Moving files/folders to another hard...

After carefully studying the full Lightshop manual, I am still having difficulty understanding how to track files/folders within Lightroom when they have been moved to another hard drive on the same PC.

To clarify, I have two external hard drives attached to my PC, one of which holds my pictures after editing on the PC and the other as a backup. When I have processed my pictures in Lightroom I would like to move the original photo to my ''storage'' hard drive and place a backup on the other external drive.

Would any very kind Forum member out there privide a simpletons explanation of the procedure?

Many thanks.
Moving files/folders to another hard...
What do you want to track in Lightroom - both - or just the original?



If just the original - then you should do any moves of that original from within Lightroom so that it stays in sync. I moved my entire set of images from my local hard drive to a shared network server's drive the other day using Lightroom to do so.



If you don't use Lightroom to do the moves on things that you want to continue to work with from withiin LR - you have to ''tell'' LR where to find them - and I think that is at least on a folder by folder basis by double clicking on a thumbnail in the library module. I think at that point LR asks you to find the image file since it cannot be loaded from its original location - at that point you have to navigate to the new location. I have seen from other posts that once you do that for a single image in a folder that LR figures out that the others moved there too and automatically fixes their location - but I have not seen any of this myself. I did all of my moves from within LR and avoided that whole mess :)
Moving files/folders to another hard...
Hi Scott

Thanks for your post. However, I still seem unable to get my files/folders to move within Lightroom. I have two large external hard drives and wish to move about 800 of my pictures to one of them. I have tried this using the Export command in the Library module, but when I browse to either of the external hard drives, Lightroom comes up with a message asying they are not writeable media!

How did you manage to move your pictures?

Regards

Andrew, it can take some figuring so don't worry.

LR doesn't hold the files at all, only links and within LR a database of instructions etc and previews.

I don't export at all unless I want to make a copy to use in some other application. There is no need for multiple copies as they can be rendered from LR at any time.

Here's what I do: Import from card to a drive as DNG and at the same time back up raws to another drive. Two copies, one for archiving immediately.

For back ups of work in progress I simply let LR backup once a week (this is selectable in prefs). This backs up the LR data only.

When I wish to move a file or folder in LR (the DNGs) I either move it within LR by dragging or move on the HD and then right click the folder in LR and use the menu to link the folder again.

Hopes this helps in the understanding,



ENJOY LR !!!!

I believe also double clicking on the folder is a shortcut to locate a missing folder.

Hi Geoff and Francesco,

Problem now solved with your invaluable help. Many thanks, although I wish Lightroom (which I love) had a smoother way of doing this.

There was a thing called Binders when we had Shoots for the Betas. Now we have folders and some form of Binders has been pointed to as a possabilty for the future. It's wait and see for now.



Don



Don Ricklin, MacBook 1.83Ghz Duo 2 Core running 10.4.9 %26amp; Win XP, Pentax *ist D

http://donricklin.blogspot.com/