Help me understand how Lightroom lives in my computer.....

[mom2rtk]

I'm trying to clean up my computer a bit. I keep all of my photos and other documents on external hard drives. But the internal hard drive on my computer seems quite full. So upon investigation, I see I have lots of photos in the "My Photos" section of my C drive (about 700GB). I really have no idea how they got there since I have all of those photos on external drives. I didn't download them to the "My Pictures" folder but they are there.

I just don't understand how Lightroom works when I "import" photos enough to know whether I can delete them from the "My pictures" folder safely, or if they need to reside there for Lightroom to access them.

 

[havoc315]

You should be able to keep them all on your external drive, just slows down your process a bit. When you import them, where are you importing them too? Do you import them onto your C-drive or the external drive? If you are importing them onto the C-drive, you may want to move the entire import folder onto the external drive, through lightroom. Make the move through lightroom, so that lightroom knows where to find the files, instead of moving them through your file explorer.

 

[TheBigE]

In Lightroom you can view your Catalog Settings and this will show you where Lightroom is brining the files in on your computer when you do the import. As @havoc315 15 if you want to move to an external drive that is not issue, just make sure you do the move IN LIGHTROOM. This way Lightroom knows where the files are located.

I use an external drive as well, but I import to my computer first and then do all my Post Processing that I need to on the photos. Once I have completed PP and anything else (FB posts, Photobooks, etc), I then go in and move the photos to the external drive. I also then back up the external drive to another drive just to make sure I have two copies of the photos.

This works well as I can work on my computer with the photos until I am done and do not have to worry about bringing my external drive with me everywhere I go. Good luck

 

[mom2rtk]

Thank you both! That's a big relief to know I can move these around without messing up the paths in Lightroom.

I love Lightroom, but have to confess I really have never understood that part of it very well.

I start by just putting my photos (by date) on files on my external drive(s). I import them in to Lightroom, but never understood that it actually copies that photo into a new spot. That's a lot of room on my computer! I'm sure since I didn't select a different spot that it just defaulted to putting those copies in the "My Pictures" section of my internal drive.

I'll order an extra external drive and see if I can figure out how to move those over.

I'm sure I'll be back here soon with more questions. Thanks!

 

[mom2rtk]

I'm bumping my thread back up looking for a little assistance. I have my new external hard drive and have put off this task for as long as I should. My computer has been a little wonky lately and I'm thinking it's time to move the files and see if it behaves better with more space freed up on the internal hard drive.

I found where my Lightroom files are on my C drive. But the file folder called "Lightroom" as big as I expected. What's taking up so much room are all the folders in "My Photos" that must have been put there through the import process.

I know Havoc said to move them through Lightroom so it knows how to follow them there, but I'm not sure where to start.

Anyone care to help?

 

[havoc315]

In your library, you may need to add the external hard drive... not sure if I had to do that originally. But after that, just drag folders, in your library, from your c-drive to the external drive. That will move the folders and files.

 

[mom2rtk]

In your library, you may need to add the external hard drive... not sure if I had to do that originally. But after that, just drag folders, in your library, from your c-drive to the external drive. That will move the folders and files.

Thanks Havoc! I actually nosed around online and just watched a couple tutorials. And that's what I'm in the middle of doing right now. I did have to add the new drive. I really wish I had known what I was doing when I first started using Lightroom. I never really used it for cataloging my photos, really just stuck with what I was doing before and used it for the editing. And yes I know the cataloging feature is one of its greatest assets....

Do you know if Lightroom will know to put any new photos I import on that new drive or do I need to somehow tell it that I now want them to go on this new drive?

 

[havoc315]

Thanks Havoc! I actually nosed around online and just watched a couple tutorials. And that's what I'm in the middle of doing right now. I did have to add the new drive. I really wish I had known what I was doing when I first started using Lightroom. I never really used it for cataloging my photos, really just stuck with what I was doing before and used it for the editing. And yes I know the cataloging feature is one of its greatest assets....

Do you know if Lightroom will know to put any new photos I import on that new drive or do I need to somehow tell it that I now want them to go on this new drive?

when you import, you select the location. You'll need to select the external drive.... but...
I'd recommend importing on to the c drive. It's much slower editing photos if they are on the external drive.
Basically, I do all my importing on to the c drive. Then every few months, I move the folders.

 

[mom2rtk]

when you import, you select the location. You'll need to select the external drive.... but...
I'd recommend importing on to the c drive. It's much slower editing photos if they are on the external drive.
Basically, I do all my importing on to the c drive. Then every few months, I move the folders.

That makes a lot of sense! And now that my internal drive has about 750GB of free space again, there's no reason for me not to do the same. I back up all my hard drives a couple times a year. I'll just move those files over from the C drive to the external when I do that.

Thanks for the help!