Importing to Lroom 3

Hi chaps - am I getting my workflow totally wrong, I am trying to view my images before I import them, I want to zoom in to 100% to check IQ etc but the only setting I can find in the 'import' module is "Render Previews" - the image I can see in the 'preview' window is not good enough for me to assess the IQ - do I have to import everything and then start 'flagging' for quality ?

Regards Roger

to view your photos 100% before you import them, in the import module, double click on the image you want to look at and slide the zoom slider to 1:1. you can also press E. you can also click on the button next to the grid button near the bottom left, left of the "check all" button.

the render previews setting is the quality of the preview you want to use for viewing while using the Library module only. If you render previews to 1:1, then when you zoom into photos in Library module, you will not have the "loading" dialog. However, if you use 1:1 preview rendering, the import process can take 4 times as long. I use standard for the preview renders.

imjason wrote in post #14185206
to view your photos 100% before you import them, in the import module, double click on the image you want to look at and slide the zoom slider to 1:1. you can also press E. you can also click on the button next to the grid button near the bottom left, left of the "check all" button.

the render previews setting is the quality of the preview you want to use for viewing while using the Library module only. If you render previews to 1:1, then when you zoom into photos in Library module, you will not have the "loading" dialog. However, if you use 1:1 preview rendering, the import process can take 4 times as long. I use standard for the preview renders.

excellent...concise...​......appreciated

rogertb wrote in post #14185153
I can see in the 'preview' window is not good enough for me to assess the IQ - do I have to import everything and then start 'flagging' for quality ?

That is the way that Adobe intended it to be used. There is a quick method for doing this. Import all the images (I prefer to have it generate 1:1 previews - I go and do something lese while it's importing). Then disaply the first image, make sure 'Caps Lock' is on and press one of 'X' for 'delete', 'P' for 'pick' or 'U' for undecided. LR will then apply the relevant flag and display the next image. It's very easy to step through a lot of images at a fair speed using this method. Once everything is flagged press CTRL-Backspace and you can delete all of the 'X' flagged images.

hollis_f wrote in post #14185741
That is the way that Adobe intended it to be used. There is a quick method for doing this. Import all the images (I prefer to have it generate 1:1 previews - I go and do something lese while it's importing). Then disaply the first image, make sure 'Caps Lock' is on and press one of 'X' for 'delete', 'P' for 'pick' or 'U' for undecided. LR will then apply the relevant flag and display the next image. It's very easy to step through a lot of images at a fair speed using this method. Once everything is flagged press CTRL-Backspace and you can delete all of the 'X' flagged images.

I know that was their intention, especially in LR 1 and 2 where the pre-import thumbnails were horrible, but it never made much sense to me, to download and then delete, so I got in the habit of doing my first viewing/rating in Breeze Browser Pro which has the advantage of doing comparisons of up to 4 images with synchronized zoom up to 800%. After images tagged as keepers are selected, Ctrl + D sends them to Lightroom.

Several different and valid approaches, so it's up to the user!

I myself have always been content following the approach Frank describes -- I just do a quick import and then flag things. I've never been "into" the idea of going through the Import previews -- it just seems like more work that way.

But that's just me!

Thanks chaps - I guess I'll also go down the 'Frank' route, seems to make sense but I still think I'm missing something, here's a scree shot, I'm in Lr3s import module and my preview is at 4:1 but is very pixelated, (the image to the right is the same file in Pshop at 100% .. I obviously have a setting or something wrong in Lroom as obviously I want to view the images at 100% ... I'd rather not buy yet another bit of software like Breeze Browser Pro and ok I'll do as Frank does but sometimes I'll have 150 shots of the same bird and know I only really want one or two of them imported ... it seems crazy to import the lot and then delete ... or is it crazy ? if that's the way it is that's the way it is ! Thanks again to all of you for taking the time. Rogerhttp://www.rogerburton​.co.uk/stills/sparrow.​jpg

One thing you might try, don't know if this has come up or if it will help anything:

Go to Edit/Catalog Settings, and to the File Handling tab, and tweak the Preview Quality settings, try High quality and see if it helps!

