Lightroom...I finally get it.

I've tried out each and every Lightroom version since the beginning and I never thought about migrating and never really seriously watch any demos, etc. just brushing it off.

Last Friday, I was helping out on a wedding and the primary was doing an SDE slideshow on his laptop with an older version of LR. He was lighting fast. Took about 60 images, processed them and put together a slideshow. It was impressive. We spoke about his workflow and how he also used to use Bridge, import into Photoshop,and save for every single photo, and how LR saves him TONS of time.

So I go download a trial of LR5. Get him on chat, create a catalog, import some wedding photos, and begin culling, editing, etc. Any detailed editing I'll of course do it in Photoshop, but I would say 80-90% of the photos can be processed in LR.

Man...what was I thinking?!?

I think I'm a convert!

Just wanted to get that off my chest!

Welcome to the party LR has saved me hours... if not days in processing. I still use Photo Mechanic for culling, as Lightroom is just a bit too slow building previews. It may be faster on lower resolution monitors, but its not nearly as quick as PM.

Thanks Trent!

I put both the catalog and the photos to be edited on separate SSDs so I haven't noticed any lag at all. Pretty responsive going through photos and rating for culling purposes.

I intend to create a new catalog per wedding.

nicksan wrote in post #16305473
Thanks Trent!

I put both the catalog and the photos to be edited on separate SSDs so I haven't noticed any lag at all. Pretty responsive going through photos and rating for culling purposes.

I intend to create a new catalog per wedding.

That would help. I have all of my weddings on a spindle drive and the read times just aren't there for culling. Editing wise, I do not notice any lag.

Lightroom is the bomb. I wouldn't do this with out it. I did a wedding with 1700 files this weekend is 8 hrs start to finish and ready to print. We imported 2200, culled and edited the whole thing is 8 hrs.. I love that program. I will need to ask you about the slideshows. Have not done those yet.

Here is an Adobe tutorial on slideshows:
http://tv.adobe.com …om-5-publish-a-slideshow/

Just be careful about the bug - if your exported JPG size is less than 1/3 of the original size, it does not save the final sharpening and noise reduction changes. So your JPGs won't come out like your RAWs look on the screen. You just need to save it a pixel larger than 1/3 of your original size for now. I understand that the bug will be fixed in 5.2. It is not a big deal for amateurs like me, but for professionals like you, it may be really important to be aware of this.

nicksan wrote in post #16305473
...I intend to create a new catalog per wedding.

If creating new catalogs works for those seasoned in Lightroom - I would not presume to suggest otherwise.

However as you are still advancing on your Lightroom journey of discovery - I have watched a few tutorials regarding organizing, specifically from Julianne Kost of Adobe and she encourages just using 1 master catalog. I have did this myself and find it easier to manage, especially from a back-up perspective - one Catalog to manage.

For different weddings, you could consider grouping them in stacks, or smart collections, etc. Just a few thoughts to consider.

Much easier keeping separate catalogs when shooting weddings.

It was suggested to me to create a separate catalog per wedding actually so that's what I am going to do. It makes sense. I don't really need organization across weddings but just within a wedding.

nicksan wrote in post #16306043
It was suggested to me to create a separate catalog per wedding actually so that's what I am going to do. It makes sense. I don't really need organization across weddings but just within a wedding.

You can archive everything all in one go then all in the same place for each wedding. No broken links etc.

The SDE slideshow is fantastic for immediate ooohs and aaahs plus garnering potential future business. I usually load the ceremony files into my netbook which has Lr3 in it. Cull out test shots and run a quick preset edit. All while on the drive from the church to the reception. This past weekend, I shot a wedding where the reception was in the banquet hall on the church grounds. I found the best time to load/cull/edit/create the slideshow is while everyone is eating.

Feel free to read through the number of posts from users to end up with issues when using multiple catalogs. I'm sure there are plenty who do it, but it's something that I was going to recommend against as well. I don't see any benefit of doing so. You can simply organize all of your weddings into a weddings folder, and have subfolders for specific weddings under that. Then, anytime you want to gather multiple images across multiple weddings, they can all be accesses from the same location (catalog)... just navigate to the appropriate folder.

I watched an episode of The Grid a few weeks ago, and they talked about organization of image folders... I'll try to find it again and post the link. That said, I think it would be well worth it for you to pick up a good book on LR - I can't explain how much it helped me to understand some of the finer details and inner workings. I got The Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Book for Digital Photographers by Scott Kelby. Pick your version: http://www.amazon.com …=Lightroom+bo%2​Caps%2C224

Alright, so after some searching I found the episode The Grid here (the discussion starts at around 17:00; note that the discussion here is mainly about how to best organize your folders):

http://kelbytv.com …ography-with-anna-nguyen/

The episode references this article:
http://lightroomkiller​tips.com/?p=4974

Which references this article about catalogs specifically:
http://lightroomkiller​tips.com/?p=4925

I've been using a single catalog for well over 2 years now. For me, if I were to create separate catalogs, they would be for individual genres... maybe one for weddings, one for seniors, another for family portraits, etc. However, for now, I just do the same thing with folders. YMMV.

memoriesoftomorrow wrote in post #16306045
You can archive everything all in one go then all in the same place for each wedding. No broken links etc.

The guy was telling me he creates a LR catalog for each wedding and puts the catalog in the folder for that wedding. So it's all in one place. He doesn't care about keeping a catalog across weddings.

Is that what you are talking about?