One RAW, many XMP files

MathemAddicts · May 21, 2012

Hello all,

It's been quite a long time since I have posted in these forums, but I have a question that I cannot seem to "google" an answer for.

My wife is the photographer, but I am the data guy. I know enough about photography to pass, but really am more concerned with data management (yes, I that that DAM book as well). My wife's workflow is... creative. She offloads the RAW image from her camera to a RAW subfolder (where the parent folders are organized by date). When she goes to work on the RAW file in ACR, she copies it to an EDITS subdirectory. She then works in ACR a bit, thus creating an XMP file. Unfortunately, she may work on the same RAW file about two or three different ways thus creating two or three different RAW files, each with their own XMP file. Since the RAW files remain unchanged, is there a way to gear ACR (or PS) to use the one RAW file with the many XMP files?

For example, let's say she has three different XMP files for three different edits of the same RAW file. Must these all exist in different directories with copies of the RAW file or (just as bad) in the same directory with the same RAW file renamed in three different ways? Can I just have IMG001VERA.XMP, IMG001VERB.XMP, and IMG001VERC.XMP in one directory and rename the RAW to IMG001VERA (or B or C) as needed to correspond with the edit I want?

mercphoto · May 22, 2012

You need to abandon ACR and being your own IT guy and switch to Ligthroom or Aperture. Either will natively support that workflow with zero IT type work.

JimClark · May 22, 2012

Convert the raw files to dnt files and the xml files will be embedded in the dng plus the files are smaller

Sent from my MB611 using Tapatalk 2

mercphoto · May 22, 2012

In either Lightroom or Aperture you'd import the RAW file once into a project. You'll make your adjustments. Then make a version of that RAW file and make a new set of adjustments. Make a version again and make your third set of adjustments. Arrange all three versions as a stack from a single image. No hassles. No copying files from one directory to another. No worrying about sidecar files. You don't even need to worry about non-conflicting filenames anymore. No IT work to be done. Let the modern tools work for you!

MathemAddicts · May 22, 2012

First, thank you for the responses. Second, I imported a few test directories into Lightroom. Here's the basic structure
C:.../July/Edits/File1.CR2
C:.../July/Edits/File1.XMP
C:.../July/RAW/File1.CR2
C:.../July/RAW/File1.XMP
C:.../July/Finals/File1.CR2
C:.../July/Finals/File1.XMP

(ridiculous organization... I am convincing her to change this)

Anyhow, all the .CR2 files are the SAME raw files in three different locations. All the XMP files are different versions and edits of this RAW file. When I import into LR, only one of the RAW files show with only one of the edits. How can I combine these into one master and two virtual copies? Or is there a better way?

P.S. I did import the main July directory so I know all three subdirectories should have been imported.

I absolutely appreciate the advice here.

mercphoto wrote: »

In either Lightroom or Aperture you'd import the RAW file once into a project. You'll make your adjustments. Then make a version of that RAW file and make a new set of adjustments. Make a version again and make your third set of adjustments. Arrange all three versions as a stack from a single image. No hassles. No copying files from one directory to another. No worrying about sidecar files. You don't even need to worry about non-conflicting filenames anymore. No IT work to be done. Let the modern tools work for you!

basflt · May 22, 2012

+1 for LightRoom
she can edit as much as she wants , back and forward , all lossless

copying the same file / image several times has no benefit

and , it can be sent to PS when needed

edit ;

MathemAddicts wrote: »

Anyhow, all the .CR2 files are the SAME raw files in three different locations. All the XMP files are different versions and edits of this RAW file. When I import into LR, only one of the RAW files show with only one of the edits. How can I combine these into one master and two virtual copies? Or is there a better way?

you do it the other way around
first LR , then PS

mercphoto · May 22, 2012

basflt wrote: »

you do it the other way around
first LR , then PS

That's correct. Lightroom will become your total one-stop shop for most everything you do, from import, to cut and cull, to edit, to export. Don't start in ACR and then migrate into LR. Also, ditch the idea of having separate folders for edits and such.

I use Aperture but the idea in LR will be the same. Start a new project (this is what Aperture calls it) and import your files directly from the card reader. Now start culling and rating. Next I can set a filter, showing only my "5 star" photos (the rest are there, just hidden) and I start doing my adjustments. If I want multiple edits to compare, I simply create a new version from the master and edit that one. Repeat, rinse.

