In Photos (Mac), I was able to pick a single photo as my preview image. I'm trying LR, and imported two albums, two different dates. I was always able to scroll through my main previews to determine which pictures I wanted to look closer at, or scroll through scrap previews to see what products and colors might work. Is there a way to have a preview image of what is in the folder? I can't imagine working just on my memory, or clicking though each folder. Any help is appreciated!
I'm not sure what you mean. In the left pane, where the folders appear? When you click on a folder all the images appear in the center area so it's easy to see what's inside. I want to help - I love Lightroom and use it all the time. I just don't understand what you're looking for.
It's important for you to start utilizing keywords, so you can see what's in folders, sometimes multiple folders, with one click of the mouse. For instance, I know your boys did Scouts stuff, right? You would have a keyword for Boy Scouts or Scouts. Once you click on that, you would get all the photos you had attached that keyword to. You could also further cull that into dates or perhaps just the name of one son or the other. Or even use multiple keywords to get really specific . . . like photos that have Boy Scouts, your son's name, your name, and maybe a friend's name. I know we've already blah-blahed it to death, but seriously, this series has a lot of useful information in it, I think anyway. LOL Lightroom: From Workflow To Wow Videos
Thank you both. @gonewiththewind @michelepixels I'm trying to get something kind of similar to the system before the switch. I googled my question too, and Lightroom does not have this feature that I am thinking about... so I might just have to give it some thought and then find my work around. That's all. I will figure out one, I just have to go slow and in a small batch first to make sure it's the way I want to organize going forward. It's all overwhelming, so figuring out how to organize in a similar manner while learning is not fun at the moment. I don't want to import and have a mess of photos, so I have at least started small to figure out my way. Honestly, I don't use keywords, nor do I tag... nor do I want to start. I'm a visual person. That also sounds like a HUGE undertaking to me, and I'm not ready to do that on top of everything else I'm trying to do now. All of my albums already have an inkling of what is in them in the folder name (like the date and then Beach Outing Lava or Snowmobiling Schroon) that I can quickly understand what or where we were. Michelle, in Photos (Mac), you import your images, and then you can create albums, similar to the folder structure on the left in Lightroom. Then in LR, once that folder is clicked, you can see your photos in the center area. In Photos, before clicking on a specific folder to see the images, the center area shows all the folders (known as albums) and uses a single picture as the "preview" image of what the folder has inside. I didn't have to click on every folder to see what was inside, but would refer to the image to jog my memory. Thank you again... I have to figure out a happy medium, because I'm visual, and tagging/keywording that amount of photos would take me a lifetime. Sounds more like work, and would take all the fun out of playing with my photos and scrapping. (Sorry!) Just mulling ideas, but I might have to keep an Album Preview folder above all the other folders... and within that I would put a single photo from every folder, name the preview image as the date... this way I could scroll through these "preview" pictures to determine the album that I want. If I wanted to tag, then I could tag that single photo, instead of all the albums. Gotta find my happy medium.
Jenn @jk703 This won't help you in LR, but I do something similar to your idea in your last post (at least, it's similar if I'm understanding you correctly... which I may not be cuz I didn't get lots of sleep last night lol). Anyway, for my DS kits, I made a PREVIEW folder. Inside of it, I have the preview of every kit (or BYOC EP or PP or JC or whatever lol) I've purchased since 2016 (when I started doing this) as well as kits I've snagged off an EHD to use (so I'm not going thru and getting older stuff. I figure I'll use what I want to use, and newer stuff will get scrapped with first anyway). I also have a PREVIEW folder in my "extras" DS folder (where I keep actions, styles, and other non kit-based goods). The naming system is easy: Kit Name and then Designer Initials. If something is for BYOC, then I also put "BYOC 2017-03" so I can search for all BYOC 2017-03 stuff and see what I have. I wish I could use a JPG as a shortcut, so I could just click the image and go straight to the kit, but oh well. Anyway, here's an actual example from my folder: "Daydreamer (EP PP JC) LBW BYOC 2017-03" [that's a cheat cuz I use the EP folder jpeg for all three packs, cuz I know what colors are in the PP and JC cuz it's a BYOC]. So that's for Little Butterfly Wings' Daydreamer packs for this month's BYOC. You might want to make contact sheets of your photos in a similar manner. Actually, now that I think about it, maybe I want to make contact sheets to keep in a Photo Preview folder to show which pics happened in which year-month (that's how I organize pics). And if this is way off base, I'm sorry for my long-windedness.
@Tree City I'm still reading... have to go slow... but wanted to ask before I forget. My Photos app doesn't look like yours. Did it update recently?
