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[JimH]

There was a recent discussion about Lightroom.  Could anyone help us learn what we need to do to improve compatibility?

Thanks.

[RoderickGI]

I have it on my todo list to look into using Lightroom rather than Photoshop, and then use MC for image management properly. So I am interested to follow the discussion.

Please be concise.
Please describe your workflow, with brief notes of why you use that workflow.

Thanks.

PS: Perhaps include the version of Lightroom you are using as well. I am using an old version, 5.7 currently.

[Ferdi]

Thanks, Jim, for picking up this thread.

LR is used as a photo editing and a photo managing & cataloging system. When shooting and editing in RAW, LR stores all information in a sidecar file, and in order to see the edits in an app that's not LR, one has to export the photos (e.g., to jpg format).
I don't export images from LR to anywhere but Flickr for two reasons:

• I already have plenty of photos on my HD without exporting / duplicating them locally
• LR is and always will be my system of truth: often enough I tweak photos when I look at them. Keeping a collection of duplicates in sync (jpgs and RAW) just adds too much of a headache (though using a publishing services within LR might help with the sync).

Like most photographers, I have a workflow, which I am quite content with, using one or more SW for each step: import from camera, selecting photos, tagging, editing, final usage and storage. So being curious what other MC users are doing in this context, I had asked about use cases (https://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php/topic,126085. The two compelling answers were:

• to easily access photos and play slideshows with music on your TV
• to manage metadata / keywords

As I don't have a TV, the first case doesn't apply to me, but I can see the value.

Tagging is a different story, and my thoughts on that are:

• Tagging / keywording works well (enough?) for me in LR.
  There's no doubt though that MC's meta data features are far superior, and I am very open to further explore possibilities.
• No matter the workflow or use case (first MC then LR or vice verse), tagging would have to work both ways, and it would have to be on the raw file (and potentially the stacked jpg)
• The keyword hierarchy that I have created in LR would have to be reflected seamlessly in MC, and changes or additions to it would have to be replicated in either app.
• Especially because I am using cloud back-up for my photos, changing the workflow must not touch any existing tags and photos - I'd not be willing to have all my photos and catalog files be changed and therefore having to be backed-up again (similar to the pain of adding waveform to all audio files, which I have done recently and which will keep Carbonite working for weeks)

Given these challenges, creating and showing slideshows with music on a TV is probably the low hanging fruit use case you should aim at, as this might be a huge value add for many.

*side note: To me it appears similar to what I currently experience with ebooks - I am spending quite some time on finding out how MC can improve my reading experience: I can edit metadata in MC better than anywhere else, but unless the metadata is integrated seamlessly with a 'usage' app like Calibre and eventually my Kindle Paperwhite, I am not sure what value I get from it.

[darichman]

I use MC and lightroom together: MC for most of the tagging and organisational heavywork, and lightroom for facetagging and geotagging. I then 'update library from tags' in MC. I guess my workflow is otherwise similar to Marko's.

The biggest single compatibility feature for me would be EXIF writing for date. I have thousands of scanned photos - I have added correct dates the [Date] field in MC, but when imported into lightroom it's not visible anywhere and date is set as the scan date, which makes it really hard to keep things organised. The same applies for photos taken on a camera with the wrong date settings - while I can correct the dates in MC, these aren't reflected on import into Lightroom.

I've posted the odd time here and there, as have others (see this post from 2011). EXIF date handling would improve compatibility with lightroom, but also any other software or web services. If I upload my scanned photos from my MC library to Google photos, for example, the dates are all wrong as it defaults to the scanned date even though MC has the correct info in [Date].

I also use the coloured 'flag' fields in lightroom. I have no idea how this info is stored in the tags, but it would be wonderful if this field was viewable and changeable in MC too.

These two requests would pretty much sort out my worklow and save me several steps. Raldo & Marko might have some other thoughts as well - some of what I do is based on their posts in years gone by...

Thanks for considering this Jim!

[JimH]

... I tweak photos when I look at them. Keeping a collection of duplicates in sync (jpgs and RAW) just adds too much of a headache (though using a publishing services within LR might help with the sync).[/li][/list]

When you edit in MC, only the changes are saved.  Images are not duplicated.

