LR to Capture One: transfering a large catalog

[froyd]

I'm considering a move to C1 Pro9 from LR5 if Adobe fails to deliver stand alone versions of LR after 6.

The main question that I'm wresting with is transferring my extensive catalog to a new platform. How difficult is it? Does the C1 catalog follow the computer's file structure as LR does? With that file structure remain intact? In Vesrion 8 of C1, not all image edits were transferable (cloning, etc), has this improved with ver 9?

Anyone made the switch and can share some of the experience, aprticularly as it relates to the file management (I'm pretty sure I'll adapt to the editing environment quickly).

 

[:: Mark]

I think it is very difficult. The import will bring in the images and meta data (keywords etc), but not any edits made. The latter is always going to be impossible due to the different raw engines.

I chose to freeze my existing LR catalogue (75k images), keeping a copy of the software needed running. At some point it will become difficult to maintain the software, at which point I will export the processed images and metadata for use in other software. However, since LR is still running I have yet to try this.

If you do try to import a catalogue, do so with caution. A lot of people have had trouble, and the import process is allegedly very very slow. With a large catalogue it is almost inevitable that some photographs might give trouble...

 

[froyd]

Ugh. This is what I feared. I'll start keeping both an edited and an original copy of each image so I can eventually export a version with baked-in edits and one as it came out of the scanner. So far, I 've just kept the edited copy because LR edits just lived in the sidecar and it was easy to revert to the original image of need be.

 

[sevo]

As the tools are not similar, you cannot really hope to transfer a edit from one to the other - even if both makers would cooperate and disclose their algorithms to each other there would be differences that cannot be reconciled.

 

[Scapevision]

you can try embedding the edits in the standalone sidecar files, but I doubt Capture One will read these and apply because of a different engine and tools.

 

[Godfrey]

I have always planned for the possibility that I might need to migrate to other software.

My LR workflow involves using mostly one main catalog for my 'in progress' work (I sometimes create a special catalog for specific projects, then re-incorporate the data in the main catalog later when I'm done). Whenever I finish a rendering, I export a full resolution, full size, 16-bit per component TIFF file as the 'completed' work into a separate directory tree in the computer's file system. A second LR catalog is used to manage all such completed work—no editing allowed, just search in the Library module and sometimes Print.

All of the files, both original and rendered, (including the LR catalogs and all presets) are backed up to two separate archive drives after every editing/work session.

This way, I always have the unedited original file and the fully rendered, finished work. I link them via file naming conventions so that I can always backtrack from rendered work to original capture, and if I have to move to some other software, I at least have not lost all my editing time. I would move as simply as possible, just the original files unedited but with all metadata included.

So ... You can search in LR for all files that have been edited, export them into 16bit TIFFs, and thus ease the transition to C1 if you so choose.

I strongly recommend this workflow anyway: any parametric, lossless editing system is essentially looking at the original file as an interpretable entity, and the interpretations can (and have!) changed as revisions of LR have surfaced. I always what what I have completed as a revision to stand alone without interpretation so that I can get that exact thing repeatedly, regardless what software I use to view or manage it.

G

 

[Calzone]

Godfrey,

Thanks for the thoughtful post.

Any files that I have printed have parallel 16-bit TIFFS and the original DNG file. Good to know that somehow I have made things easy for myself by having sorted out files this way.

Now all I have to do is set up that separate directory like you did.

Cal

 

[ChrisLivsey]

Capture One added on the catalog function fairly recently it is not well integrated nor do users in the Phase One Forums rate it highly either.
It seems to struggle with size and searching in particular.
As a RAW developer using what they call sessions which is a mini catalog per shoot/project/card it is one of the best.