Maybe also up the pixel res of the preview.

rogertb wrote in post #14190805
sometimes I'll have 150 shots of the same bird and know I only really want one or two of them imported

If I find myself in this situation I'll often do a preliminary cull using Faststone. I'll get it to display the images on the CF card and step through them deleting the obvious duds straight from the card. Faststone is only displaying the embedded jpeg but that's good enough to be able to tell which images don't stand a chance of being developed.

Of course, it's not much good for when you're trying to pick the best single image from a run of two to twenty similar images. For that I use LR and I'll leave all those candidates unflagged in the initial sort. Then I'll go back to them, select the group of images from which one needs to be selected and press 'C' for compare. The first two images are displayed and you can zoom and pan them, either locked or individually. I select the best of the two images and the reject is replaced by the next candidate. Repeat until there's just one - the best - left. Then that gets flagged as a 'Pick'.

Or you can select multiple images and press 'N' for Survey View, but I've never really used that so I'm not able to comment.

Deleting from the flash card will shorten the life of the card quite significantly but you all probably know that. It's not replacing CF or SD cards that scares me.....it's loosing images when it goes. It's best to delete from a spinning hard drive if possible.

Hollis - I like you sig. I hate when people spell lens "lense" . . .

nate42nd wrote in post #14191104
Deleting from the flash card will shorten the life of the card quite significantly but you all probably know that.

Er, no. I don't know that - probably because it's not true.

I do know that some people believe that the limited number of read/erase cycles is something to be worried about even though it is nothing to worry about at all.

Most card use memory with 10,000 to 1,000,000 write/erase cycles. So a 16GB card can have around 160 to 16,000 TB of data written to it. Let's take that lower figure. At 25MB per image, 160TB means you can shoot 6.4 million images. At 1000 images a day that means you can shoot for 17 years before the card runs out. I think I might want to get a new one before then.

Even if it was something to worry about, erasing an image from the card doesn't involve loads of writing - otherwise recovery programs wouldn't work.

Well, I messed with things in LR3 -- I changed the catalog settings like I mentioned above, but still, the preview does start to pixellate when you go beyond the 1:1 preview size, which is in fact smaller than a 100%/1:1 view, as you noted. 4:1 is definitely bad.

In other words, there is a limit to how high a res the preview is...however, 1:1 isn't "bad", especially compared to a thumbnail, although it's more like "fit" rather than the 100%/1:1. Oh well -- using the 2:1 preview size may work better for you although it does show a bit of the pixellation.

I personally don't fuss with the previews. If I want to check IQ at 100%, well, obviously the Import/preview panel is not the place to do it...

nate42nd wrote in post #14191104
Deleting from the flash card will shorten the life of the card quite significantly but you all probably know that. It's not replacing CF or SD cards that scares me.....it's loosing images when it goes. It's best to delete from a spinning hard drive if possible.

Hollis - I like you sig. I hate when people spell lens "lense" . . .

I don't think deleting from the card in LR is actually an issue -- LR doesn't give you that option when importing.

The one thing that could be done is to "selectively Import" by unchecking photos you don't want. Then you just format the card in the camera.

hollis_f wrote in post #14191217
Er, no. I don't know that - probably because it's not true.

I do know that some people believe that the limited number of read/erase cycles is something to be worried about even though it is nothing to worry about at all.

Most card use memory with 10,000 to 1,000,000 write/erase cycles. So a 16GB card can have around 160 to 16,000 TB of data written to it. Let's take that lower figure. At 25MB per image, 160TB means you can shoot 6.4 million images. At 1000 images a day that means you can shoot for 17 years before the card runs out. I think I might want to get a new one before then.

Even if it was something to worry about, erasing an image from the card doesn't involve loads of writing - otherwise recovery programs wouldn't work.

Er, okay.