LR virtual copy to existing collection

I know that if you create a collection while you have files selected, you have the option to virtual copy the selected files into the collection you are creating.

I have an existing collection and I want to select a bunch of photos from elsewhere and simply add them as virtual copies, but I can't find the way to do it.

Help!

RandMan wrote in post #16074339
I know that if you create a collection while you have files selected, you have the option to virtual copy the selected files into the collection you are creating.

I have an existing collection and I want to select a bunch of photos from elsewhere and simply add them as virtual copies, but I can't find the way to do it.

Help!

1. Set the collection as the target collection by right-clicking on it and selecting that option.
2. In the grid view select all the desired images.
3. Click Photo/Create Virtual Copies. The VCs will now be the selected images in the grid.
4. Press the "B" key.

Another way: Once you have created and selected the virtual copies (steps 2 and 3 above) you can then drag and drop them onto the target collection.

Rimmer wrote in post #16075228
Another way: Once you have created and selected the virtual copies (steps 2 and 3 above) you can then drag and drop them onto the target collection.

Or right-click on the collection and choose "Include selected photos".

Rimmer wrote in post #16075228
Another way: Once you have created and selected the virtual copies (steps 2 and 3 above) you can then drag and drop them onto the target collection.

Doesn't this duplicate the virtual copies though? So then you would have them in the source folder, and then a copy in the destination folder?

A Virtual Copy is called "virtual" because it is not a real copy. Whatever editing you do to an image exists only as a couple dozen lines of code in the database, just editing instructions, and is actually applied only at the time of export. The VC is a second, alternate, version of of the editing instructions, another couple dozen lines of code in the database. (About 25 KB worth, as a matter of fact, about one thousandth the size of a single Raw file.) You can make 20 VCs without using very much space. But putting an image into a collection, either a master copy or a VC, isn't even that big. It is just a single line added to the code that says, "This image also belongs to Collection X". There is no second "destination folder".

BTW, it doesn't make any sense to make a VC unless it is different from the master in some way. Unless the VC is an alternate version you might as well just put the master copy in the collection. For instance, I might have a collection called Best Portraits of Jane in which I put the ten best shots out of hundreds that I have done of Jane over the past year. But I also want to have black and white, 8x10versions of those shots ready for immediate access, so I make VCs, convert them to b/w and crop them and make another collection Best B/W Portraits of Jane.

The big advantage of LR's databased approach to DAM is that you can have the same bit of data (the image file it's associated processing) organised in many different ways at the same time without the need for multiple copies. Collections as the means for organising the "display" of groups of images is brilliant as you can have the same image in lots of different collections at the same time. Even better is the ability to have Smart Collections, whose content is based on sorting one or more different attributes of the image based on the files EXIF data.

So for my airshow pictures for example I can just drop all the images from one day into a suitable folder on the hard drive. As I import I had generic keywords, such as the location show "title" etc. I then go through the images and keyword each one for the different types of aircraft in the pictures (not has hard as you might think as you can add the same keywords to lots of files at once, or use the Painter tool to "paint" keywords to images) along with any details of display teams etc.

I then have Smart Collections that trawl through the keywords so that with a click I can see all the images of one Manufacturer, or even one model. Or I can look for a particular display teams images. The great thing is that the smart collection can show me those images from all of the different events, or only one particular years. Pretty much if you can think of a way to sort the data you can have a smart collection do it for you. It is a bit like having a single click access to all of the sorting options that you can apply in the Gridded library view. Of course you can also have manually sorted collections by simply adding the image to the collection. Which is great if you either want to skip keywording say, or want to group totally random otherwise unrelated images.

Only if you want another different version (different processing/crop etc) of an image would you need to create a VC. On creation as the only difference is the copy name the VC will be included in any Smart Collection that the original image is included in, UNLESS the copy name is used in the definition of the Smart Collection. If you create the VC in a collection then the VC will also be in the collection. VC's are not added to a collection that the master copy is unless you are viewing that collection at the time though.

The thing I like about this approach to organising your images is that you can have really complex sorting systems, and only need a really simple folder system to hold the images. I just do for the very simple YYYYMMDD named folders under the My Pictures folder. I don't even bother with splitting it by year. On import I am always working with the last folder imported, even then as I will have as a minimum added a name of the event during the import those images will appear in a Smart Collection for that event as that will be the first thing I do after the import. Almost all of my working is then done from the smart collection.

Alan