# Two Mac Question



## Allsop (Dec 5, 2016)

I have for a long while been using Lightroom on my Mac Mini with my photos stored on an external disk which is permanently connected to the Mac Mini and I have recently got a Macbook Air and I would like to access the same photos on it along with the ability to process new photographs using various plug-ins and Photoshop CC.

I do not want to keep swapping the external disk between the two computers so what would the best way be to accomplish this? (If it is relevant I do have an iCloud account).

Any help or pointers would be most appreciated.


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## Johan Elzenga (Dec 5, 2016)

It depends a bit on what you want to do exactly. Many people use their laptop as 'travel computer'. They import their travel images on that computer and when they get home, they want to transfer them to the desktop computer. The best way to do this is to have a 'travel catalog' on the laptop, and then when you get home you connect both computers and use 'Import From Another Catalog' on the desktop computer.

If you really want both computers to have access to all images, consider storing them on a NAS disk. You do have to realize that work done on one computer (for example edits in Lightroom) won't carry over to the other computer just like that, because the edits are stored in the catalog. You'd have to synchronize the catalogs too one way or another (a cloud service is a way to do that), or continuously use 'Export as Catalog' and 'Import From Another Catalog' to keep the work synchronized.


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## Allsop (Dec 5, 2016)

Thank you Johan, the first part of your reply is what I want to do though I had not articulated it as such! So I will do as you suggest and that will be exactly what I want. One question though, can you please expand on the  coonnection of "both computers and use 'Import From Another Catalog' on the desktop computer" bit? Do they have to be physically connected?


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## Johan Elzenga (Dec 5, 2016)

Allsop said:


> Thank you Johan, the first part of your reply is what I want to do though I had not articulated it as such! So I will do as you suggest and that will be exactly what I want. One question though, can you please expand on the  coonnection of "both computers and use 'Import From Another Catalog' on the desktop computer" bit? Do they have to be physically connected?



Not necessarily. You can also copy the catalog and the images to an external disk, and then connect that disk to the other computer. Most Macs can be started in 'target disk mode' however. Then they act as if they are that external disk.


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## Allsop (Dec 6, 2016)

JohanElzenga said:


> Not necessarily. You can also copy the catalog and the images to an external disk, and then connect that disk to the other computer. Most Macs can be started in 'target disk mode' however. Then they act as if they are that external disk.


Much obliged and thank you for your help.


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## Johan Elzenga (Dec 6, 2016)

One more tip: if you use a 'travel catalog' like this, store your images in a subfolder _inside the catalog folder_, not somewhere else. If you keep them inside the catalog folder, Lightroom uses a 'relative path' to the images (i.e. it remembers where the images are relative to the catalog folder). That means that you can copy or move the catalog folder (to that external disk for example) without Lightroom losing the connection to the images.


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