# Photos synched on mobile not appearing in Classic



## johnmills2 (Oct 27, 2019)

I've set up Lightroom on my mobile and tablet, and it was working fine. Then, I assigned a destination for synched photos in Preferences  (of Classic on the desktop), but now when I add a photo to Lightroom on the phone, it downloads to that designated folder in Windows but does not appear in "Imported Photos" in Lightroom Classic at all.  Before I went into preferences and assigned a destination, the photos were appearing fine. Any ideas?


----------



## Johan Elzenga (Oct 27, 2019)

It’s not an *imported* photo, it’s a *synced* photo. It should appear in ‘All Synced Photographs’ and (if you added it to an album in Lightroom Mobile) in the synced collection.


----------



## johnmills2 (Oct 28, 2019)

For the life of me, I cannot find an "All Synced Photos" folder/collection. However it doesn't matter because I've tracked them down. They appear in 2 places - in the folder directory (within the folder I created and assigned photos to under the Preferences tab), and they show within a collection "From Lightroom". It's confusing because they do not show within the "Imported Photos" (from the phone) folder.


----------



## Jim Wilde (Oct 28, 2019)

johnmills2 said:


> For the life of me, I cannot find an "All Synced Photos" folder/collection.


Look in the Catalog panel in the Library module, "All Synced Photographs" should be listed underneath "All Photographs".
.


----------



## Johan Elzenga (Oct 28, 2019)

johnmills2 said:


> For the life of me, I cannot find an "All Synced Photos" folder/collection. However it doesn't matter because I've tracked them down. They appear in 2 places - in the folder directory (within the folder I created and assigned photos to under the Preferences tab), and they show within a collection "From Lightroom". It's confusing because they do not show within the "Imported Photos" (from the phone) folder.


Photos can only be in one *folder* at a time. If they are in the folder you assigned for synced images, then they cannot be in some 'Imported Photos' *folder* at the same time. That's different for collections. I assume that the 'Imported Photos' folder is/was a folder that you used to import images directly from the phone, and as I already explained, that is the difference. The current images were not 'imported', they were 'synced', and so they end up in the folder you assigned for synced photos.


----------



## clee01l (Oct 28, 2019)

In Lightroom Classic Preferences, there is a Location setting for all images sync'd FROM the cloud.


----------



## gbfabiani (Feb 12, 2020)

I specified a folder on my Mac the way you suggested, and it works fine, my  photos from mobile are automatically synced with this folder. However I don't see  any symbol telling me these photos are synchronized (they should be , as I see them on web Lightroom CC as well)
As I only have the 20GB plan, I need to de-sync them over time and keep them just on the Mac. database.
It looks like that if I transfer them using Lightroom from this folder to another one , they remain sync. 
So I have tried to move to another folder, remove them from the catalog but leaving them on disk. Eventually I imported them again from the very same folder and now it looks like they are not sync anymore, and the Cloud space is released. 

Is it a proper way to work, or a better solution is available, or  was I wrong ?

Thanks !!
giovanni


----------



## clee01l (Feb 12, 2020)

In the Catalog panel, there is a special collection called "All Synced Photographs".   This will show which images have been synced.    if you remove an image from the "All Synced Photographs" special collection it will be removed from your 20GB limit.   However if you then place these unsynced images in one of the collections in the collection panel and turn on syncing for that collection, Lightroom Classic will create a proxy Smart DNG and sync that to the Cloud.  This Smart DNG will not count against your 20GB storage limit.  You can sync an unlimited number of Smart DNG proxies to the cloud.
Full sized images that come for other Lightroom (cloudy) sources are stored in your Adobe CC plan storage are an and count against your plan limits.  Smart Preview proxies synced from Lightroom Classic are always unlimited and do not count against your plan storage limits.

As you have figured out you can move image files from any folder to wherever you like and this does not affect their sync status which can be verified in "All Synced Photographs".


