Known Participant

Question

Export Original Raw Files WithOUT Sidecar XMP files.

Forum|Forum|6 years ago
January 7, 2020
9 replies
7867 views

Almost daily I export original raw image files from Lightroom in order to do some processing in Photoshop.

All I want is the raw file that was originally imported from my camera's card, and no adjustments, etc.

But what I find are the raw files plus an equal number of matching .xmp sidecar files. These .xmp files clutter up the folder and make one more step in processing as I have to select the original files for opening in Photoshop.

Thus my quesiton: How do I export original raw camera files from Lightroom Classic without the accompanying sidecar files? Aperture never added the .xmp files to my exports.

Thanks for any help.

This topic has been closed for replies.

J

jblo

Inspiring

I've been using PS since it was just PS (no version) shipped on floppy disks, so I may be biased. The process works well for my workflow.

Since the elimination of "Coverflow" by Apple, I've found LR a great way to review photos.

So help educate and old guy. If I process a photo in lightroom, then 2 years later want acess to that processing again, how many files do I need to find? It seems to me I'd have to acrchive and locate BOTH the LR file AND the raw file. In PS I open the PS file, complete with layers, and edit or reoutput. The sidecar is automatically saved next to the raw file. All in one place. If I want to share the edited file with another person or system, I'm not sure how that would work without my LR catalog.

I'm open to new workflows if it makes things better, but am allways hesitant to commit to having to archve multiple files to maintain the integrity of a project. (for those who use premiere, if you have a project that links to After Effects, you also have to make sure you archive that AE project along with your premiere project and media. If you simply output the premiere project to a video file then your project will be intact. And god forbid Adobe makes the project linking unstable again 🙂 )

I'm open to new ideas. I keep hearing "You should ALLWAYS process in LR" Can someone explain the advantages of creating a new workflow using only LR?

Thanks for any insight.

Rob_Cullen

Community Expert

So firstly I assume that "LR" is referring to Lightroom-Classic with a Catalog you mention.

"locate BOTH the LR file AND the raw file"

It is a mis-understanding that photos are IN Lightroom-Classic. The "LR file" you refer to is only a reference to the one raw file on the hard-drive. And when you do any Edits in Lightroom-Classic, all the edits are saved IN the Catalog. The raw file is not changed neither is another raw file created.

"In PS I open the PS file, complete with layers, and edit or reoutput."

You should be 'Opening' the raw file to Photoshop FROM Lightroom-Classic [Ctrl+E] and NOT opening from a Finder view. Opening from Finder will add an XMP sidecar to the raw file as it opens through the ACR interface then to a Photoshop document, AND it does not add the new Ps image to LrC.

When Opening from Lightroom-Classic (LrC acts as your ACR) the edits are stored IN the Catalog and no XMPs are created, and when [Save] in Ps the new image is automatically added back to the LrC Catalog library.

" If I want to share the edited file with another person or system, I'm not sure how that would work without my LR catalog."

The only "edited file" you will have is the new Photoshop TIF/PSD. You can 'share' it from its folder location in Finder (Copy and Paste to wherever.),

OR if you view the new Photoshop TIF/PSD in the LrC catalog, you can EXPORT a derivative file in various formats- JPG, TIF, or 'Original TIF/PSD', etc.

CLASSIC to PHOTOSHOP

Moving Between Lightroom and Photoshop - YouTube

Regards. My System: Windows-11, Lightroom-Classic 15.1.1, Photoshop 27.3.1, ACR 18.1.1, Lightroom 9.0, Lr-iOS 10.4.0, Bridge 16.0.2 .

TheDigitalDog

Inspiring

You don't want nor need to export anything. Simply use the Edit in Photoshop command.

Or, if you don't want sidecar files, which are required for proprietary raws, convert to DNG; no sidecar files necessary nor generated.

Author “Color Management for Photographers" & "Photoshop CC Color Management/pluralsight"

Bob Somrak

Legend

You can use the Camera Raw filter in Photoshop and the ACR edits won't be baked in but there are several issues/gotchas to watch out for if you are using the Camera Raw filter and then make changes later to the filter.

M4 Pro Mac Mini. 48GB

K

krinkly2009Author

Known Participant

Thanks -- I've occasionally used those in-Photoshop ACR filters, but in order to make them undoable, isn't it necessary to create Smart Objects? Which are huge.

(And of course those ACR filters within Photoshop and performing processing on the RGB file, not the raw image, but still sometimes useful.)

D Fosse

Community Expert

I can only agree with Jim. This workflow makes absolutely zero sense and it needs to be said.

Why would you use ACR to process these files when you have already gone to the trouble of importing them into Lightroom? Doing it in Lightroom produces the exact same result, and vastly simplifies the whole process. Raw processing in ACR and Lightroom are identical in every respect.

In addition, "outside" raw editing means it won't be visible in Lightroom.

