Lightroom 2 Import Preferences

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taxboy

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Looking for some advice from experienced users on thier recommended setting for import - in particular the file structure & the benefits that the way operates gives them.

For example do you just throw everything into one folder & find the pics by a keyword search, do you bother to custom rename or let the camera file numbering do the job, do you bother with sub folders but let LR sort by date.

These are the type of things I'm interested in as I don't want to get 6 months into the year & find that I'm in a mess file wise and have to spend hours trying to sort it out

Basically I'm being a bit lazy & don't want to reinvent the wheel. I've got Martin Evening's latest book on LR2 but he seems to be a bit non-commital on this type of thing so looking for some real world experience please

TIA

Andrew
 
I let Lr import all mine into one folder as one of the main features to lightroom is it's organisation it can be time consuming but worth adding as much metadata and keywords as needed.

Within Lr you also have collections so you can then add photos to these such as "Outdoors", "Portraits" etc so you can quickly get to certain groups of photos.

I also convert all my photos to DNG. I'm still leaning it myself fully but when i have taken photos of friends weddings i tend to create a catalogue specifically for them to keep them away from my general photos.
 
I import into a folder structure of decade, year qrt and subject. if you import just in to one folder what happens if you stop using LR, at least with the file structure you will be able to find stuff.
 
my real world advice is to utilise folders based on year and month. At the very least have a per year folder, and ideally sub folders based on dates or months. A little tip if naming folders based on date values is to reverse the code, so 10th january 2009 would actually be a folder called 20090110. This might seem odd but when listing the folders it ensures they display in the right chronological order.
 
Import into year/month/day and also have the date added to filenames on import. Trying to make it easier for me if things go tits up in the long run.
 
year/month/shoot name but I also run several catalogs depending on the type of shoot and weddings each get their own dedicated catalog. This keeps the catalogs fairly small and I can quickly find an image based on the type of shoot and when it happened. I don't bother with keywords very often except when sorting images for a specific purpose.
 
May I suggest you spend a few minutes thinking as to what you want to do with the filed images. I tend to use my old PC directory tree method, and also use global keywords. It really depends on what you are filing and what you want to recover.

If it was weddings you may want to use year and then subdivide that into bride+grooms name. Alternatively I use year and then shoot ID. I can also subdivide that such as 2008/Cornwall/beaches. I could also subdivide that, but I would probably rename the images for individual beaches. This would help when they are exported as I would have the Beach names on the final files

I would probably then keyword those images, with "Beaches" and "Seascape" .

It really all depends on what you need to find, and how many images you have .
 
Chappers said:
May I suggest you spend a few minutes thinking as to what you want to do with the filed images. I tend to use my old PC directory tree method, and also use global keywords. It really depends on what you are filing and what you want to recover.

If it was weddings you may want to use year and then subdivide that into bride+grooms name. Alternatively I use year and then shoot ID. I can also subdivide that such as 2008/Cornwall/beaches. I could also subdivide that, but I would probably rename the images for individual beaches. This would help when they are exported as I would have the Beach names on the final files

I would probably then keyword those images, with "Beaches" and "Seascape" .

It really all depends on what you need to find, and how many images you have .
Click to expand...

Thanks for that I'll give it some thought. Al the posts have been very helpful though

Andrew
 
I've kept going with the folder structure I used pre Lightroom. Not much different to what has been mentioned above. Year folder with subfolders for each outing with the camera. Sub folder names start with the month, then a number I increment manually then the 'event' name. Last years last entry was 12 199 Christmas. This years first subfolder to directory 2009 will be 1 200 something or other. The number just means I can have 2 folders with the same name in the same month.

Those subfolders have the RAWs from the camera. Any exports go into subfolders below the RAWs.
 
i use the date plus a name to help find the folders easily

2009-01-09 Black Country Museum

then i use a name plus original file numbering and i also put a few keywords in to make sure
 
I copy and convert to DNG, then sort them in a Year/Month/Day folder structure, using the original filename. Also copy to a back up drive.

I thin add my metadata, bulk keywords and a develop preset.
 
I am evolving over time - aided now by Lightroom.
I keep the original file name when importing and import by date into an annual file and add a description of the shoot to the file ie "2009_01_01 blue, great, cold tits, woodland". I keyword each image on import with the shoot (ie bird, wildlife, snow, month, year) and then add keywords to certain images if required.

I have also started using collections quite a bit and am gradually importing all my pre-Lightroom images which is taking rather a while as I keep getting sidetracked :D
 
I have seperate folders for the year and within that I create new folder (within the Lightroom import screen) with a title, say "Peterborough", then let Lightroom set up the date folders for me.

Therefore if I then go back to Peterborough for more pictures later in the year I use the "Peterborough" folder and Lightroom sorts out the new date as a folder and imports them here.

If I rememeber, I add keywords at this point as well.
 
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