----------



## gbfabiani (Feb 12, 2020)

Thanks !
I have a number of Smart Previews sync through collections, and they don't count against the 20GB, I noticed it. . I see them in the Catalog panel , true.
However this special Collection tells me which photos are sync, combining both Smart previews and originals ( if any) . The photos coming from LR mobile are in original, so they count. 
Today I have 9215 photos sync, of which I believe ( as I have at the moment in one specific folder) 1097 are in original.
The moment I will start moving these pictures in different folder, I will not be able to know if they also are in the cloud as originals,....
How can I  identify them in order to better plan my space usage ? 

THANKS AGAIN !


----------



## clee01l (Feb 12, 2020)

gbfabiani said:


> The moment I will start moving these pictures in different folder, I will not be able to know if they also are in the cloud as originals,....
> How can I identify them in order to better plan my space usage?


Unless someone can figure out a different way, You will need to use the Lightroom (cloudy) app. RAW files will appear with their RAW file name suffix and can be exported as Original. If the “Original” filetype is not in the list of file types to export, then the file was sent to the cloud as a SmartDNG. 
Note DNGs can be RAW too but SmartDNGs are RGB files.



Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


----------



## gbfabiani (Feb 12, 2020)

I was trying a way to see in the sync which files were  "originals" and which ones  were smart reviews. 

I know the Heic files are from the iPhone, and at the moment are sync with cloud . However I am pretty sure that the most of the raws 

"


 are in fact smart previews . When  I select any of  those 7381 pictures, on the istogram top right I see the word Original becoming Smart preview. 

If I select a normal folder where I just have smart previews ( Originals being on my  Nas , currently not connected), The system tells me raw / jpeg .

How can Identify  RGB 's?

thanks
giovanni


----------



## Jim Wilde (Feb 12, 2020)

clee01l said:


> Unless someone can figure out a different way, You will need to use the Lightroom (cloudy) app. RAW files will appear with their RAW file name suffix and can be exported as Original. If the “Original” filetype is not in the list of file types to export, then the file was sent to the cloud as a SmartDNG.
> Note DNGs can be RAW too but SmartDNGs are RGB files.


I don't think that works. The option to export as "Original + Settings" is still available for Smart Previews synced from Classic, though it will subsequently fail when you try to execute the export as the Original is not available.

However, there's no need to waste time trying to check whether the export will work in order to establish if the file is an Original or a Smart Preview. In the Square Grid view you can check the sync icon at the bottom right of the thumbnail....a Smart Preview's icon will be "hatched", whereas an original's icon will be solid grey or blue. But by far the easiest way, using Lightroom cloudy, would be to select All Photos, then in the Filter bar select "Sync Status"....then select "Synced and Backed Up" for Originals, or "Synced from Lightroom Classic" for Smart Previews.


----------



## gbfabiani (Feb 12, 2020)

I found the Icons, thanks , on Lightroom CC . 

On Classic, I saw Smart previews not sync has a small rectangle top right 




Originals sync has the sync symbol





Smart previews sync has both . 

Is it possible in Classic to batch divide above categories to identify all pictures having originals and being sync ??

Sorry of I am abusing of your kindness !


----------



## Jim Wilde (Feb 13, 2020)

I think you're a little confused about smart previews in Classic. You have the option in Classic to generate Smart Previews, which are useful for offline editing and performance improvements in the Develop module. These have nothing to do with syncing to the cloud. When you see the smart preview icon on the thumbnail in the Grid view, that means that the original file is missing or offline.

When you sync images from Classic to the cloud, Classic creates a smart preview of that original for syncing purposes only (or copies any existing smart preview which was made for performance reasons) which is then uploaded to the cloud but NOT retained in Classic....in Classic the underlying file is the original, i.e. original in Classic, smart preview of that original in the cloud. When an image has been synced, the sync icon is shown on the Grid thumbnails. If after syncing the file to the cloud the original is deleted or otherwise taken offline, and a "performance" smart preview already exists in Classic, then you would see both the smart preview icon AND the sync icon.

