Ask Tim Grey

Today’s Question: I’ve put my Lightroom Classic catalog and images all on an external hard drive. Can I move my catalog to my laptop [internal hard drive] without messing everything up?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, you can move your Lightroom Classic catalog to an internal hard drive from the external hard drive. This will likely help improve overall performance and will also enable you to work with your catalog even if the external hard drive is not connected to the computer.

More Detail: The Lightroom Classic catalog contains the information about your photos, such as metadata and adjustments you have applied. Even if the source image is not available, such as when an external hard drive is disconnected, you can still review the information about your photos. You can even update information about photos with the source files unavailable, such as to assign keywords or other metadata updates to the photos.

You may therefore want to keep your Lightroom Classic catalog on an internal hard drive so you can review the information in the catalog even when you have not connected the external hard drive that contains the actual images.

Before getting started I do recommend backing up your catalog, just to ensure you can recover if anything goes wrong as part of this process. Then you’ll need to be sure you know where your catalog is currently stored. You can get this information in the Catalog Settings dialog, which you can access by choosing Edit > Catalog Settings from the menu on Windows or Lightroom Classic > Catalog Settings on Macintosh. In the Catalog Settings dialog go to the General tab and click the Show button to the right of the Location field. This will bring up a window in your operating system for the location where the folder containing your catalog is located, with the folder selected.

Next, quit Lightroom Classic to make sure you don’t move the catalog while it is in use. You can then move the entire folder containing your catalog to the preferred location. Note that you may also prefer to copy the folder to the new location, and then rename the existing folder to make it clear that this is now a backup copy of your catalog.

You can then navigate to the folder containing the catalog in the new location you have placed it. Inside that folder you can double-click the catalog file, which is the file with the “LRCAT” filename extension. This will launch Lightroom Classic and open the catalog. Because your photos will still be stored in the location they are expected, everything in Lightroom Classic will look exactly the same as it did before.

Today’s Question: Wouldn’t this photographer [who asked about whether they could continue using old versions of Photoshop and Lightroom] have to upgrade when he/she purchases a new camera model that isn’t supported by Photoshop CS6?

Tim’s Quick Answer: No, the photographer would not need to upgrade Photoshop (or Lightroom Classic) to gain support for a new raw capture format because they could use the Adobe DNG Converter as a workaround.

More Detail: The Adobe DNG Converter is a software tool that enables you to convert proprietary raw captures to the Adobe Digital Negative (DNG) file format. Those DNG files can then be processed with older versions of Lightroom or Photoshop that haven’t been updated to support the newer proprietary raw capture.

As I mentioned in Tuesday’s edition of the Ask Tim Grey eNewsletter, I recommend upgrading to the latest versions of Adobe applications, which generally means signing up for an Adobe Creative Cloud Photography Plan subscription (https://timgrey.me/ccplans). This ensures you have the latest features, support for newer raw capture formats, and more.

For photographers who are avoiding the subscription model by continuing to use older versions of Photoshop and Lightroom, at some point they will likely run into a situation where they buy a new camera that uses a proprietary raw capture format that is not supported by the older versions of the software they are using. The Adobe DNG Converter provides a workaround for this situation.

You can download the free Adobe DNG Converter here:

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/adobe-dng-converter.html

Note that I still recommend signing up for an Adobe Creative Cloud subscription plan, to provide access to the latest features, bug fixes, and other updates to Adobe’s software applications. But if you continue using an older version of Adobe applications that don’t support newer raw capture formats, the DNG Converter provides a solution.

Today’s Question: You shared a photo and mentioned wide angle, but the lines on the sides were straight. How did you accomplish that?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Distorted lines in a wide-angle can be corrected quite effectively with a combination of profile-based lens corrections and transformations, which are available in Adobe Camera Raw (Photoshop) and Lightroom Classic.

More Detail: Photoshop and Lightroom Classic both include powerful tools for correcting distortion in photos. For Photoshop users you can find these adjustments in Camera Raw (including the use of the Camera Raw Filter within Photoshop), with the profile-based lens corrections found in the Optics section and the transformation options found in the Geometry section. In Lightroom Classic these adjustments are found in the Lens Corrections and Transform sections, respectively, of the right panel in the Develop module.

The profile-based lens corrections enable you to use a profile for the behavior of the specific lens used to capture the photo. As long as a profile is available for the lens that was used, you can apply a correction based on that profile. This will compensate for barrel or pincushion distortion in the image, as well as vignetting, both of which are especially common with wide-angle lenses.

