# Move Mobile iPhone Camera roll auto import photos to main Library - how?



## RichardQ

OK - so i have spent a lot of time looking through Google search and cannot seem to get what seems a very simple answer - please bear with...

I take photos with my iPhone and Canon 6D. I have a laptop catalogue for all photos and import from the 6D camera card organised by capture time (year/month/day/time) with import presets applied etc. I use the LR Mobile camera roll auto import function on the iPhone and that syncs those photos to the laptop LR5.5. All works OK. 

Now ALL I want to do is move (import!) those iPhone photos into my main library adding into the correct year/month/day applying all the presets like the 6D. As a result I would see all the photos for that day in time order with presets applied whether from the iPhone or 6D. Simple, isn't it??? BUT HOW?? Incidentally I do not want to leave the iPhone photos in LR mobile as they fill up space and are on the camera roll anyway.

What am I missing??


----------



## Jim Wilde

Hi, welcome to the forum.

No, it's not that simple I'm afraid. When you add pictures from the Camera Roll into an LRm collection (either manually or automatically), that picture is then synced back to your main desktop/laptop catalog. On completion of the sync, a copy of the pictures will now physically exist on the hard drive of your desktop/laptop and will also be referenced by your main catalog. Whilst you can then move those images into your main folder structure, that's really a manual drag and drop (easy enough if you are confident in doing that, but may be daunting for some).

I suppose you could, once the sync has completed, remove the images from the catalog (without deleting them from the hard drive), then import them using Copy or Move into your preferred dated folder structure.

In terms of the images occupying double space on the iDevice, I'm not sure about that, but will ask a question and if I get a definitive answer I'll report back. However, if you remove the images from the main catalog prior to a re-import that will cause them to be removed from the collection in LR mobile.


----------



## johnbeardy

I'm 99% certain they do use double space and that LrM has to make its own copy of the camera roll image. I think this is due to change in iOS8 when apps such as LrM will get the option to work directly on camera roll content.


----------



## clee01l

Welcome to the forum.  If you use LR mobile as a conduit to get photos from your iDevice into LR, then LR will create a folder called "Mobile Downloads.lrdata" in your "../Pictures/Lightroom" folders  and automatically import these into your master catalog.  Where a master image resides should not be important.  It is more important that it is cataloged and can be managed like any other photo with keywords.  All of the metadata is present and all of the filter and smart collection tools in LR  work with these image files like any other.  While I realize that using a default date named folder scheme for import is expedient, it is not essential.  I can't stress enough the *unimportance* of the folder panel.  Your workflow should be in collections smart collections and publish services. If you are doing visual scans of files in folders to find your images, you are not using LR effectively. 
For sometime now, I ave let iCloud track my iDevice photostream images and get them to my desktop where I can manage them in LR.   I use Photostream2Folder and LR's Auto import watched folder to manage the import from iCloud to LR. LR does not import from the watched folder into a date named folder either, but it will collect *all* of my iDevice captured images into the catalog.  Either method works to get your photostream into LR where you can manage them.  If you insist upon moving or renaming the folder after LrM has synced the files to your catalog, you can do this within LR.  However, it is not something that will contribute to improving your workflow.


----------



## RichardQ

Thanks all for your replies. I have transferred the photos by date into the proper folders by selecting in the mobile folder and then highlighting the folder i wanted them to move to and right click electing 'move selected photos to this folder'. I had previously applied a renaming preset. I am not a professional so although i agree for shoots i would use collections, for me, I find it easier to work with dates. I also found that some of the photos on transfer had 'lost' the GPS metadata (but not other metadata)!!! However, I was able to select 'Add from camera roll' and import into mobile again and the GPS metadata transferred this time - the the camera roll remains intact. I had previously used auto import with watched folder from Photostream but that also lost some GPS metadata - in this case the import preset I used was not wrong but I reserved it again and this time the GPS was in.

Thanks again guys


----------

