Benefits of "Referenced Files" vs Managed

I have been an Aperture user since day 1. I have tried LR a few times as well and have found that they each have their strengths and weaknesses. My biggest issue with LR is it is 100% referenced files. I have heard a lot of stories of people losing LR data etc. this way.

This is not a LR vs Aperture question, but rather a question of what is the real advantage of having your files stored outside of your library (Catalog)

I am always looking to increase performance and I have been told this may help with that. Mostly I just want to know if the advantages of a managed library make that much difference.

Again, not a LR vs Aperture question, more of a file management type of question.

Cheers

5ifty mm wrote in post #15371018
what is the real advantage of having your files stored outside of your library (Catalog)

Not sure if I understand the question (don't use Aperture, but AFAIK it's also catalog based?), but the advantage of catalog software is DAM. And the catalog will also show images if they are on an external HDD that's offline for instance.

DAM: Digital Asset Management.
http://www.thedambook.​com/ (if you google, chapter one can be found as a pdf)
http://www.impulseadve​nture.com …flow-catalog-compare.html

I'm a windows / LR user, if I went Mac there is no way that I would use Aperture due to this issue. There is no way that I would want my image files stored in the database file along with the edits as Aperture dose. Having everything all inside one file would worry me no end, what happens if the file gets corrupted? You loose everything, including the original images. At this point you hope that your backup is ok. It's not? Oh well guess you better get out there and start re-shooting those pictures, but you can't re-shoot never mind.

With LR I have all of my image files stored separately on the drive and all the edits stored in the catalogue. So the catalogue gets corrupted, run your backup. Oh dear the backup is corrupted too, well at least at this point I still have my original image files (which as they are sitting on the disk should have been backed up individually too) to use to re-edit from.

Another advantage to having all of the files sitting on the hard drive is that if I want to use a different application to edit a few files then that's easy too. the file is just sitting there ready. The only thing that you should remember with LR is that if you do not want to have to have LR try to find "Lost" images is to only move the files from within the application. Use external drives? That's fine too, LR will still show you the preview image, just have to connect the drive to edit it though. Multiple drives in one computer also work, I guess that with Aperture you are limited to having a single catalogue on a single drive. In LR you can have the same image in multiple catalogues too if you want to, with different edits too, or you can import the existing edits to a new catalogue if you need to.

As you can see I have lots of good reasons to use a fully referenced system, over holding the image data within the catalogue files along with the edits. The difference in the catalogue file sizes will also be significant, and I'm sure that will also affect system performance, after all disk reads are pretty slow, imagine having to read a Terabyte catalogue file in order to open the application. I have only had a play with Aperture in an Apple Store, and given it was running on the latest hardware the performance did not seem great compared to LR4.1 on my 4 year old Dell laptop.

Alan

René Damkot wrote in post #15372481
Not sure if I understand the question (don't use Aperture, but AFAIK it's also catalog based?), but the advantage of catalog software is DAM. And the catalog will also show images if they are on an external HDD that's offline for instance.

Yes, Aperture is catalog based, and it has a ".aplibrary" file that is similar to LR's ".lrcat" file. Lightroom uses a separate file to store previews, but Aperture keeps both adjustment info and previews in the same file. The Aperture library file can grow very large for this reason - mine is 35GB with just under 20,000 images.

You have the option of using a referenced library where your image files are stored separately from the database file, or you can use a managed library where the library file acts as a large container and all of your images are stored inside of it. The size of your library file can grow into the terabytes if you chose this approach.

I personally don't like the idea of a managed library. If the .aplibrary file becomes corrupt, then not only do I lose my adjustments and metadata, but I could potentially lose every one of my images. Images inside of the library are only available to Aperture and iPhoto, can't be seen or accessed by the Finder or any other software, and the original RAW files have to be exported as a second copy to use them in other programs.

I choose the referenced library where my RAW files are in standard folders on my drive and not inside of the Aperture library. This allows me to easily work with a single copy of my images and still be able to access them in Lightroom, Bridge, DPP, or any other software that I choose.

BigAl007 wrote in post #15372510
I'm a windows / LR user, if I went Mac there is no way that I would use Aperture due to this issue.

It's not an issue because you have the choice to use a managed library, a referenced library, or a combination of the two. It's very flexible and can accomodate every user's preference.

Thanks for the replies guys, I appreciate it. I do have a very large Aperture Library. I believe currently over 300GB total. (I have 3 copies backed up also) I like in Aperture that I can have a project and within that project I can have different "smart albums" that are organized by criteria I have set (selects, edits, blogged etc) and only pulls matching photos from that specific project. Not sure if LR has something like this. I will have to try and do some experimenting with LR file management. You guys have given some good advantages to referenced files. Thanks again.

5ifty mm wrote in post #15373268
Thanks for the replies guys, I appreciate it. I do have a very large Aperture Library. I believe currently over 300GB total. (I have 3 copies backed up also) I like in Aperture that I can have a project and within that project I can have different "smart albums" that are organized by criteria I have set (selects, edits, blogged etc) and only pulls matching photos from that specific project. Not sure if LR has something like this. I will have to try and do some experimenting with LR file management. You guys have given some good advantages to referenced files. Thanks again.

Lightroom has several "smart" ways of bringing up photos. What you are describing sounds like LR "Smart Collections" that you can set up for files that meet various criteria. So to use your example you could select a project, either a folder or a collection you've set up or using keywords, then you could either use a smart collection to view the files that meet a criteria. Also Lightroom has a built-in utility to filter/view files with certain exif attributes. So you can open a folder and then select to view all the files in that folder that shot with a certain aperture, shutter speed, etc.

That being said, I'm not a Mac/Aperture user. And, if I did try to use Aperture for say a free trial I would not have the knowledge on which to give an "educated" opinion, since I began studying Lightroom back before it even became a released program!

Mark-B wrote in post #15372982
you can use a managed library where the library file acts as a large container and all of your images are stored inside of it. The size of your library file can grow into the terabytes if you chose this approach.

Why would anyone want that?

René Damkot wrote in post #15375891
Why would anyone want that?

I can't really understand it, but I know many photographers - both professional and hobbyist - who do it this way.