The transformation adjustments are even more powerful. In particular, I recommend using the Guided option for the Upright adjustments. With the Guided adjustment you can draw two to four lines within the image to identify lines that should be perfectly horizontal or perfectly vertical. The image will then be transformed to make those lines straight.

So, for example, let’s assume you’re correcting a photo of a building. You could start by drawing two lines for the horizontal areas, such as the roof line and a line toward the bottom of the building. You could then draw two additional lines for the sides of the building. The result would be an adjustment that compensates for the warped appearance of the building, so the lines are all straight again.

Note that there are also manual transformation options, such as sliders for both vertical and horizontal perspective correction, so you can continue fine-tuning based on the initial adjustments.

Today’s Question: I have Lightroom 6 and Photoshop CS6. I haven’t changed my equipment in five years and rarely use Photoshop, but I do use Lightroom a lot. Would it be prudent for me to finally update both?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, I absolutely think it is worth updating to the latest versions of Lightroom Classic and Photoshop. This will enable you to update to the latest versions of the operating system, which will provide greater security. It will also enable you to upgrade to the latest computer hardware if you would like.

More Detail: I completely understand that many photographers (including myself) are frustrated by the shift to the subscription model for software. That said, when it comes to the Adobe software applications such as Lightroom Classic and Photoshop, I do think the subscription rate for access to these applications is reasonable, and Adobe does continue to update their applications regularly.

One of the most important reasons to subscribe if you’re using Lightroom and/or Photoshop is to enable you to make updates to your operating system and hardware. Many photographers are using older (and sometime unsupported) versions of operating systems, which are less secure than the latest updates. In some cases this approach also means you are unable to update to the latest computer hardware.

Taking all of this into account, I think it makes the most sense to accept that the subscription model is here to stay, and that it is worthwhile to sign up for the Creative Cloud Photography Plan if you are interested in using Lightroom Classic and/or Photoshop in your workflow. You can learn more about the Photography Plan and other options for the Adobe Creative Cloud here:

https://timgrey.me/ccplans

Today’s Question: What is the hierarchy in Lightroom Classic for the catalog, folders, and collections, and how they interplay?

Tim’s Quick Answer: The catalog in Lightroom Classic represents all of your photos and the information about those photos. Folders represent the actual folders on your hard drive, and therefore represent your actual storage structure. Collections provide a way to group photos together in ways that go beyond the folder structure, such as grouping photos together from various folders for a particular project.

More Detail: The catalog is at the foundation of a workflow for organizing, optimizing, and sharing your photos using Lightroom Classic. I strongly recommend using only one catalog to organize all of your photos. Taking this approach means that you don’t really need to think about the catalog directly, but rather can simply think of Lightroom Classic as being at the center of your workflow.

Folders in Lightroom Classic are a direct reflection of the folder structure for your photos on the hard drive. When you import existing photos from a hard drive, for example, the folder structure for those photos on the hard drive will be reflected in Lightroom Classic. If you make changes to the folder structure within Lightroom Classic, such as by renaming or moving a folder or creating a new folder, those changes will be reflected on your hard drive as well.

It is important to note, by the way, that any folder changes should be made within Lightroom Classic, which will result in those changes being reflected in the operating system. If you make changes directly through the operating system, those changes will not be reflected in Lightroom Classic, and in fact you will end up with folders and photos that are missing because they are no longer found where they are expected.

Collections represent the organizational feature that many photographers get confused by. A collection simply provides a way to group photos together in a way that goes beyond the folder structure on your hard drive. Collections are not reflected in the operating system at all, as they only exist within Lightroom.

You can use collections in a variety of different ways depending on your specific needs. For example, if you wanted to have an easy way to reference favorite photos from a single trip, you could add those photos to a collection within Lightroom Classic.

One of the great things about collections though is that they can contain photos from a variety of different folders. For example, if you were creating a photo book featuring your favorite images from a variety of different trips, a collection is a great way to organize those photos. You can add photos to a collection from multiple folders, but adding a photo to a collection doesn’t create a copy of the source image on the hard drive. The image in the collection is simply a reference to the original photo, similar to a saved search result.

Another great feature of collections is that you can enable synchronization to the Adobe Creative Cloud for a collection of photos. Those photos can then be viewed and shared using the Lightroom app on your mobile device, or by signing in with your Creative Cloud account at https://lightroom.adobe.com/.

