P: Should be able to Sync full raw files to the cloud, not just smart previews

Well, I think I found a workaround. With both Lightroom Classic and Lightroom open on my Mac, I dragged some photos from Lightroom Classic into Lightroom and accepted the import. Lo and behold, those photos then showed as "originals" in the cloud…and no duplicates! 🙌

After this revelation, I spent a day feeding it more photos. There seems to be a ~4,000 photo import limit, so I had to do it in chunks, and each batch took a while. But now all my photos are in the cloud as originals.

I was able to replace OneDrive as my camera roll import solution, so now all photos taken on my mobile devices (both Android & iOS) eventually end up in Lightroom Classic. I say eventually because cloud sync is so slow and flaky. 

I wish I'd seen this idea before upgrading to the 1TB plan and spending a day "syncing" 31k photos! I had no idea only Smart Previews would be available from Lightroom cloud/mobile. 🤦 

Adobe should either do this feature correctly or not use the misleading word "sync". Sync is short for synchronize, which in computing terms means:

cause (a set of data or files) to remain identical in more than one location.

 

Adobe, please rename this feature "Smart Preview upload" (or similar) until you implement a true "sync" where original files and all metadata are copied to all locations.

Clearly Adobe does not care about customers' comments. 

I 100% agree. What a gateway for them to sell more cloud storage as well! Seems like a miss. Have it turned off by default for the basic workflow folks and allow the full resolution to be turned. The sync the other way is so good! backing up photos directly to lightroom mobile while abroad where they all upload to the cloud and then download full res on my desktop and long term storage back home, not to mention access on my laptop via lightroom cc. Would just be great to upload a set of pictures from long term storage to work on remotely at full resolution.

When Lightroom classic sync a collection of photos to the cloud (Lightroom on the web), it would be apreciated to have the option to upload the full size (high resolution) of the files. Currently a low resolution (smaller) version of the file is uploaded.

Problem: main work and archives are in Lightroom Classic, but often like doing some photo editing in Lightroom Desktop or mobile. When you start the process in Classic, only smart previews will get uploaded.

For me, that is fine most of the time but not always. Some functions are quicker in the Lightroom Desktop, and some functions are quicker or only existant in Classic, so I sometimes move between both. As I work, I will run into an image that I had imported with Classic and I can't zoom in on the smart preview with enough detail to do the editing I'd like. Now I have to decide if I'll just be limited to working in Classic for these images, or do I want to go through all the bother of importing them again in Desktop.

In Lightroom mobile there is an option to "get original". To continue along the same way, I'd like to have one or both of the functionalities below:

a. In Classic a way to click "Upload original" on an image or selected images, or

b. in Desktop a way to click "Get original" on a smart-preview-only image or selected images.

Either/both of these options would eliminate so much complexity in working with images across the different Lightrooms. Please PLEASE please?!?

 My larger issue is that some tools such as the "remove" tool are worse than useless when exporting full size images. 

 Since it only syncs back the low resolution result, the replaced areas are a blurry mess in full resolution. You could accidentally use that tool on an iPad and submit a full size photo to a client without noticing.

 It is possible to do this in the other direction, but not practical. 

 Since Lightroom and Lightroom mobile are fairly capable, it would be useful to be able to select an album or collection to sync at full resolution originals while using the cloud storage quota. 

An iPad Pro using iPad Lightroom is good enough for many use cases, but the "remove" and other tools sync back to Classic at a low resolution, making them useless for anything but low resolution retouching. 

This could be solved if specific photos or albums could be synced at full resolution. 

It would make life so much easier for some of us.

I only edit on iPad and someotimes I don't edit all my photos. So after a while I've offloaded the photos to LrC on PC and removed them from the cloud. If I could sync them back to my iPad in full resolution, I would not have to use my PC to get my final full resolution jpegs.

Actually, why is it not possible? The "regular" version of Lightroom on desktop is able to do it, why not Classic? What is the reason for this?

Of course that would also need some adjustment in LR mobile for the "story files locally" setting, it would also need a "store smartpreviews locally" and "store originals locally" switch, wouldn't want the phone to suddenly need to download 2TB, especially without working background sync on Android.