 The Catalog is Lightroom’s main application for organizing and storing your Image files and edits.  Lightroom is not a “file browser” application like many photo editing programs, it is a database system with the capacity to track all your images at any given time. The “Catalog” is the name of Lightroom’s library database.  Unlike Photoshop, you never have to “save” with Lightroom because the catalog set-up means you never change the original file, so there are no alterations to a file to save.  The catalog system stores all your edits as “metadata edits” separate from the image data. This is why when you open an image from your Lightroom picture folder, without opening Lightroom, you do not see the changes you made. You need to open your catalog to see the edited versions.  You can always export JPEGs. Lightroom copies the original file and all it’s metadata and compresses them into a JPEG file showing the edits you applied. The Catalog

The Catalog Continued  When you put the Lightroom application/program onto your computer, It automatically creates a catalog in the “Picture” folder called “Lightroom.”  The computers in our lab have a regular default Lightroom Catalog on them.  For this class you created a separate catalog in which all your images for this class reside.  Your catalog for this class is called Yourname+Lightroom which contains Yourname+Cat And Yourname+Pictures.

IMPORTANT: Only the photos you imported into your catalog should be in Yourname+picture folder If you intend to keep other images on your drive, you should create a new folder on your drive named “Pictures Main” in which to put image folders not yet imported into Lightroom.

When you work on your images in the SCC Photo Lab, you must be sure your are working in your personal catalog. If you sit down in the lab, turn on the computer, and launch Lightroom, you are working in The labs default Lightroom Catalog, not your personal one. DO NOT LAUNCH LIGHTROOM FROM THE DOCK OR FROM APPLICATIONS ALWAYS OPEN LIGHTROOM FROM YOUR EXTERNAL DRIVE double click Your drive

Navigate to your Catalog file

Chose the file containing Yourname+Cat.lrcat Double click on icon or file name

IMPORTANT: During the import of images into Lightroom, place image files into the “Yourname+picture” folder (“Source” top right) and into a subfolder describing the images, i.e. #1 Abstracts (Destination Panel>check Into Subfolder> Into one folder. Lightroom knows where to find these images files. If you move them, Lightroom Will not know where they are and you will have to redirect Lightroom to them.

If you move your picture files, delete your pictures files, or open Lightroom without the drive containing your files You will see “?” + “… offline or missing”

Click on the question mark Click the “Locate” And use the finder window To tell LR where the images Are.