Ut idag igen, jag får mina steg, idag blev det ca 6 km i makligt tempo. Start vid Solsidans restaurang och ner mot plåtbron vid spannmåls silon och tillbaka.
Backup Lightroom
>> Lightroomqueen backups <<
The Catalog
Your catalog(s) have a *.lrcat extension. They hold all of the information about your photos, including all of the work you’ve done on the photos within Lightroom, so it’s essential that you include your catalog in your backups.
By default it’s stored at:
Windows—C: \ Users \ [your username] \ My Pictures \ Lightroom \ Lightroom 6 Catalog.lrcat
Mac—Macintosh HD / Users / [your username] / Pictures / Lightroom / Lightroom 6 Catalog.lrcat
But stop! You may have changed the name or location of your catalog, so open Lightroom and go to Edit menu (Windows) / Lightroom menu (Mac) and select Catalog Settings.
In the General tab, it will tell you the name and location of your current catalog, and the Show button will open to that location in Explorer (Windows) / Finder (Mac).
In Lightroom CC/6, backups are automatically zipped if they’re under 4GB in size.
The Previews
The previews are stored in the same location as the catalog.
It’s a folder (Windows) / package file (Mac) with Previews.lrdata at the end of the name.
If you have available backup space, backing them up would save time rebuilding them, and if you deleted your original photos accidentally, they may be the only copy left.
That said, the previews would be rebuilt on demand as long as you have the original photos, and they do take up a lot of space.
If you run a versioned backup system, which keeps additional copies each time a file changes, you may want to exclude the previews as they change constantly and will rapidly fill your backup hard drives.
The Catalog Backups
By default, Lightroom offers to back up your catalog once a week when you close Lightroom, and it keeps each of those backups.
They’re stored in a Backups folder next to the catalog, but you may have changed the location.
In Lightroom CC/6, the backups are zipped (compressed).
To check the current location, open the Catalog Settings dialog, which you’ll find under Edit menu (Windows) / Lightroom menu (Mac), and change the Backup pop-up to When Lightroom Next Exits.
Then close Lightroom and the backup dialog will appear.
There you can view and change the current location of the catalog backups.
When you visit that folder using Explorer/Finder, you’ll notice that Lightroom never deletes your older backups.
You can delete older backups yourself to free additional hard drive space.
I would recommend keeping at least the most recent backups, in addition to some slightly older ones (i.e. 1 month, 6 months, 1 year), just in case you later discover you’ve accidentally overwritten some settings or removed some photos from your catalog.
The catalogs zip to around 10% of their original size, if you’re concerned about the amount of hard drive space consumed by backups (this happens automatically on Lightroom CC/6).
The Photos
Of course backing up your photos is essential.
Remember, the photos aren’t “in” Lightroom, but are stored as normal files on your hard drive.
Make sure you back your working files up using their current folder structure, in case you ever have to restore a backup.
The ‘Make a second copy’ backups are only a temporary backup, and since they’re stored in a completely different folder structure, they’re extremely time-consuming to attempt to restore in the case of a disaster.
Don’t forget, you’ll want to include your edited files (i.e. the ones created by Edit in Photoshop or other external editors) in your backups too.
If you’re not sure where you’re photos are stored, right-click on your parent folder in the Folders panel and select
Show in Explorer (Windows) / Show in Finder (Mac) to take you directly to that folder.
If your photos are a long list, rather than a hierarchy, you may want to use Show Parent Folder in order to more easily visualise how your folders in Lightroom relate to the folders in Explorer/Finder.
Your Presets & Templates
You’ll also want to back up your presets, whether they’re ones you’ve downloaded or presets that you’ve created yourself.
That includes Develop presets, Slideshow, Book, Print and Web templates, Metadata presets, Export presets, etc.
To find them, go to Lightroom’s Preferences dialog, under the Edit menu (Windows) / Lightroom menu (Mac) and select the Presets tab.
Clicking the Show Lightroom Presets Folder button will open an Explorer/Finder window directly to their location.
By default, they’re stored at:
Windows—C: \ Users \ [your username] \ AppData \ Roaming \ Adobe \ Lightroom \
Mac—Macintosh HD / Users / [your username] / Library / Application Support / Adobe / Lightroom /
If you’ve checked the ‘Store presets with this catalog’ checkbox, some of your presets may be stored in a Lightroom Settings folder next to your catalog as well.
Checking or unchecking that box doesn’t automatically copy them to the new location, so you may have presets in both locations. I
’d recommend leaving it unchecked, unless you have a specific reason for using that feature, as it doesn’t include all settings and often creates confusion.
Settings shared with Camera Raw – Default Settings, Point Curves, Custom Camera & Lens Profiles
Some settings are stored in a shared location, where they can be shared with Camera Raw hosted by Photoshop or Elements.
They include your Develop default settings, lens profile default settings, custom point curves and any custom camera or lens profiles that you’ve created or downloaded.
They’re stored at:
Windows—C: \ Users \ [your username] \ AppData \ Roaming \ Adobe \ CameraRaw \
Mac—Macintosh HD / Users / [your username] / Library / Application Support / Adobe / CameraRaw /
Plug-ins you’ve installed
You may have downloaded Lightroom plug-ins, for example, Export plug-ins, Publish Services, custom web galleries, and so forth.
You can probably download those again from the developer, but it’s worth backing them up to be on the safe side.
To find them, go to File menu > Plug-in Manager and on each non-standard plug-in, check the current path, as shown below.
Don’t forget to write down your serial numbers or registration codes at the same time! Creative Cloud-program kräver inte serienummer.
Your Lightroom Serial Number
If you need to reinstall Lightroom and you’re not a Creative Cloud member, you’ll need your serial number, and if you purchased an upgrade, you’ll also need a serial from an earlier version.
As long as you registered your copy with Adobe, your older serial numbers can be accessed on Adobe’s website by selecting My Products and Services.
Creative Cloud-program kräver inte serienummer. Ett fel har inträffat om du ombeds att ange ett serienummer vid start av ett Creative Cloud-program. Hjälp för att lösa detta problem finns i Felsökning när Ceative Cloud-appar frågar efter serienummer.
Your Preferences
Finally, you may want to back up your Preferences file.
That includes last used catalogs, last used settings, view options, FTP settings for uploading web galleries, some plug-in settings, etc.
The preferences could be rebuilt if necessary, but you would save yourself some time by backing them up and restoring them.
Windows—C: \ Users \ [your username] \ AppData \ Roaming \ Adobe \ Lightroom \ Preferences \ Lightroom 6 Preferences.agprefs
Mac—Macintosh HD / Users / [your username] / Library / Preferences / com.adobe.Lightroom6.plist
What a list!
If you’ve saved all of those files and you ever have to restore from your backups, you can simply return those files back to their correct locations, open your catalog, and carry on working as if nothing has happened.
If you don’t like exploring the hidden application data folders, Matt Dawson’s LR Backup plug-in makes it very easy to back up most of those preference and preset files (not the photos!!) automatically, as long as they’re stored in the standard user locations.