

It is not until you export a copy of the image or otherwise share it that adjustments apply to pixel values. Even then, the adjustments are only applied to the output you produced, not to the source image on your hard drive.

Because of this aspect of Lightroom Classic, you should feel completely comfortable refining any and all adjustments for any image until you’re completely happy with the result.

Today’s Question: I tried the technique you shared for finding photos that still have an outdated process version assigned to them in Lightroom Classic. Now that I’m finished with the collection created by that search, is there a way to get rid of it?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes. Any temporary collections created in the Catalog section of the left panel in the Library module of Lightroom Classic can be removed by right-clicking on it and choosing “Remove this Temporary Collection” from the popup menu.

More Detail: The Catalog section of the left panel in Lightroom Classic includes some “special” collections, which differ from the collections you can create in the Collections section further down that panel.

Some of these collections are permanent, meaning you can’t remove them. These include the “All Photographs” collection that enables you to browse all images in your entire catalog, as well as the Quick Collection that provides an easy way to temporarily group photos together for a short-term project.

Other collections that might appear in the Catalog section are considered temporary and can be removed if you no longer want them to appear there. For example, if you use the Library > Find Previous Process Photos” command to locate all images that have a Develop module process version earlier than the current version, the “Previous Process Photos” collection created in the Catalog section is temporary, and can be deleted. Just right-click on the temporary collection and choose “Remove this Temporary Collection” and it will be removed.

Similarly, if you use the Library > Find All Missing Photos command, a “Missing Photos” collection will be created in the Catalog section. That temporary collection can also be removed with the same command. And there are some other temporary collections that will be created with certain other commands. The key to remember with these collections is that they can be removed when you’re finished working with them.

If you’re not sure whether a collection in the Catalog section is temporary, just right-click on it to see if the “Remove this Temporary Collection” command is on the popup menu. If not, the collection is “permanent” in the Catalog section.

Today’s Question: When creating a composite image in Photoshop, I sometimes want to apply a layer effect, such as a drop shadow, to multiple layers with the same settings. Is there a way to apply a layer effect to more than one layer at a time?

Tim’s Quick Answer: You can’t simply apply the same layer effect to multiple selected image layers in Photoshop, but you can copy effects from one layer and paste them to one or more other layers on the Layers panel.

More Detail: Layer effects can be added to the active layer on the Layers panel by clicking the “fx” button at the bottom of the panel and selecting the type of effect you want to apply. While it is possible to select multiple layers on the Layers panel, the layer effects option is not available when you’ve selected multiple layers.

However, you can still copy a layer effect from one layer and then paste those settings to one or more other layers.

Start by applying the layer effects with the settings you’d like to one of the layers. When you’ve finalized the effect, right click on the name of the layer and choose “Copy Layer Style” from the popup menu. If you want to paste the effect to more than one layer, select those layers at this point. Then right-click on the name of the layer (or one of the selected layers) and choose “Paste Layer Style” from the popup menu.

After you’ve pasted the layer style to one or more additional layers, you can still go back and refine the settings for each individual layer. For example, if the various layers contain objects of different sizes you may want to adjust the settings for the layer styles based on that sizing. To change the settings for a layer style for an image layer simply double-click the name of the layer effect below the layer you want to make changes for.

Today’s Question: My hard drive is getting a bit full, so I want to free up some space. I thought I would start with video files, since those tend to be quite large. Is there a way to view just the video clips in a given folder in Lightroom Classic?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, you can easily set a filter to only view videos rather than still photos with the video setting for the Kind option on the Attribute tab of the Library Filter bar or among the filter criteria on the bottom panel at the top-right of the filmstrip.

More Detail: Videos are indeed generally among some of the largest files you’ll find on your hard drive, assuming you’re capturing videos of at least a moderate duration. It can therefore be a good strategy to target videos when you want to try to free up hard drive space quickly, although videos do have the added disadvantage of generally needing to be played back to review, which takes longer than reviewing a still photo.

You can set a filter to view only videos in the current location, whether that is an individual folder or even the “All Photographs” collection in the Catalog section at the top of the left panel in the Library module.

The filter option can be found on both the Library Filter bar and among the filter settings found at the top-right of the bottom panel. On the bottom panel you can click the “Filter” text if you don’t see the full range of filter options. When the filter list is expanded, you’ll see a set of three icons toward the far right. The third of these icons is the video option, and you can click that to filter based on videos. The other two button options, by the way, are original photos and virtual copies.

The same control can be found under the Kind heading at the far right of the Attribute tab of the Library Filter bar above the grid view display. If the Library Filter bar isn’t currently displayed, you can enable it by choosing View > Show Filter Bar from the menu. To the right of the Kind label, you’ll find the same set of three buttons, so you can click the far right of those buttons to filter for videos.

