{"id":510463,"date":"2023-11-30T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-11-30T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lightstalking.com\/?p=510463"},"modified":"2023-11-29T17:09:35","modified_gmt":"2023-11-29T22:09:35","slug":"lightroom-workflow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lightstalking.com\/lightroom-workflow\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Streamline Your Lightroom Workflow to Save Hours"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

There is a well-known acronym called KISS, Keep It Simple, Stupid. Created by the US Navy in the 60s, this tag could also be applied to modern-day photography. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Adobe\u2019s Lightroom<\/a> is probably the widest-used photographic app there is. Its appeal is the seamless integration of image management and nondestructive editing. I have used Lightroom Classic for many years and have a catalog reaching around 80k images.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Recently though I have started to look at my workflow in Lightroom. Like many professional photographers these days, I dabble in multiple revenue streams, stock, prints, and courses to name some.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A large Lightroom catalog can become unwieldy <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

For that reason, I have used Lightroom\u2019s powerful rating tools to isolate, edit, and export my images for each type of genre. The problem is that recently I realized that my workflow has become overly complicated. I tend to use pretty much every cataloging tool available to me, and that\u2019s slowing <\/a>me down. Today, we are going to look at Lightroom\u2019s image management in general and why you should try to streamline your Lightroom workflow. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Look Over the Shoulder of These Experts As They Show You Their Lightroom Workflow<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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#1 Lightroom Made Easy<\/a> by Phil Steele<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Watch Here<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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#2 Decoding Lightroom<\/a> by Adam Welch<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Watch Here<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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#3 The 80\/20 Guide to Lightroom<\/a> by Steve Arnold<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Watch Here<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

The Problems With Over-Complicating Lightroom Workflow <\/h2>\n\n\n\n

There are many potential issues with over-complicating your Lightroom workflow. Even before you start, you may have spread your images over multiple folders on multiple drives and have multiple catalogs. This in turn can make it difficult to sort and find images in your catalog.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Inconsistent importing can be an issue. You might apply metadata to some, copyright info to others, and apply a basic import preset to yet more images. This can lead to extra work in the future if you want your images to have a consistent default metadata and look.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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KISS – Keep It Simple Stupid very much applies to how you store your images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Once imported, the use of Lightroom\u2019s rating system can become very erratic and inconsistent. This can seriously slow down your workflow as you try to remember what a particular rating means. Before we delve any further into a rating workflow<\/a>, let\u2019s take a look at how they work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lightroom\u2019s Image Rating System<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Lightroom\u2019s catalog has three main rating tools. Stars, Colors, and Flags. Let\u2019s quickly break down each.<\/p>\n\n\n\n