And.. yes, I think I might have a Preview Directory... lol! I'll have two catalogs in Lightroom - one for scrapping and one for Photos, and each will have a Preview folder. That preview folder will contain one image (a photo or the scrap preview) will direct me to which folder I specifically want. I might tag the preview in the Preview folder, but I'm not sure. I really don't want to tag, as I haven't in 7 years of scrapping, and it sound like more work, but it might be helpful too. So, tagging one picture, doesn't sound too hard, and might prove useful for location of photos if the preview image isn't jogging my memory. One last question - do you use photos for just your photos? Is there a way to have two "libraries or catalog" of photos that don't mix in the app? @Tree City
I don't think there's a way for them not to "mingle" on that initial Photos page (like when you first open the app). I only use my Photos app for photos--not DS. But if you wanted, you could tell the app to to look in your DS folder. If you've already told the app to "look" in your DS supplies, then this is what you need to do to see just those pics: At the top of the app, click FOLDERS. Then you should be able to look at either your Photos folder (which I'm assuming you keep in your PC's PHOTOS folder that "came with" your laptop) or you can choose the DS folder(s) of your choice. If you haven't chosen which folders should appear in the Photos app, then you can click "Not seeing all your photos? Choose where to look" and then navigate to the DS folder you want to include. TBH, it might also include non-jpeg items, like TIFF or PNG, which would be nice.
This is why I keep my scrap stuff in Bridge and my photos in LR. You cannot have two catalogues open in LR. So I keep my scrap stuff in Bridge and make every folder have a preview and then I toggle between programs for scrapping - LR for photos and Bridge for scrapping. I can utilize everything at once.
Hmmm... this is all so helpful. I'm going to mull it over and try to figure out what my plan of organization attack will be. Then I can move forward! Thank you all SOOOOOOO much! You have no idea how nice it is to come to the forum with questions and someone will help.
Okay, now that it's morning (and you explained further) I think I'm getting what you're saying. I'm a visual person too, and I think if I'd started on a Mac and used Photos I might have had a similar difficulty as you're having, but I used PCs from 1993 until 2011. I'll tell you how I manage using Lightroom on a Mac but first let me say . . . I RARELY use keywords Do you like to journal? While I am visual, I also love to write and I caption most of my photos in Lightroom. Do you see, in the LR library module, the spots for Title and Caption in the Metadata panel on the right side? My workflow includes taking a minute or several minutes to type a few words or sometimes several sentences about just about every photo I take. This works just as well as keywording -- better, in fact, for me. It's much more natural, and I end up using a lot of the words I would have used as keywords (maybe more!). So when I want something -- say photos from our trip to the zoo last year or photos of my mom or whatever -- I can search "zoo" or "mom" and they pop up. I don't even have to be in Lightroom because I have my Lightroom settings set so metadata is automatically saved to my files. (Look in Lightroom Catalog Settings > Metadata tab > check the third box for "Automatically write changes into XMP.") When I'm scrapping I usually don't even have LR open; I search Finder for photos using the search bar and it works well. As for digiscrap kits I have yet to use Lightroom for them. I just organize them in Finder and turn the blue folder icons into kit previews as I explain in this blog post. (TLDR: after Command-Copying the kit preview image, right click on the kit folder, choose Get Info, and then Command-V paste the image into the icon at the top). I'm kind of rushing at the moment, but will be happy to come back and talk about this more later!
I will look into that! Thank you! I know this might be a super silly and somewhat daft question... Does it come with the Photoshop CC/Lightroom package? I hadn't noticed it, and I think it does, but if so, that may be a way for me to go, and not have the two separate catalogs! (Photos was the same with Libraries - unable to have more than one open at a time, so I was used to that). Can you post a screen shot of your Bridge with the Preview? Is that possible? Another odd question... is there a reason why people don't use Bridge with their photos for organization? @mollyc
I use LR to process photos, and organizing them is a byproduct. I started using LR when I was using PSE, so I got used to the interface there first and I find it takes way longer to process photos in Bridge through Camera Raw than it does in LR. LR is so much more efficient. For you, since you tend to use your images more SOOC (I think? based on previous conversations) maybe keeping everything in Bridge is a good option for you, because you can have multiple windows open in Bridge (another reason I like it for scrapping if I am using multiple kits - I just alt tab through the open windows). In this thread I pasted a photo of my Bridge previews.
LOL! Sorry, Michelle, the writing would take me as long as key wording. I say that, since I would have to do this eventually for all the years of photos that I have since 2003. I think going from 2017 and any photos going forward I'll pull a single image and then tag that image. This way I can still scroll and look. Then if nothing comes to mind, I'll look for people, places and events via the simple tagging I will go. I like to journal, but all that notetaking is not my cup of tea.
Yes... I now understand that Screen Shot - that will be perfect for my scrap stuff! Apparently, seeing things in the forum and then understanding how they will work and using the different software clears it up a bit. I didn't totally understand previously, but now I do. Bridge for scrap stuff! THANK YOU! Yes, I would say that I am a more of a SOOC... though I edit them when scrapping. I am not a photographer, ny any means. I have always edited using actions and RadLab in Photoshop. Though I just learned that I can edit using RadLab in Lightroom too! I may just have to get used to and give Lightroom a try for my photos! Clicking on folders isn't horrible, just different than scrolling Do you know if you can tag folders... or it is specific to images? Thanks again for your help!
I also use Bridge for browsing and opening files. I find LR is a little awkward for that -- at least with the way I work. I only use LR for importing and editing.
That's weird. I'll see if I'm missing an update but it'll be awhile. Sorry I took a nap (flu still kicking myself butt!) And you've got some good info here. Hopefully you find a way that works for you!