Today’s Question: How do you determine the right f-stop and shutter speed for a photo captured during blue hour?

Tim’s Quick Answer: As a good starting point for exposure during “blue hour” you can use a lens aperture of f/8 with an 8-second shutter speed at ISO 100. You can then fine-tune or refine from there based on the conditions and your artistic preference for the photo.

More Detail: “Blue hour” is the time shortly after sunset (or before sunrise) when the color of the sunset starts to fade (or before the color of sunrise appears) and a clear sky will take on a deep and rich blue color. This will gradually fade to a very dark sky that appears nearly black of night. Despite the name, blue hour doesn’t generally last for a full hour, depending on how you choose to define the span of time with a nice blue color in the sky.

The optimal exposure will vary throughout the duration of blue hour, as the amount of light in the sky (and on the foreground scene) will change. This is especially true if you are photographing a scene such as a city at night, where the artificial lights of the city will add light that you may need to compensate for with your exposure.

However, a good starting point is to use the “8 and 8” rule of thumb, using a lens aperture of f/8 and a shutter speed of 8 seconds, with an ISO setting of 100.

Of course, you can then fine-tune the overall exposure settings based on the actual results you’re achieving, as well as your preferences for the image. For example, one of my favorite blue hour shots is of the Duomo in Florence, Italy, photographed from Piazzale Michelangelo. Instead of f/8, I stopped down two stops to f/16 to get a starburst effect for the lights of Florence. I kept the shutter speed at 8 seconds (using a sturdy tripod, of course), and increased the ISO setting by two stops from 100 to 400, to compensate for the change in lens aperture.

So, with exposure settings equivalent to the “8 and 8” rule of thumb for blue hour photography, I got a good exposure and a blue hour photo I’m happy with, which you can see on my Instagram feed here:

https://www.instagram.com/p/0DdnlqJ-eb/

Today’s Question: Would you recommend using both Lightroom Classic AND Photoshop for someone who is new to it all?

Tim’s Quick Answer: I recommend first making sure that you are able to confidently make full use of Lightroom Classic for organizing and optimizing your photos before you start to learn to use Photoshop to supplement your workflow for optimizing photos.

More Detail: Photoshop is a remarkably powerful application for applying a wide variety of adjustments to your photos. However, it is also a bit complicated, and can be a little overwhelming to those who are just getting started.

Therefore, I recommend first making sure you fully understand how to use Lightroom Classic for organizing and optimizing your photos. Then I think you’ll be in a better position to add Photoshop to your workflow, to go beyond the capabilities of Lightroom Classic.

In particular I consider Photoshop to be superior to Lightroom Classic when it comes to image cleanup, targeted adjustments, composite imaging, and creative effects. That means you don’t need to know every single feature of Photoshop to be able to significantly improve your photos. However, because Photoshop is a little complicated, I suggest making sure your basic workflow is mastered before adding Photoshop to the mix.

Because Lightroom Classic is only available as part of a subscription, such as the Photography Plan (https://timgrey.me/ccplans), when you have access to Lightroom Classic you’ll already have access to Photoshop. I recommend starting with Lightroom Classic, making sure you understand how the catalog works and how to organize and optimize your photos. Then, when you feel ready, you can add Photoshop to your workflow to maximize your ability to improve your photos.

Today’s Question: I often save images as JPEGs to send by email or post on social media. Up until now this has been straightforward, but since the recent update to Photoshop the only options for Save As are PSD, TIFF and JPEG2000. Any idea what is going on?

Tim’s Quick Answer: This is a new “feature” in the 22.4 version of Photoshop. Instead of choosing Save As from the menu, you can select the new Save a Copy command, which will enable the other file formats supported by Photoshop, including JPEG.

More Detail: When you choose the Save As command in Photoshop, you can of course specify the folder location, filename, and file format to be used to save a copy of the current image. However, with the latest update to Photoshop when you use the Save As command you will only be able to select a file format that supports all features or settings for the current image.

For example, the JPEG file format does not support layers, nor does it support 16-bit per channel images. So, if you were working with a 16-bit per channel image with multiple layers, the Save As dialog would not show JPEG as an option. In this case you would want to save as a TIFF or PSD file, for example, in order to preserve the layers for the image.

If you specifically want to save a copy of the image in a different file format for some other purpose, you can use the new “Save a Copy” command on the File menu to overcome this new limitation. When you use the “Save a Copy” command you’ll be able to choose from any supported file format, even if all features used for the current image will not be retained. For example, if you opted for the JPEG file format the resulting JPEG would be in the 8-bit per channel mode and would not contain any layers.