Today’s Question: I recently noticed the “Import Preset” popup at the bottom of the import dialog in Lightroom Classic, though I’m sure it isn’t a new feature. Does it make sense to use an import preset, and if so why or for what purpose?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Creating a preset for the Import dialog in Lightroom Classic is a good way to preserve the settings you use most frequently when importing photos. As with any import, if you make use of a preset you just need to be sure to review all settings so they are correct for the specific photos you’re currently importing.

More Detail: The Import Preset popup is relatively small and perhaps somewhat hidden at the bottom of the Import dialog, and so I wouldn’t be surprised if most photographers don’t even notice it is there. This popup can be helpful in terms of providing a set of baseline settings for an import. Just be sure to review the final settings before actually importing your photos.

To create a preset for Import, start by configuring the settings you want to use within the Import dialog. For example, you can make sure that the primary storage location you use for your photos is set as the destination at the top-right of the Import dialog. For some settings, such as if you want to create a subfolder in the Destination section, you may want to put placeholder text, such as “FOLDER NAME” in all caps so you’ll know to change that to the actual intended folder name before importing.

Once you’ve established the settings you want to preserve with a preset, click the Import Preset at the bottom-center of the Import dialog and choose “Save Current Settings as New Preset” from the popup. In the New Preset dialog, type a meaningful name for the preset, and click Create.

In the future, you can simply select this preset from the popup at the bottom of the Import dialog to quickly establish the settings saved with the preset. Then review and update the specific settings as needed for the current import job and click the Import button.

Note, by the way, that you can create multiple presets for the Import dialog if you have more than one configuration you tend to use during import for different types of photos, for example.

Today’s Question: While replacing a crashed computer I somehow managed to delete an image folder from the catalog. The image files are OK except that along with the images the folder now contains .xmp files (that’s what leads me to believe the images were once in the catalog). Will anything bad happen if I just reimport the folder?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Nothing bad will happen by importing those photos into Lightroom Classic, though some metadata may be lost in the process depending on your workflow.

More Detail: You can remove an entire folder from Lightroom Classic by right-clicking on the folder and choosing “Remove” from the popup menu. If the folder you remove contains photos, the folder and photos will remain on the hard drive, but those photos and their metadata will be removed from the Lightroom Classic catalog. Note, by the way, if the folder is completely empty and you choose the Remove command the folder will be deleted from the hard drive.

The presence of XMP sidecar files suggests you had enabled the option to automatically save metadata updates to XMP, which is a setting found on the Metadata tab of the Catalog Settings dialog. If that was the case, standard metadata such as star ratings and keywords would be preserved along with the photos. That, in turn, means that when you import the folder full of images back into your Lightroom Classic catalog, the saved metadata will be imported along with the images.

Interestingly, even though the adjustment settings in the Develop module could certainly be considered metadata that is specific to Lightroom Classic, those details are preserved along with the source image file when you enable the option to automatically write metadata to XMP.

However, there are some features specific to the Lightroom Classic catalog that are not preserved in metadata when you save metadata to the images rather than only having that metadata in the catalog. For example, pick and reject flags, virtual copies, and collections require the Lightroom Classic catalog. Therefore, if you import these photos again and you had taken advantage of these features for those images, that information won’t be recovered.

Regardless, you can safely import the entire folder into your catalog. Be sure to use the “Add” option at the top-center of the import dialog to add the images from their current location rather than copying them to another location. Also make sure the “Don’t Import Suspected Duplicates” checkbox in the File Handling section of the right panel in the Import dialog is turned off, just in case the same images are in the catalog based on copies being stored in a different folder. I also suggest making sure the Metadata popup in the Apply During Import section of the right panel in the Import dialog is set to “None”, so that you don’t change any of the existing metadata for the photos during the import process.

Note, by the way, that if it was important to recover the metadata that is specific to Lightroom Classic for these photos, you could go through a more involved process of recovering a backup copy of your Lightroom Classic catalog from before the folder had been removed. You could then use the “Export as Catalog” command to export a copy of that catalog with only the applicable folder of photos, and then import that catalog to the master catalog using the “Import from Another Catalog” command.

Today’s Question: Is there a way to get the rotation buttons that are available on the toolbar in the Library module of Lightroom Classic to appear on the toolbar in the Develop module? Or do I have to be in the Library module to rotate in 90-degree increments.

Tim’s Quick Answer: You can’t add the 90-degree rotation buttons to the toolbar in the Develop module, but you can still rotate while in the Develop module using keyboard shortcuts or a menu command.

More Detail: The buttons for rotating in 90-degree increments are included by default on the toolbar below the image preview area in the loupe view in the Library module in Lightroom Classic, but they are not on the toolbar in the Develop module. Furthermore, while you can modify which controls appear on the toolbar, in the Develop module you can’t add the rotation buttons.

However, you don’t need to switch to the Library module to rotate an image in 90-degree increments. In the Develop module you can still use keyboard shortcuts for rotation. While holding the Ctrl key on Windows or the Command key on Macintosh you can press the left square bracket key ([) to rotate counterclockwise or press the right square bracket key (]) to rotate clockwise.