I don't know of an easy way to identify images in Classic that exist as originals in the cloud (because all files in Classic are "originals" no matter where they originated), unless you have used some metadata tokens to identify them (e.g. keywords). Easiest way is to create albums in Lightroom cloudy, one which  which contains only originals and the other which contains only smart previews. Those albums will appear in Classic as collections, after that it won't matter if you move images around in your folders, as that would have no effect on the content of the collections.


----------



## gbfabiani (Feb 13, 2020)

Jim Wilde said:


> I think you're a little confused about smart previews in Classic. You have the option in Classic to generate Smart Previews, which are useful for offline editing and performance improvements in the Develop module. These have nothing to do with syncing to the cloud. When you see the smart preview icon on the thumbnail in the Grid view, that means that the original file is missing or offline.



Yes, I am confused !
I have quite a large (95k raws) library, and to mange it "easily" I download new pictures on my MacBook Pro, and  create smart previews. I keep originals + smart previews of current year  on local HD , while  I transfer (using Lightroom) originals of the  other years on a NAS I have home. 

This way my database on local HD is around 100GB only, and I have all my pictures available locally , this year originals+smart previews, last years previews only.
I than create sync collections where I add ('B' key) the smart previews of the year, so than I can later edit them with the iPad or with my desktop on LR CC

Basically I don't sync my current folders ( honestly I am note sure I would be able to do ) , I sync specifically made collections where I manually transfer a copy of f the smart preview . 

The only folder with originals  that  syncs  with Cloud is  the folder where LR mobile transfers the iPhone photos , and I am trying to find a way to use these photos in a similar way I am using the others : originals on HD and later on NAS, smart previews used also to sync with cloud
giovanni


----------



## Jim Wilde (Feb 13, 2020)

gbfabiani said:


> I than create sync collections where I add ('B' key) the smart previews of the year, so than I can later edit them with the iPad or with my desktop on LR CC


Adding photos to collections has nothing to do with smart previews.....you are adding a catalog reference for the particular image to that collection. That image may or may not be online, and a smart preview may or may not already exist.....none of that matters, you are simply telling Lightroom Classic to record the fact that image xxx has been added to collection yyy. Remember that collections are virtual containers, they do not physically exist apart from entries in the catalog's database.



> Basically I don't sync my current folders ( honestly I am note sure I would be able to do ) , I sync specifically made collections where I manually transfer a copy of f the smart preview .



Similarly, you cannot "manually transfer" images to a collection, you add images (not smart previews). If the image if offline, it doesn't matter if a smart preview is available or not, it's only a database record that is added to reflect that the image is now also included in the (virtual) collection.



> The only folder with originals  that  syncs  with Cloud is  the folder where LR mobile transfers the iPhone photos , and I am trying to find a way to use these photos in a similar way I am using the others : originals on HD and later on NAS, smart previews used also to sync with cloud
> giovanni


I'm not sure why this is an issue for you.....you can continue with the same Classic workflow for the iPhone photos as you do with your other photos. *Moving them from local HD to NAS has no effect whatsoever on the images sync status.* In order to continue to access the images *in Classic* after you've moved them to the NAS you just have to remember to build Smart Previews for them before they go offline. However, if you want to replace the originals of the iPhone photos in the cloud with smart previews synced from Classic, do that as described in your other thread, and do it before you "archive" the images to the NAS.

Just understand that the Smart Previews that you might create in Classic for performance/offline editing reasons are completely different from the smart previews that Classic will create in order to sync an image from Classic to the cloud.


----------



## gbfabiani (Feb 13, 2020)

Jim Wilde said:


> Just understand that the Smart Previews that you might create in Classic for performance/offline editing reasons are completely different from the smart previews that Classic will create in order to sync an image from Classic to the cloud.


I start believing the key confusion I have in my mind is about this concept you mentioned. Today I make smart previews mainly to keep them on the local disk and being able to move originals to the Nas , otherwise my database will be too large, 
Once I  have made these smart previews, , I add ( with B key) them  ( sometime only the better ones) to synced collections, so that I have these pictures  available on CC . 
How should I sync smart previews ( not the originals) in a different way ? I believe I have first to understand this difference in the start previews workflow before I am able to manage all the rest !!!