The second suggestion, using "Edit in Photoshop" means doing edits on rendered RGB files, that should be done on the raw files in Lr/ACR . That defeats the whole purpose of shooting raw in the first place! As much editing as possible should be done at the raw stage - only when that's exhausted do you move to Photoshop.

K

krinkly2009Author

Known Participant

Here's my process:

Every week over several days I bring home several hundred images shot in raw. I bring them into Lightroom for rating, pruning and deleting, keywording, and organizing. At this point Lightroom keeps about 187,000 images for me. I often need to locate images shot years ago, or find related images shot years apart, and a tool like Lightroom is essential.

Of the images I've brought home that week, I will typically post-process ten to twenty for printing or potentially posting on the web in my blog, Instagram, etc. Post-processing might involve everything from serious image manipulation to resizing and sharpening for the final size. Of course that work is done in Photoshop, which is more capable in every way than the processing modules in Lightroom, Aperture, Capture One, etc.

I do very little in ACR -- most images simply pass through ACR on their way into Photoshop. I occasionally select a different color profile from Adobe's choices in ACR, but otherwise, I rarely use any of ACR's adjustments.

What is your thinking about a more efficient workflow?

D Fosse

Community Expert

OK, at this point I have a lot of thinking about a more efficient workflow.

The most critical part is that you're significantly compromising image quality by skipping the raw processing and going more or less directly to Photoshop. This isn't an academic point. This is very real. Rendering a raw file into an RGB file throws away massive amounts of data!

The raw file contains all the data captured by the camera sensor. Every last bit. Only a very small part of this will be used in the final RGB image - but in the raw file it's all available for adjustments, even very extreme adjustments. Once the file is in Photoshop, that's all gone.

Here's an adjustment you simply cannot duplicate in Photoshop, because there won't be any data to work with:

ManiacJoe

Inspiring

Seems like "export" is not the command you want to get the raw files into Photoshop. Exporting a raw file does nothing more than copy the original raw file to a new location.

Since you are using LR to do your cataloging, which suggests you want the resulting PSD file coming back from Photoshop to also be cataloged, why not use the "edit in photoshop" command which does all the file passing back and forth for free?

Yes, the "edit in photoshop" is going to include all the LR edits based on your current location in the file's edit history. If you have done no actual edits in LR, that will not matter. If you have done edits, you can click on the start of the edit history and get the no-edit version of the file sent to Photoshop.

JP Hess

Inspiring

Sounds to me like you're just spending a lot of time spinning your wheels. But it's your workflow.

JP Hess

Inspiring

So does Camera Raw have different profiles for you than Lightroom has? If you have everything up to date I thought the profiles should be the same in both.

K

krinkly2009Author

Known Participant

I have no idea what profiles Lightroom has. I never use it for processing photos, only for cataloging, When it's time to process images, I open them in Photoshop.

JP Hess

Inspiring

Then why even bother importing the images the Lightroom? Just copy them to a folder on your hard drive and use Bridge. If you're using the current version of Lightroom, what's different in Camera Raw? Not criticizing your workflow, just curious. I thought Lightroom in Camera Raw had the same profiles.

K

krinkly2009Author

Known Participant

Well, Lightroom (like Aperture which I used from the time it was first introduced) makes cataloging so easy. I've never used Bridge, but I find these good cataloging applications make it so easy to organize images, to add keywords and flags and colors, to search and display. to change metadata, etc. And Lightroom (and Aperture) automatically organize the input images into folders -- I don't have to think about creating folders, organizing them, naming them, etc.

I used Capture One for a while, once Aperture no longer supported my camera's raw files, but its interface has many flaws, and it handles large catalogs very very slowly. (I've got almost 200,000 images taking up almost 4 TB of hard drive space.)

JP Hess

Inspiring

I believe you can use the option in the export dialog to export as original, and that will export the raw file only without creating the XMP file that contains the Lightroom adjustments. But then you aren't really going to edit the raw file in Photoshop, the raw file will have to be edited again in camera raw before it is converted and eventually opened in Photoshop. Photoshop cannot edit raw images. That's why Camera Raw is needed. You'll have to use Camera Raw to do the same thing you did in Lightroom, and then the image will have to be converted to a RGB image before it can be opened in Photoshop.

K

krinkly2009Author

Known Participant

Thanks for those ideas.

As you suggest, I do use the Export -> File Settings -> Original setting to export my raw image files and Lightroom still adds the .xmp sidecar. All other options in the Export dialog are turned off, and I don't see any other options that would help.

(And yes, all my camera raw files do indeed pass through Adobe Camera Raw on their way into Photoshop, and I often use some of the Camera Raw adjustments. I really like the newish Adobe Color Profiles, for example.)

Sign up

To post, reply, or follow discussions, please sign in with your Adobe ID.

Sign in to Adobe Community

To post, reply, or follow discussions, please sign in with your Adobe ID.

Scanning file for viruses.

This file cannot be downloaded