[Ferdi]

When you edit in MC, only the changes are saved.  Images are not duplicated.

I know that.
One proposed use case was to export images from LR in jpg format, to tag them in MC and use them in slide shows. In this process, I'd have duplicate images that I'd work with in MC (original raw and duplicates in jpg). Unless I am mistaken though, it's the only way to see processed images in MC.
Even without exporting for this purpose I might have various versions of images in my LR library already, e.g., if I use 3rd party software to edit them (closed workflow with LR). I usually stack them in LR

The biggest single compatibility feature for me would be EXIF writing for date.

This actually would be one huge value add, as changing dates for multiple images in LR is a pain. I am working on scanned photos right now, and couldn't find any solution to quickly change the dates correctly in batch.
Also, often enough, I don't know the exact day or time, but want to have the images dated in sequential order to display them accordingly when sorting by date.
It appears that date fields for images are as varied as they are for music files, as per the recent discussion on that topic.

[RoderickGI]

Be very careful with change around image date handling.

Most applications use Date Taken for display of an image date. I believe MC loads Date Taken into [Date] on first import, and then never updates the Date Taken tag in the file.

MC should really have a separate [Date Taken] tag, which would allow the value to be protected while still being used for sorting and so on, but also remain editable for those who want to edit it. Personally, the only time I would ever do that is if the camera had an incorrect date and time setting.

[marko]

Personally, the only time I would ever do that is if the camera had an incorrect date and time setting.

Also, for me, scanned photos, and more often, when we've been out for a day, and I get all the photos together from several different photographers, inevitably, someones photos need their time adjusted to bring them into sync with all the others. DST often catches us out here!

[Ferdi]

Tagging, like I said, could be a value-add for me to incorporate MC in my photo workflow: if it works seamlessly.
To try out more, I have just imported lots of photos from LR to MC and found that the import of keywords is very inconsistent. Example:

• I have a bunch of jpgs tagged with a friend's name, all from the same weekend. In LR, it's one and the same keyword for each photo, from one and the same keyword hierarchy.
• In MC, my friend's name shows up in two fields: [People] and [Keywords]. Unfortunately, the behavior inconsistent, as for some photos, the names shows up in both fields, for some in just one, and for some in none. All combinations of tagged and not tagged exist.

One reason for the [People] field not to be populated might be how I tagged: I am not sure if all jpgs were tagged using LR's face recognition, or by manually checking the box for the photos in keyword list in LR. Even though the keyword is marked as a 'People' keyword in LR, one of course doesn't know how LR applies the metadata to the files.

These sort of things need to work seamlessly in order for me to incorporate MC in the photo workflow. One thing I don't want to do is end up worrying about metadata inconsistency between the two systems. For images, LR will very likely continue to be the system of truth for me.

[marko]

When I use face recognition in Lightroom, the exported jpgs appear in MC with those 'People' in the MC [People] field. I did not do anything to specifically make this happen, it just does.

Remember, I don't actually use the MC [People] field as all of my people tags are in a branch of Keywords, so no, nothing else is putting data in the MC people field.

[darichman]

I have also noticed that if I had previously tagged [People] in MC and then subsequently do face tagging in Lightroom, the MC tags will often, but not always, persist in MC even if further changes are made in Lightroom.

If I have never tagged [People] in MC, add or change face tags in Lightroom, and then update library from tags in MC the changes generally update correctly.

It seems that once a change in [People] is made from within MC, that change persists irrespective of what I tag in lightroom subsequently. I'll keep playing with this - there are a lot of variables, as many photos have been tagged over decades using combinations of both programs!

[Daydream]

This is backwards.

MC needs to fully implements IPTC and then can look after nice-to have, if there are any left. Not one tag, not 2 tags, the whole IPTC standard. Go to iptc.org, download it, it's free. Start with Core, then Extensions. Can be done in time, not necessarily overnight. But please stop fixing things at random, while maintaining fields designed in a hurry 20 years ago. Needs a solid base, an accepted standard first.

Until that is done, claiming that MC is amazing for photo tagging only gets "errr... really?" smiles. This comes back every couple of years in various shape or forms.