----------



## Jim Wilde (Feb 13, 2020)

gbfabiani said:


> How should I sync smart previews ( not the originals) in a different way ? I believe I have first to understand this difference in the start previews workflow before I am able to manage all the rest !!!


You need to stop worrying about "syncing smart previews in a different way". Classic cannot sync a full copy of an original file to the cloud, it can only sync a smart preview of it. So when you tell Classic to sync an image file it first checks to see if a smart preview already exists in the smart preview cache....if it does, it simply syncs a copy of the existing smart preview to the cloud, but if it doesn't already exist it will create one which is synced to the cloud *but not retained locally*. As far as Classic is concerned you have a bunch of images that are cataloged, some of them may be synced, some may not be. It does not matter that in actual fact only a smart preview was sent to the cloud, Classic just knows that its images are either synced or not.
The cloud apps work differently, in that any images imported into a cloud app will send a full copy of that original to the cloud....you can subsequently store smart previews of those images in the cloudy client apps by choice, but the cloud always retains the full original. But if the Classic catalog is sync-enabled, it will always download a copy of those original files....so you end up in the situation that Classic has a bunch of original images synced with the cloud (no matter if imported into Classic or one of the Cloudy apps), whereas the cloud could contain a bunch of original images (imported from a cloudy app) and a bunch of smart previews (created from originals imported into Classic and synced from there).

All you need to do, assuming you want to remove all originals from the cloud after import from iPhone, is do what we've explained in terms of removing them from the cloud and then re-syncing them from Classic. Let Classic worry about the need to create smart previews just for syncing purposes, you only need to be concerned about two things: first find a means to identify the images in Classic that are in the cloud as originals so that you can easily remove them from sync and then re-sync them again (plenty of ways to do that), and then including those images in your regular archive to the NAS. For the latter you need to do nothing different to your normal workflow other than to create smart previews of them before moving them to the NAS (athough Classic will create smart previews when you re-sync the images after removing them from the cloud, those smart previews are NOT retained unless they pre-existed). So just get in the habit of building smart previews prior to archive to the NAS (Classic will know if they already exist, in which case it will skip building them and will only build them for images which don't currently have one).


----------



## gbfabiani (Feb 13, 2020)

Wow, what a (nice) change to my workflow !! 

However I just tried now, it looks like the folders where I have also the originals offer me the option to be synced, while all the folders I kept on my catalog where I have the previews ( the Nas being in this moment disconnected ) does not . 

That's why I become used to sync Just the Collections ......

I imagine I have to be home, connect to the Nas a and then sync these folders with the cloud, having just the smart previews being transferred .

Using Collections just as a way to sync was not the right model , I assume now : I completely missed the point I could sync a photo folder with Cloud , Is it  Correct ?

many thanks
Giovanni


----------



## Jim Wilde (Feb 13, 2020)

It should be possible to sync an image from Classic if the original is "missing/offline" *provided* that a smart preview already exists in the catalog. I just tested it and it worked. Not sure how you're trying to do it, but as a test just drag one of the images with the smart preview icon on the thumbnail to the All Synced Photographs collection....


----------



## gbfabiani (Feb 13, 2020)

Jim Wilde said:


> It should be possible to sync an image from Classic if the original is "missing/offline" *provided* that a smart preview already exists in the catalog. I just tested it and it worked. Not sure how you're trying to do it, but as a test just drag one of the images with the smart preview icon on the thumbnail to the All Synced Photographs collection....


You are perfectly right , I did try too and it works ! Great.

It is much simpler when compared with what I am doing today . Only caveat , using Collections like today I have Albums on the CC side already grouped, while moving pictures to the All Synced make the sync done, it is super easy, but I do have to build albums manually in CC. 

Concerning my original issue with Pictures from iPhone/ LRCC your explanations were superuseful ,I feel I can now manage a lot better than ever before . !!

ciao from Italy
giovanni


----------

