Hi there, first post here… Looks like a great site!!
I have about 6TB of images on my thunderbolt RAID system at home. I have them all in my aperture library as referenced files. That seems to work ok for me in the Studio. But when I travel, I want to take say my last 4 or so projects and be able to work on them while on the road. When I get back, I want to be able to merge it back into my studio library…
So I need to pull the reference files and the aperture library data to my laptop. Edit them and then when I get back, put them back, plus the changes and add any additional files that were created by photoshop edit etc.
Is there a clean way to do this?
Many thanks,
Nick
Nick,
Sure, you just have to be sure you follow the steps carefully so you don’t end up with duplicates. I do this often.
Couple of ways you could do this…
1. Export the projects you need, and include masters, so it’s a managed library
2. Copy that project to your other Mac.
3. Do what you’re gonna do, but avoid importing new images. I’d do that in a separate library. It’s cleaner.
4. When you get home, relocate all managed files out of the library. Doesn’t matter where you put them. They will be discarded.
5. Copy the edited library to your desktop Mac (it has no masters now so should go quick)
6. reconnect masters back to the original masters on your Tb drive
7. merge with your main library
Another way would be…
1. Export masters for project you want to export
2. Export projects as new library
3. copy both masters and library to other computer
4. reconnect library to masters
5…
then pick up on step 5 from above. Basically you choose to make the masters referenced from the start, or later, it doesn’t really matter
@PhotoJoseph
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Thank you so much… I am going to give this a whirl..
It is going to be a lifesaver…
Nick
Joseph, I am interested to know why you suggest:
1) to avoid importing any new photos to the “library on the go”?
2) to do the whole relocate masters, copy library to base-station Mac, merge libraries, instead of just moving the “on the go managed” library to the base-station Mac and then merging it with the original library?
I have done this (exported Project as a new library incl. masters), worked on it (did not import any new photos , but it was by chance, not on purpose) and then just merged it with the original library and all seemed to be ok.
I am not questioning your solution, I’m just interested to understand why. Thanks
Jan,
(still getting used to the new terminology of “originals” instead of “masters” so forgive me if I interchange them)
The whole starting point is from a referenced library. So if you export a new library to take on the road, you need the masters/originals to go with it. Making that managed is an easy way to move those originals. However if you then merge that library back to the main library, you will be merging masters/originals back in. You now have two original files (OK maybe I don’t like this new “original” name… hmmm) — one in the library (managed) and the original ones outside the library (referenced).
At this point you would want to relocate the originals out of the managed library, to return it to referenced. But if you relocate them to the same location as the original maters, then you will have duplicates. Aperture will handle this fine, but you will have 2x the originals in the Finder.
By moving to referenced and discarding the originals before the re-merge (option 1), or keeping the travel library referenced all the time (option 2), you can avoid that problem.
The only reason I suggest keeping a separate library for new imports is because you would be adding the further step of separating the old files from the new ones when doing your original file shuffle. This is confusing and could lead to lost files if you’re not careful. I think it’s safe to keep it separate, and do the transfer and merge to your primary library in two steps — one for the exported, temp files, and one for the new ones.
@PhotoJoseph
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Hi Joseph,
Like Jan, I export project (w/ originals) from a referenced library, make adjustments on another system, and merge in the modified library quite often. To clarify, when you say there’s 2x the originals in the Finder, are you referring to “extra” originals in the managed, exported library? My last step after a merge is to trash the exported library (once I’m certain my backups are done, of course. :)
I’d just done this in the morning, went old school and used the UNIX ‘find’ command to check for duplicate originals. Indeed, the only ones found were my referenced master for the main Aperture library and the “extra” in the exported/imported library. Hoping I’m understanding all this and not eating up disk space unnecessarily…
Scott
http://scottdavenportphoto.com/
Scott,
So you create a small managed library from your main referenced library… do your work then merge the small library back into the big one. Don’t the managed originals come into the main library as well, so you now have managed projects where you don’t want them?
The duplicates would come when you relocated those now-managed originals out of the library.
Heck maybe I’ve been overworking it all these years…
-Joseph
@PhotoJoseph
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Right. What I see is when the small, managed library is created (File -> Export -> Project as New Library), a *copy* of the originals is made and put into the exported library. My referenced original is still in place, where I expect it to be in the Finder, as I expect it to be in Aperture. “Show in Finder” looks good, “Locate Referenced Files…” looks good.
