Joseph- Here's my set up and what I would like to do. If you have a better format or other suggestions, I'm all ears! OK, I have a 15in MBP laptop and a 24 inch monitor. My MBP is hooked up to a 500MB TimeCaspule/Air Express-which is full up already. My Aperture library has all managed files from both my prior iPhoto collection and what I have been doing over the past almost 2 years-almost 12,500 photos. I would say that about 85-90% of them were jpegs from prior P&S and T1i Canon cameras. The last 6-8 months I have been shooting RAW. I have space on my MBP HD as managed but I'd like to either a) move these present photos to an external HD as referenced files and upload new photos as managed, b) keep them on my MBP and start uploading all new photos to an external HD as referenced files, or c) make all of them past and future, referenced files. Oh, I do have a 1TB portable HD (at home) and a 500MB portable HD (off site) to back up my photos. So what I was thinking of doing was getting an larger external HD (I was looking at the G Tech 2TB G Safer external HD array [actually 2 2TBs mirrored with one backing up the other]). So my question is how do I go about doing this and does the setup I am looking at make sense. I would probably need some sort of hub to my 800 firewire port on the MBP for my card reader (or can I connect the card reader directly to the external HD)? I have read about managed v referenced files both in the aperture manual and your “15 Tips..” tutorial. However, I am a little OCD in that I'd like to do things right and make sure the setup is efficient and that I don't have unnecessary equipment or set things up that creates extra steps in my workflow. So there you have it. any advise would be greatly appreciated!
Florian
Joseph & Stu- Thanks for the input. Joseph, I have a SanDisk 800 FW CF card reader. By daisy chaining, I’m assuming the card reader would plug directly into a port on the external HD. If that’s the case, when I insert a CF card will my MBP recognize it and automatically open A3, like it does now, or will I have to open A3 first then select import and find the CF card? It’s not that big of a deal and if I do not have to spend money on a hub that in reality I’ll may only be using for two,possibly three devices (external HD, card reader and a back up of site portable HD) I’d rather put the money towards something else (camera equipment, of course!). Thanks again.
Florian
Florian Cortese
www.fotosbyflorian.com
Florian,
If you have Aperture set to launch on mount of a CF card, then it doesn’t matter how it’s connected. Once the OS sees that card, it will launch Aperture.
@PhotoJoseph
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:)
Florian Cortese
www.fotosbyflorian.com
Joseph, I’ll may be purchasing my external HD soon. Actually, I’m waiting to see what the new Canon 5D Mark III looks like and it’s cost first. Anyway, I have my libraries set up as folders with the year as the title, e.g., “2010 Photos”. Inside those folders are my projects which are titled in a yyyy/mm/dd format. So if I understand the relocation process correctly, I would create a folder on the external HD entitled 2010 Photos, then I would select the 2010 project(s) in Aperture Library folder 2010 Photos and start the relocation process selecting the 2010 Photos folder on the external HD as the destination location. I am assuming I could SHIFT-CLICK and select all of the 2010 projects and they would be transferred in tact as individual projects and not just a mass of all of the photos.
Florian
Florian Cortese
www.fotosbyflorian.com
Florian,
It’s actually easier than that.
Create a folder on your new HD titled “Aperture Masters” or something similarly obvious.
In Aperture, you can select your 2010 photos folder, or you entire Library and do it all at once.
When you choose the Relocate Masters command, you’ll point to the “Aperture Masters” folder, and then choose a subfolder format of yyyy/mm/dd and Aperture will automatically move all your masters into appropriate folders, creating the folders as needed.
If that’s not the flow you want, let me know… I didn’t re-read this entire thread before responding to this last question :)
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Joseph- Thanks. I had moved my iPhote pictures into Aperture when I purchased it so I have pictures dating back to the early 20’s, but began organizing them in folders by years. I’d like to keep 2011 and 2012 as managed and move all of the rest. So I’l probably do it by years or groups of years into a single “aperture masters” folder on the new HD. In the selection process of selecting the photos you want to send to the external HD, I am assuming you could COMMAND-CLICK each folder or SHIFT-CLICK a selected group of folders
and all of the projects in those folders would be moved.
Thanks again.
Florian
Florian Cortese
www.fotosbyflorian.com
Florian,
Early 20’s?! Oh, early 2000’s hehe…
Yes, you can shift or command click on projects and you’ll see all of their content in the browser. Be sure you’re filter is set to ALL photos, and not just “unrated or above”, or you’ll leave all your rejects in the Library.
