Lightroom offline storage.

[SWC]

Sorry if this was answered I did a quick search and didn't come up with anything.

I just got the new MBP and am in the process of transitioning my workflow from a desktop to the laptop. With that being said I will not longer have enough storage on the laptop to hold all of my photos. I am currently using lightroom to stor everything. I was wondering how I would go about being able to import into lightroom locally and then archive to a network drive after I finish with the project without removing them from my lightroom library.

Basically I want to store the masters remotely but keep them in the catalog after I do my edits and access them when needed and connected to the network.

 

[HBOC]

don't know if this will help at all, but here is what i came up with..

link 1

Link 2

Link 3

Organize

Last one

 

[SWC]

Thanks for the links. None quite seem to do what I want. It seems like the only real solution is to just use multiple catalogs and just move them to the network stor once I finish with them. Would love to have a way to browse thumbnails when offline though.

 

[panoz7]

I don't know if it works the same for network drives, but I have my lightroom library split amongst my internal drive and several externals. After I no longer need continuos access to the photos I drag their folder to an external drive using lightroom. I have the photos split into year folders and day folders by lightroom on import so it's usually pretty easy to do. One hold up is that lightroom will only allow you to move one folder at a time so it can be a bit of a pain if you need to move a bunch of folders at a time.

When one of my externals is disconnected the photos on that drive are still displayed by lightroom but can't be edited. You can still keyword them, add them to collections, and rate them though, even when they're offline.

 

[Edge100]

Thanks for the links. None quite seem to do what I want. It seems like the only real solution is to just use multiple catalogs and just move them to the network stor once I finish with them. Would love to have a way to browse thumbnails when offline though.

Lightroom will not manage image files on network drives (and I don't believe it will work with a catalog on a network drive either).

The best you can hope for is to work with the files on the local drive (built in or external), then export them to the network for backup but leave the catalog on a local drive.

 

[SWC]

I don't know if it works the same for network drives, but I have my lightroom library split amongst my internal drive and several externals. After I no longer need continuos access to the photos I drag their folder to an external drive using lightroom. I have the photos split into year folders and day folders by lightroom on import so it's usually pretty easy to do. One hold up is that lightroom will only allow you to move one folder at a time so it can be a bit of a pain if you need to move a bunch of folders at a time.

When one of my externals is disconnected the photos on that drive are still displayed by lightroom but can't be edited. You can still keyword them, add them to collections, and rate them though, even when they're offline.

This did the trick, not sure why I didn't think to just drag the files to the network drive from within lightroom. Set this up earlier and it's working beautifully. Still need to test how it will react when im not on the local network but if I had to guess it'll be fine as it's the same as an external for all intents and purposes.

 

[Ruahrc]

Lightroom will not manage image files on network drives (and I don't believe it will work with a catalog on a network drive either).

The best you can hope for is to work with the files on the local drive (built in or external), then export them to the network for backup but leave the catalog on a local drive.

I store many images on a USB hard drive which often gets connected as network storage via the USB port on my Time Capsule. It works pretty seamlessly, when the drive is connected via the network LR sees the pictures and I can open/edit them. When I take the same drive and attach it locally via USB or FW, it still shows up exactly the same in LR.