When I merge back into the main referenced library, there’s no duplication. Aperture evidently “just gets it right”. Once I delete the small, managed library I exported, no duplicates.
More details on my steps:
http://sdaven.blogspot.com/2012/01/aperture-workflow-update-library.html
Scott
http://scottdavenportphoto.com/
Scott,
So you’re merging a managed library into a referenced one, and Aperture is leaving the manage files behind because it already has referenced ones to look at?
That’s very clever… wish I’d thought of that ;-)
@PhotoJoseph
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First time posting and trying hard to get this right,Same deal bought new iMac from Mac Book Pro,(Love it) Now trying to work with one library,Not understanding the Exporting back to the MBP.or how.I’m missing something.Any help is appreciated.
Paul
Paul
Another option is to keep the library on an external disk drive. Only connect it to one computer at a time. Works like a charm. Also lets you keep multiple duplicates of the drive for onsite and offsite backups.
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I do keep the whole library on a external drive and usually work on the iMac but when going to the MBP i have to reload the complete library again and delete the old,can’t figure out the way to work on the MBP and merge everything,I’m not understanding how to update both computers without loading the external disk library again from the start and deleting old library.I know it’s got to be a simple solution.and i’m missing something.Thanks again
Paul
Paul
Scott, Joseph;
my workflow was in line with Scott’s workflow, but reading the explanation by Joseph, I see his logic. Now I have to test it at home to see if it works as described by Scott. I used that workflow before but never thought of checking if I have the same original(master) as managed and referenced.
So just to summarize, Scott, you work like this?
1) Main Library is Referenced
2) you export sub library in which you included originals/masters thus getting a managed smaller library “for on the go”
3) work on the new small managed library
4) then merge new small managed library into Main Referenced Library
5) Changes are transferred (merged) into Main Referenced Library but you still retain only one set of referenced originals/masters? In other words, no duplication of originals/masters in the Main Referenced Library?
Hi Jan,
Yes, that’s an accurate summary. I’ll stipulate at times during the workflow, there are two copies of originals. But the second copy is transitory and easily done away with.
At the risk of over-explaining, I’ll walk through an example. There’s a MAIN system using a referenced library, and a MOBILE system for on-the-go work. For this example, we’ll take project “Foo” on the road, do some work, then merge it back into the main Aperture library.
1. On the MAIN system, export “Foo” as a library, checking the box to include the originals. Once the export is complete, there are two sets of originals on the MAIN system. A set referenced by the main Aperture library and a set included in the managed “Foo” library.
2. Move the “Foo” library to the MOBILE system. MAIN has its initial set of referenced originals. MOBILE has a set managed within “Foo”.
3. Do work on “Foo” on the MOBILE system.
4. Move “Foo” from MOBILE to MAIN. Once again, MAIN has two sets of originals, the initial referenced set and the set within with “Foo” library.
5. Merge “Foo” in the the main Aperture library. Aperture does “the right thing” and folds in the adjustments and metadata into the main library. There’s no copy of originals made from “Foo” - the referenced originals continue to be used.
6. Trash the “Foo” library. Once done, MAIN has a single set of referenced originals.
After doing the above, I’ve done a full system search for duplicate masters (in Finder and at the UNIX level) and I don’t find any duplicates. Interested to hear if your testing shows the same.
-scott
Scott
http://scottdavenportphoto.com/
Hi Scott and all others;
I CONFIRM that the above described workflow works as described by you. Nice to have that confirmed!
Cheers
Jan
That’s really great, thanks for that. I just never bothered trying I guess ;-) Silly me!
-Joseph
@PhotoJoseph
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Use the Finder to navigate to the folder containing the library on the external drive. Double-click the library and Aperture will open it. All your changes will be made directly in that library. When you are done, exit Aperture, eject the drive, move the drive to the other computer, plug it in, use Finder to navigate to the folder containing the library, and double-click the library.
No merging multiple libraries. No copying libraries to/from the external drive. Just use the library directly on the external drive. Aperture doesn’t care whether the drive is an internal or external drive as long as the library is locally attached to the computer. I don’t think Aperture likes (trusts) using libraries over network mapped drives for data integrity reasons.
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