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Florian,
I would move all older photos (let’s say more than six months old) to an external drive to make them referenced, and continue to work managed for your new projects. Then as you run low on space, or just every six months or so, move anything older off to the external HD. That way you’ll still have your most recent work available for full editing.
You could make a Smart Album that always shows you images older than 6 months (or whatever you want) and are managed, so that way you’d be able to click on a single Smart Album and immediately see what needed to be relocated. Here’s a [screenshot] of a Smart Album I just built to do that. Be sure you set it to “ALL of the following” (I forgot to highlight that in the screenshot). Those criteria,Date and File Status, can be added from the gear drop-down.
Once you have photos selected, to move them just choose File > Relocate Masters and move them to your external drive.
It sounds like you’ve read the ebooks, but be sure you choose a structure in the Finder that makes sense and don’t put them all in a flat folder hierarchy. I like yyyy/mm/dd but of course you can do whatever you like.
Remember too that if you have Previews enabled, you’ll be able to see a pretty good sized version of images that are offline when you’re away from your external HD, but even without previews you’ll still see a 1024x thumbnail. If you haven’t yet, read this article to answer any questions on Previews: “A Comprehensive Look at Thumbnails, Previews, and More in Aperture 3”.
Does that answer all your questions?
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Florian,
Another update to the Smart Album I suggested you make. I forgot that this could include files that are shared on flickr, Facebook etc. as those previews are cached in the Library and will show up as managed files. Here’s my more extensive “Managed” Smart Album that I use on my personal library, with no time restrictions, which I occasionally check in case I accidentally got something in there as Managed: [screenshot]
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Joseph- Thanks that helps a lot! Three questions. When moving older projects, etc, I have them grouped by year and I do use the yyyy/mm/dd set up like you have recommended (I read most of your material and downloaded them before I even loaded A3 onto my computer). Can I select say a whole year with all of the projects, folders etc and then relocate the masters en masse or do I have to do that individually? If those relocated files are part of an existing smart album, do they remain in the smart album?Secondly, I believe you use a firewire hub to connect your HD(s) to your computer. Do you recommend a particular one? Thirdly, I am assuming that by using recent photos as managed on my MBP, my card reader would have to be hooked up to my MBP, hence the possible need for a FW hub.
thanks again. This is a huge help.
Florian
Florian Cortese
www.fotosbyflorian.com
Hi Florian,
You asked about the Firewire hub. I am sure Joseph will reply to your question, but in the mean time I am using the NitroAV 8-Port FireWire 800/1394b Professional Hub and Repeater. Have it connected to my MacBook Pro 2.66 (June 2009). I have had up to 6 Firewire 800 drives connected at once. So far I have had no problems. Joseph did report about Nitro within his blog back on February 9, 2011.
When I purchased this product it was $149. Looks like it the price has now increased to $156.95.
I go back and forth between Aperture 3 & Lightroom 3 (testing Lightroom 4 Beta) with all photos stored on external Firewire 800 drives.
Best,
Stu
Stuart
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Google+: https://plus.google.com/+StuartSchaefer/
Florian,
For the hub; yep the one Stu recommended is the one I’m using. It’s been a champ. However if you’re only talking about a drive with a card reader, chances are you won’t need the hub as most drives have dual FW800 ports specifically so that you can daisy chain. But what CF card reader to you have? There aren’t many FW800 ones out there, and in fact I think there aren’t any being made right now. Lexar discontinued theirs due to problems with it and they recommend the USB one now. I’ve had issues with my FW ones before (although a lot less — maybe none?! — since dropping my Drobo) yet the USB one never fails.
FW800 hubs aren’t cheap and unless you do a lot of work, you may be better off just getting a USB card reader. That’s assuming of course that you can’t daisy chain. And to your point, if you’re importing all current images as managed, then you shouldn’t need to have the FW drive connected at the same time anyway.
As far as selections go, you can select any number of projects simultaneously and all their contents will load in the browser. If the Library pane is still “in focus” (meaning that’s the one that is currently being controlled by the keyboard) then the Relocate command will relocate everything in the selected project(s).
Relocating has no effect on Smart Albums since you aren’t changing anything in the Aperture library layout. It’s just the masters that are moving, and Smart Albums don’t look at the masters, they look at what’s visible in Aperture.
And remember if you follow my tip on moving everything more than [insert number of days/months/years] by building a Smart Album to show you that for the entire Library, then you can do ALL of the migration at once. No need to select individual projects.
@PhotoJoseph
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