The idea is that Photoshop is trying to help ensure that you don’t accidentally save an image in a file format that doesn’t support some of the features in the current file. The “Save a Copy” command is intended as a way to specifically choose a format even though some features may be lost in that copy.

Of course, it is worth noting that you can preserve special features such as layers in the primary version of the image, and then save an additional copy for a different purpose, such as when you want to create a JPEG for sending via email or sharing online.

Today’s Question: Do you prefer bringing photos directly into Lightroom Classic from the memory card or downloading to the hard drive and then add to Lightroom Classic?

Tim’s Quick Answer: I prefer (and recommend) importing photos into Lightroom Classic directly from the media card on which the photos were captured. This provides a streamlined workflow that helps ensure that new photos are brought into the review process more quickly.

More Detail: In my view it makes the most sense to import photos into your Lightroom Classic catalog directly from the media card on which the photos were captured. I realize some photographers prefer to download their images to their hard drive first, often because they will perform an initial review of their photos to delete outtakes before importing into Lightroom Classic.

However, to me downloading outside of Lightroom Classic creates a more convoluted workflow and also creates the risk that you may forget to later import some of your photos into your Lightroom Classic catalog.

I prefer to keep my workflow streamlined and make full use of the many features within the import dialog. That includes making a backup second copy of the photos being imported onto a separate hard drive from where I’m downloading the originals. This provides a quick backup that provides more confidence should you need to reformat the media card right away to capture additional photos.

Especially when it comes to organizing your photos, I think it is a good idea to keep the workflow as simple as possible, without complications that can lead to confusion. Plus, Lightroom Classic has a variety of helpful features both for importing your photos and reviewing your photos to identify favorites and outtakes.

Today’s Question: I have a full hard drive and am getting a new one. I always use Lightroom Classic. What is the best way to move my pictures (all under Pictures) to a new external hard drive?

Tim’s Quick Answer: I recommend using the “Export as Catalog” command in this case, because doing so will help minimize confusion or errors in the overall process of this migration.

More Detail: There are, of course, a variety of approaches you could take when upgrading your photo storage to a new and larger hard drive. You could create a new empty folder on the new drive from within Lightroom Classic, for example, and then move photos and folders to that new folder. However, this can sometimes be problematic, especially if there are any issues moving any of the photos.

Instead, the “Export as Catalog” command can help streamline this process. This command enables you to copy all photos in your entire catalog to a new storage location. It also results in a new catalog, which isn’t really necessary, but can be helpful in terms of transferring photos to a different storage location without the risk of any photos or folders becoming disconnected from the catalog.

To use the “Export as Catalog” approach, start by going to the menu and choosing Edit > Select None, so that no photos are selected. With the “Export as Catalog” command you need to either select all photos or no photos in order to export all. Selecting all images can be problematic because you might, for example, have a filter set that causes only a portion of your photos to be displayed.

With none of your photos selected, you can then go to the File menu and choose the “Export as Catalog” command. In the dialog that appears, navigate to the external hard drive that you want to migrate your photos to. In the Save As field at the top of the dialog, enter a name for the new storage structure. The name you enter will be used as a main parent folder for all of the folders containing your photos and catalog. That name will also be used for the new catalog being created as part of this process.

The key to getting your photos copied to the new hard drive is to turn on the “Export negative files” checkbox. This is perhaps the most poorly named checkbox in any Adobe software application (and one of these days I would love to meet the person who decided on this name). The “Export negative files” checkbox actually means “Export source photos”. In other words, this is what enables you to copy your photos to the new location along with the new catalog. Click the Export Catalog button to initiate the process.

When the export is complete, quit Lightroom Classic and navigate to the external hard drive through your operating system. If you prefer to have the catalog on an internal hard drive, you can locate the folder that contains the “LRCAT” catalog file as well as all of the supporting files, and move the folder containing the catalog files to the desired location on your internal hard drive.

You can double-click the “LRCAT” file (the file with the “.lrcat” filename extension) to launch Lightroom Classic with that catalog. Once you have confirmed that everything is in order and have backed up the external hard drive that now contains your photos, you can delete the original photos on your internal hard drive.

From that point forward, just be sure to only use the new catalog that was created as part of this process, treating any copies of your prior catalog as purely a backup copy.