LR Preferences guidance needed

[Charlie Dunton]

In both the DAM book and the DAM video tutorials, Peter went to a lot of trouble to explain the preferences he uses in the various programs. I may have missed it, but I haven't seen preferences for LR discussed here directly. While many of the preferences are rather self-explanatory, I would be very interested in hearing from some of the senior folks about the file management perference settings; in particular, the Preview Cache and the Metadata perferences.

For instance, what are the trade-offs involved in the Preview Cache settings? Are there specific times when one setting would be perferred over another? Obviously, I haven't gotten to the first 30 day period for v1.0 yet, the default for discarding 1:1 perviews, but will I care when that happens? Should I care?

And with Metadata, does automatically writing metadata have a downside? In my case, I use LR for only initial image adjustment, rating, and key wording followed by conversion to DNG by DNG 3.7, followed by import to iVMP. In many threads I seen the advice to "export the metadata and convert to DNG". Is exporting the metadata a wiser policy than writing it automatically?

Any guidance would be greatly appreciated.

Charlie

[Patrick Cox]

These are all questions that I would be interested in others' opinions on.  I don't use IVMP but I am converting to LR.  Thanks!

[Niall Horley]

Most of the preferences I have left at the adobe default as they seam to be quite sensible, I always let lightroom open my most recent library, mind you I have moved the library so that it is backed up. I also let lightroom backup my database every day. For the preview cache I would select a size for the standard size preview that is similar to you monitor. Just bear in mind that the large the preview size the more of your disk it will eat, mind you disks are cheap these days. If you import a shoot, process it then archive it and never look at it again you can discard previews after a shorter time. If however you spend a loot of time looking and reworking old photos perhaps never expiring the previews is a beter option.

I also Make sure that metadata changes are automatically written into the xmp files. As for file name generation I use dashes for illegal characters and _ for spaces. This is more important if you are up loading files onto the web.

I hace also changed the preference so that star ratings and picks are shown in the film strip and also zoom clicked point to the center of the screen, I think that is a neat option.

Thats about my lot, hope it helps.

Niall

[peterkrogh]

Charlie,
There is a downside to always keeping XMP current, and that is speed.  With this option checked, any time you make a change to one or more images, the XMP file (or XMP data inside a DNG, JPEG or TIFF) gets rewritten. THis can slow down the program.

If you're using Lightroom like I am, then all images go through the software for initial adjustment, and then go off for conversion to DNG.  In this case, you only really care that the XMP data reflects the end-state of the adjustments, since that's what will be written in to the DNG.

If you are using LR as your asset manager (still early to do that, IMO), then you still don't really care too much about saving XM changes along the way, since your images will b e viewed and organized within that environment.  THese users will want to make sure to backup the database frequently.

A note about converting to DNG with 3.7.  It works fine for all LR changes except spot healing/Cloning.  I ran through a bunch of images last night with a pretty nasty piece of Sensor Dust , and did the corrections.  The only way to get the DNG built with a preview htat shows the dust removal is to send through ACR4 in CS3. (Ugh, yes, I know).

I'll see if I can post a description of my general settings sometime soon - I have to shoot today and tomorrow, not to mention ACC Basketball this weekend (go Heels)...
Peter

[Charlie Dunton]

Thanks Peter,

That's just what I was looking for. Makes perfect sense.

On the topic of ACC basketball, I fear the third time may be the charm. (Hokie, Hokie, Hokie, Hi)

Charlie