Moving from LR to LRC

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Adamcski

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Adam
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I keep reading / seeing comments online that LRC is the better of the two and since using the Adobe software I have always used the desktop LR.

I am not a pro and do not take 1000s of images but I thought I would take a look and see what I am / maybe missing.

Now my workflow is pretty straight forward. I go out, take some images, come home and copy them to my desktop to review. I shoot RAW and JPEG and once I have decided which images I want to keep I delete the rest and name the keepers, and add them to a folder (example folder name - walk in park June 2025). I will then upload the RAW files to LR and edit them. Once done, I will download the edited JPEGS and store these in the same folder along with the original RAW and SOOC JPEGS. This folder is then added to my 2025 back up folders on an external SSD and HD. So as far as sorting and storing the images, I keep nothing on my system, I have files going back a few years, all of which have individual folders with names and dates.

Now in LR I have set up various albums, like Landscape, or macro and so on. I then put the LR file into one of these albums and I have about 11 different ones. So my images are stored and then sorted in LR albums (I do not worry about the year in LR as data is easy to find).

So,

I loaded LRC yesterday and it pulled over all my LR albums so they now show in LRC (did this on its own).

But...and I appreciate this may not be the case for everyone, I find the UI of LRC to be really clunky and almost archaic. It is just not a particularly nice experience when compared the LR desktop.

I then noticed that I had some catalogues and LR data stored on my internal ssd and I have been trying to understand the whole catalogue system, which again, I just don't get.

I have read that you should keep XYZ folders for LRC on system and then have a back up on an external...but to me I am already doing this myself.

What am I missing or doing wrong here? I do not sell images or need to store client files for weddings or events...

How do I go about moving the LRC data off my internal system and just use the external systems I have?


I feel it may just be me as I was an early adopter of cloud and have very, very little stored on any machines physically for any purpose. Perhaps I am just not suited to LRC and not tech savvy enough to understand it (wouldn't surprise me).

I thought perhaps LRC would be less RAM intensive than LR - but my experiences playing around editing the same files yesterday would suggest it is no better, possibly a little worse (which seems to be the consensus on sites I have read).

Any help or guidance on LRC would be appreciated because if I am missing out on the extra benefits, I would at least like to explore them more although I do not want data stored locally.
 
I much prefer LRC, but I guess thats what i started with, it feels like their is more control, but I guess the features are more or less the same. I haven't moved images from one to the other tho, but I'm sure someone can help out!
 
Adamcski said:
I then noticed that I had some catalogues and LR data stored on my internal ssd and I have been trying to understand the whole catalogue system, which again, I just don't get.
Click to expand...

What LR data do you mean?

One catalogue is usually fine, how many do you have?
 
Brentor said:
What LR data do you mean?

One catalogue is usually fine, how many do you have?
Click to expand...
I will have to write the names when I get home as I am at work.

I primarily use LR so use the cloud storage. You don't have catalogues there but can make albums - which is what I have done.

When I loaded LRC it pulled these cloud albums across automatically, so I have the albums on the left of the screen.

I then have some random files (will type them later) showing on my macbook internal storage.
 
Brentor said:
What LR data do you mean?

One catalogue is usually fine, how many do you have?
Click to expand...
Right, back home and this image show what has been added to my macbook
 

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So,

If I go out and take some pictures. Follow my usual workflow and just upload the RAW file to LRC where are these stored and what is the whole catalogue thing about?

Ideally I don't want anything stored on the Macbook.

Prior to opening LRC those files I posted above did not exist as far as I am aware on my internal ssd (on the macbook).
 
I have always used classic , load files by date then back up 3 or 4 months worth at a time.. in all honesty I don’t even know why I back up files as if I need a old processed image I can just pull it off of flickr
 
I upload all the files from my cameras’ memory cards into LRC and it adds these to the folders I have set up. I use camera name/year/month/day. These folders are physically stored on an external drive that is attached to my Mac. The LRC system files, the catalogue and related files are all on the internal drive, which is generally deemed best practice. These files should not take up much memory. I only use one catalogue which again is best practice. This records the location of each image and edits you have made and no doubt other information. The related files are mainly previews, which help to load images quickly and backup files. Each of these can be culled after a time that suits you as previews can always be rebuilt and backups become redundant. Backups are backups of your catalogue not of your images.

From your screenshot above it looks like you need to deal with the mobile downloads and Lightroom library folders as I think these are both related to your LR cloud system. The first is all the downloads from the LR cloud system, which you have stopped before the process is completed.. If you already have these stored on your external drives, it shouldn’t be necessary to keep this folder. I expect the library folder shows edits you have made on the cloud. Probably not necessary to keep, but needs researching.

Lightroom Queen is a very good resource and has members with far more knowledge than me.

They have a guide to transferring from LR to LRC Transfer. May not be that helpful given you have already started but some useful pointers.

LRC does not have albums, it uses collections as shown in your screenshot above. LRC also has keywords, I don’t know if these are available on LR. I find them very useful, I rarely use collections. If you use them I suggest you give careful thought to the structure as it is difficult to change in the future.

It looks like they have not made to process of moving from LR to LRC easy
 
Thanks @Brentor

As I don't hold many images on LR in the cloud I'm thinking it might just be easier to download any images from LR. Then delete LR and LRC from the machine completely, delete all those files and start a fresh.

Something to do over the weekend lol

I'll have a look at that lightroom queen link as it's bound to help me out.
 
Long time classic user so feel at home and classic used to have tons of extra functionality over the new one. I believe they got just about equivalent now so your move maybe quite needless or too late...
 
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