The forum does seem to be terribly quiet and I also get the impression everything is moving in the direction of Lightroom, which slightly concerns me, even as an existing user. My concern follows the recent move to a subscription model by Adobe for Photoshop and though Lightroom isn't currently included how long until that becomes the case? My entire Raw archive has been converted to DNG and I'm wondering how safe that is at this point.

Ashley

I forgot to add that I am using LR4 but I don't think it has changed since LR3.

Having read the DAM book my Raw files are named like this: Karyl_Raw_120415_V5F7835.dng. All I want to do is have Lightroom automatically insert Der in place of Raw in the file name when I export to a different format but none of the file renaming options seem to manage this. Does anybody know how this is done? At this stage I'm doing it afterwards using an app called Rename or I change the name manually when saving again from Photoshop but I can't help feeling they should already have the Der identifier when exported from Lightroom.

Thanks

Ashley

I've just come across something called Adobe Drive 3 at Macupdate and wondered if anybody has tried this? I've been relying on Lightroom until now.

http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/detail.jsp?ftpID=5166&PID=3146232

If you look around there are some clear signs that the days of data storage on discs may be rather fewer than many of us had previously imagined. I've come to this conclusion after piecing together a few recent news stories and wondering what impact this will have on us as photographers in the long term.

For example Ford has just announced that new cars will not be fitted with a CD player. Instead they will include a USB point for MP3 players and wi-fi connections to access music via the internet. Just now Apple has released the latest Mac Mini with no optical drive, telling us we don't need one nowadays because we can always download installers from the internet. All their software is now only available via download with no physical disc like before. There is no mention of DVDs for other purposes but I guess they want us to buy those via their iTunes store...

To make all of this feasible I guess a massive leap will need to be made in supporting technologies that would allow everything to be stored online because at present most of us are not there in terms of broadband connections if we need to upload several gigs of files on a daily basis. Personally I am not wild about the idea of storing everything online and I like the idea of keeping something on a separate medium rather than just relying on hard drives. Does anybody have any thoughts about where we are headed over the next few years and how best to adapt?

I'll bet that was a moment of stress but nevertheless I am convinced that DNG is the right way forward and I now convert all .CR2 files to DNG on import to Lightroom. Once it's all on the drive and backup up to a second drive the files on the flash card are deleted and I've never had a problem.

The good thing about conversion to DNG is that is also verifies the original image for any kind of file corruption so you are able to weed out any potential issues at the same time.

I have found the answer to this problem but the cause is truly baffling and unexpected. My 1DsII has changed the format of the file names for some inexplicable reason and is now substituting an X in place of the original underscore. Yesterday I received a brand new computer so I did a clean install and to try and resolve this problem I created a new catalogue from scratch but the problem was still there. Then I found out why.

Lightroom is working fine but I have no idea why my 1DsII is suddenly naming files in a different format.

On import Lightroom is messing up the file renaming since 3.4.1 and adding an X in place of an underscore for no obvious reason.

I am suddenly having a problem getting Lightroom to use my import settings properly since the 3.4.1 update running 10.6.7. It is now naming my files incorrectly, which I just mentioned at the Adobe forums and I wondered if others here might be seeing something similar? http://forums.adobe.com/thread/867435?tstart=0

I am sorry I don't have any suggestions at the moment but I have just been thinking along the same lines. I did see a Sony model on Amazon that seemed to be getting good reviews but I really need to do some more research because my knowledge of blu-ray is just about zero. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sony-BDX-S500U-Blu-ray-Writer-External/dp/B0042X8PA8/ref=sr_1_6

I am torn between the convenience of blu-ray and wondering about the wisdom of placing so much data on one disc.

Thanks Bob, this is starting to make more sense now and I have just spent half a hour studying some video tutorials on youtube. I think the right way to start is by setting basic smart collections with simple criteria and then refining them over time as required using the edit feature. I no longer have any interest in stock photography, so I think there are certain images that I will keyword in different ways now that means more to me doing a search than if it were merely being done for some photo library.

Thanks John, that makes a lot of sense. So far I haven't made any use at all of collections but I guess it's the obvious way to move forward, so you have just one catalogue but creating collections for specific jobs to cut down on clutter. I shall have to spend some time and discover the various ins and outs of working with collections in Lightroom, since there appears to be various options.

Does anybody here have any views on the relative pros and cons of having more than one catalogue in Lightroom? At present I have just one catalogue for all my images and sometimes I wonder if there is a better way when I find myself scrolling through work images I have just done for an assignment mixed in by date alongside shots my daughter has taken of the dog on her compact camera or whatever. There are loads of images in the catalogue that I don't want to delete but equally I see no real reason to view them every day while scrolling through folders to reach my work images. I presume others have similar situations with their catalogues, especially if they shoot a wide range of subjects. 

Thanks

Ashley 

Hi Neil,
There is definitely a knack to working with Dragon Dictate and occasionally I come unstuck, either due to an error that I don't spot or because my brain simply goes blank and I can't think of what to say. The initial training period with Dragon Dictate is very fast and can be completed in around 15 minutes, however the more you use it the better it becomes and the greater the accuracy. It's vital however, that you correct any errors as you're going along using the recognition window otherwise it will repeatedly make the same mistakes. The chief problem with any software of this kind is that it can't use logic in quite the same way as we do when speaking to decipher garbled words, so you do have to try and speak clearly, though it is perfectly possible to speak at a normal pace.

One thing that helps greatly with Dragon Dictate is to feed it samples of your existing writing so that it learns the way that you put words and phrases together. You can also add your own custom words, which will be particularly useful as a photographer because you will probably be using words that wouldn't be found in a dictionary. For example when writing about lighting I have trained the software to recognise the difference between "D-Lites" and "delights". Although there is a subtle difference in the pronunciation the software still needed me to add D-Lites to the dictionary so that it can make a correct judgement.

I think there is no doubt we are all feeling a degree of day-to-day pressure simply trying to manage our businesses and I have often seen myself looking at other photographers only to wonder how the heck they manage and where they find the time. Sometimes I try to delegate tasks to others but this is rarely been a successful as I would like, however I would encourage you to look at the various parts of your work and see if there are areas that can be effectively farmed out to others at an economically viable rate. For example I know a couple of photographers who have all their clipping path work done by a company in Thailand and they both say they are very happy, though for some reason I persist in losing time by trying to do it myself Sometimes you just have to let go and allow others to do part of the work or you end up going crazy.

Unfortunately work beckons so I will have to end here but I'll try and take another look at Lightroom this evening. Good luck with it all.

Ashley

Thanks again for your kind assistance Matt. Although I keyword all my images I do it mainly so that I can search the archives when needed, so I try to strike a sensible balance to ensure I don't spend hours keywording images that I will never even search for later on. With that said most images will have at least 4 to 5 keywords just to ensure I can find them if needed. In the past I used to keyword images for the purpose of image licensing through photo libraries but I've really lost all interest in that nowadays with the current state of the market and ever declining sale prices. Hopefully there is some kind of good tutorial explanation on how to setup a smart collections. Good luck with those 1100 images!

Ashley