You can also go to the menu while in the Develop module and choose Photo followed by Rotate Left (for counterclockwise) or Rotate Right (for clockwise). The rotation options are also available on a context menu. You can right-click on the image preview in the Develop module and choose Transform followed by Rotate Left or Rotate Right. You can also right-click on a thumbnail on the filmstrip while in the Develop module and choose Rotate Left or Rotate Right.

I do think it would be nice if Adobe would add the ability to include the rotation buttons on the toolbar below the image preview area in the Develop module. However, fortunately there are other options that enable you to rotate an image in 90-degree increments without having to go to the Library module.

Today’s Question: As a follow-up, isn’t there a way to make it possible to work in the Develop module in Lightroom Classic even when the external hard drive is disconnected?

Tim’s Quick Answer: There is indeed. You simply need to generate smart previews for the images you want to work with in the Develop module when the source image files are not available.

More Detail: As noted in yesterday’s answer, by default when the source image files are not available in Lightroom Classic, such as when an external hard drive containing photos is disconnected, you can work with those images in the Develop module. However, there is a way to enable working in the Develop module even when the source files are not available.

The solution is to generate smart previews of the photos you want to work with offline. Let’s assume, for example, that you want to be able to work in the Develop module with any of the photos in a single folder. You could start by navigating to that folder in the Library module, making sure no filters are set on the Library Filter bar, and selecting all of the photos. Then go to the menu and choose Library > Previews > Build Smart Previews.

Once the previews have been built, you’ll be able to work with those images in the Develop module even with the external hard drive containing the source images disconnected from the computer.

When the hard drive is connected again, the adjustments you applied will be synchronized based on the source image files. Note that because the smart previews aren’t the exact same as the source images, there may be some variations in the appearance of the photos between the smart preview and the source image file.

Because of the potential for differences in appearance between smart previews and the original image file, I prefer not to work with smart previews in this way. Having said that, this feature can obviously be tremendously helpful when you need to work with images but aren’t able to have the source files available. For example, if you’re trying to travel light, you could generate smart previews and continue working with great flexibility with the applicable images without having to bring an external hard drive with you.

Today’s Question: I know I need to plug in my external hard drive when I want to work in the Develop module, but is it OK to make changes in the Library module without connecting the drive?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, you can most certainly apply metadata and other updates in the Library module, with the exception of the Quick Develop section. There’s no need to worry about applying updates in the Library module when the source photos aren’t available.

More Detail: All updates you apply in Lightroom Classic are saved to the catalog, so technically the source photos don’t have to be available to apply updates. You can view the images based on the previews that have been rendered, and then update metadata via the catalog.

By default the exception to this is when applying adjustments to an image in the Develop module or with the Quick Develop section in the Library module. To provide the most accurate preview possible, adjustments are based on the source image on the hard drive. That is why adjustments in the Develop module are disabled by default when you select a photo that is not currently available.

For the metadata updates in the Library module the source files don’t need to be available. You can update any metadata you’d like, and those updates will be preserved in the catalog. If you have enabled the option to automatically save metadata updates to XMP, then the metadata for the source files will be updated automatically whenever the source images are available to Lightroom Classic again.

Note, by the way, that with the XMP option enabled, metadata updates for proprietary raw captures will be saved to an XMP sidecar file, while updates for other supported image formats will be saved directly within the source image file.

Today’s Question: Can you explain the Masking slider for sharpening in Lightroom Classic? The other sharpening adjustments are familiar from similar options in Photoshop, but I can’t figure out Masking.

Tim’s Quick Answer: The Masking slider enables you to prevent smooth areas of the image from having any sharpening applied. A higher value will increase the degree to which areas with relatively low edge contrast will be protected from being sharpened. Note that this same control is available in Camera Raw for Photoshop users, in addition to being available in Lightroom Classic.

More Detail: Applying sharpening to an image enhances contrast along existing contrast edges in a photo. In other words, contrast is enhanced for the detail within a photo. For areas of a photo that have relatively smooth texture, such as the sky, sharpening can be problematic. The enhancement of the very subtle texture in these areas can create the appearance of noise or grain, which can be problematic. The Masking slider enables you to prevent smooth areas from being sharpened.

One of the great ways to get a better sense of which areas of the image will be sharpened based on the Masking slider is to hold the Alt key on Windows or the Option key on Macintosh while adjusting the slider value. This will provide a black-and-white preview of the image, where white represents areas being sharpened and black represents areas not being sharpened.

So, for example, you might increase the value for Masking until the sky area is entirely black, with the foreground being all (or mostly) white. This would cause the sky to not be sharpened, while the rest of the image still has sharpening applied.

You can refine the setting for Masking based on your priorities in terms of applying sharpening areas of the image where detail is important versus mitigating that sharpening for areas of the image with smooth textures.