If I don't want to filter off the main project I can always create an "album" under the "project" and manually drag images from the project to the album. (They still exist in the project -- all images live in a project, and are virtually linked to albums). Say I have an "edit me" folder and I drag five images there. I then do all my edits. All those edits exist back in the main project too. When I'm done with those 5 I delete them from the album (notice this does not delete them from the main project, nor do I lose those edits and versions) and drag the next 5 from the project to the "edit me" album.

You never leave LR. You never muck with the file system. You never copy and move files.

Piece of cake. Your current workflow is way too complex.

MathemAddicts · May 22, 2012

I got it! Thanks.

However, I am still at a loss as to how to get these three different versions (XMP) imported into LR so she can see all three. Or do I have to scratch two of the edits because LR cannot handle more than one edit? I can easily kill off the extra CR2 duplicates, but I need to preserve the edits (XMP).

mercphoto · May 22, 2012

A LR expert needs to chime in here, but I'm going to guess that LR does not use the ACR sidecar files. In other words, you might have to import the RAWs into LR and then re-do the edits there. Note that with the workflow we are suggesting you will be doing your raw adjustments within LR, not in ACR. You can move to Photoshop if you need the extra editing power there, but I think you'll be pleasanting surprised with what you can do in LR.

The key to remember is that LR is more than just a raw converter and editor. Its importing, ranking and culling and rating, sorting, cataloging, key wording, edits and adjustments, version control, exporting....

MathemAddicts · May 22, 2012

Yeah. Having used Elements from a long time ago, I have a pretty decent idea of what LR is. I also understand that it is the "replacement" for Bridge and ACR, but not PS (for the minute detailed work and precision stuff). I love the concept behind LR so that's not the issue.

It just seems that LR should be able to import the RAW + XMP (and several different versions of the XMP). Otherwise, that's thousands of hours of work lost because of a missing element in the program. I refuse/hope to believe that the ability to do this is not built into LR (crossing my fingers).

Nikolai · May 22, 2012

Easy: teach her how to use Snapshots in ACR, and you don't need multiple XMPs. You can have as many as you need.
In LR the whole thing is journalled, but to me it's an overkill. Snapshots work just fine.
YMMV

MathemAddicts · May 22, 2012

It's funny that you just typed that as I just found an article stating the same thing. I know how to make snapshots (development) and I sort of understand them (literally "snapshots" as you develop through the process). The issue for me is exactly how to apply the different XMP presets to each snapshot. It seems that making virtual copies and applying the different XMP data to each copy should work, but the option to "Read metadata from file" is grayed out.

Nikolai wrote: »

Easy: teach her how to use Snapshots in ACR, and you don't need multiple XMPs. You can have as many as you need.
In LR the whole thing is journalled, but to me it's an overkill. Snapshots work just fine.
YMMV

Nikolai · May 22, 2012

LR is slightly more advanced in that respect, allowing you to have different versions without bothering with the gory details where and how does it store. It's just for me personally it's an overkill and as a developer I don't trust any database to work nicely with blobs. I prefer to have my files, which I can then back up, copy, etc. But that's me.

thonsu · October 12, 2012

Hi. Old thread, I know. But I thought I would chime in with a different solution.

When your wife finishes an edit in ACR, have her open it in Photoshop as a Smart Object (i.e., by holding Shift and clicking the "Open" button, which should have changed to "Open Object"). This encapsulates the RAW file (with edits) in the layer of an image. You can re-edit the image in ACR by double-clicking the Smart Object's layer thumbnail. For different edits, she can duplicate the layer by selecting "New Layer from Smart Object" (as opposed to the regular duplicate layer command, which will NOT make a new, editable Smart Object). Then she can edit the new layer differently in ACR. When she's all done, all she has to do is save it as a PSD. You don't have to keep the CR2 or the XMP; all the data is in one PSD. If you deleted your CR2 and you, for some reason, wanted it back, you can actually get it from the PSD. Just right click on the Smart Object layer and select "Export Contents".

Upsides: she can do extra editing within Photoshop itself, all while keeping her raw file editable in ACR. Smart objects also allow one to use smart filters, which are non-destructive and always adjustable.

Downside: the PSD file will be much larger than the CR2. For example, my CR2s are around 23MB, and when I save them as Smart Objects in a PSD, the file size usually goes to 100+MB.

One RAW, many XMP files

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