Lightroom Cloud and Lightroom Classic

I think we need to clarify exactly what you are doing/have done before we can answer all your questions; You said:

 

For my purposes I THINK I want to bring my images in to the system with a card reader via my iPad pro so I have full resolution in the cloud (I'm not sure smart previews will suit my editing taste yet).  In doing that I have a folder set up on my MacBook and in my LRC catalog called LR Cloud Imports, LRC also created a collection called "From LR".

 

Can you tell us where the folder "LR Cloud Imnports" fits into the picture? Have you by chance set that folder as the storage location for all Lightroom Synced images on the LrC Preferences>Lightroom Sync tab? If so, then any images that you import into any of the Lightroom apps (desktop, mobile, web, but not LrC) will be stored in that one folder. If that is what you intended, that's fine.

The "From LR" collection....is that actually a "From Lightroom" collection SET which is automatically created by LrC when syncing is enabled, or is it really a "From LR" collection which you would have manually created? The "From Lightroom" collection set is simply a convenient place for LrC to store any synced collections that are originally created as albums in any of the Lightroom apps. If you never create albums in Lightroom, instead you create collections in LrC which you then sync, those collections would not automatically appear in the "From Lightroom" collection set (although you can manually place them there).

 

Please correct me if I am wrong in any of these assumptions:

The folder on my MacBook called LR Cloud Imports is "not a sync" it is a one way import.  Meaning that it will not sync any changes back up to the cloud, and along those same lines I should be editing the images using the "From LR" collection.....correct

 

This is an incorrect assumption. If an image is currently synced, it matters not at all if you edit it from a folder or a collection, the edits will still sync. Extending that thought further, a synced image does NOT have to be in a synced collection....all synced images will always appear in the "All Synced Photographs" special collection, but they do not also have to be in a synced collection. So if an image is synced, you can edit it and the edits will sync, no mattter what source you have selected (folder or collection or filter, if the image is synced, the edits will sync).

 

I don't want to store images permanently in the adobe cloud, I just want to use it to keep the images I am currently processing synced.  So with that in mind, what will happen if I rename and move the images out of the LR Cloud Imports folder on my MacBook into another folder on my MacBook (not to the NAS).  I think they will still stay in the From LR collection even if I relocate the images, correct?  Also in doing the renaming/moving what will happen to the full-size preview in the cloud, will it still be there even if I have renamed and moved file (I assume it would as long as the image was still in the From LR collection).

 

Additionally, what happens if I move that same image from the "From LR" collection and place it in another collection that is also synced to the cloud.  Will the full-size preview still be available?

 

Moving a synced image from one folder to another does not change the sync status of the image. Renaming a file in LrC does not change the sync status (and the rename will also sync to the cloud). Removing a synced image from a synced collection does not automatically change the sync status (though you would get a message asking you what to do), and unsyncing a synced collection does not change the sync status of any of the images in that collection.

Hopefully you've got the message here....you can rename or move synced images around inside LrC with no impact on their sysnc status. The one thing to be aware of is that effectively the status of the synced images in LrC is managed through that All Synced Photographs special collection. The rule is simple....all synced images must always be listed in the ASP, and thus by logic if you remove an image from the ASP then that will unsync that image. The follow-on from that is that if you unsync an image, it can no longer exist in the cloud and is therefore deleted from the cloud.

 

This is my thought process:

Import to ipad so I will have full size previews, then on MacBook with LRC they will show up in the "LR Cloud Imports" folder and the "From LR" collection.  Keep them there until I am ready to work on them (keyword, rename, edit etc).  When I am ready to work on them, move them to a folder in LRC called "Current Edits" and into a synced collection called "Current Edits".  Hopefully retaining full image previews so I can keep edits synced until I am completely finished with the image.

 

Once the image is complete then I would move the file out of the Current Edits folder into its permanent home folder and remove it from a synced collection.

 

As mentioned earlier, yes the synced images will show up in whatever folder is specified in the Preferences>Lightroom Sync tab. They will show up in a synced collection in LrC ONLY if you've added them to an album in Lightroom first. Otherwise you'll have to locate then in LrC either via the folder that they are in, or via the All Synced Photographs. As mentioned, the images can be moved around within LrC however you wish, but also as mentioned if you want to remove them from the cloud you'll need to do that by removing them from the ASP....just unsyncing a synced collection does not remove images from the cloud.

You'll also need to be aware of the things that do NOT sync between Classic and the cloud. Most notable is keywords and location data.

I do not think it will work that way.

Also, keywords and not all develop settings sync.

You can effectively use Cloudy as an ingestion system, and also for some edits.

However for this to work, you need to sync all the images from LrC to the cloud.

This will load the hash value for the image and the smart preview for each image into the cloud.

You can then import all images from your external device into Cloudy. It will then replace the smart preview with the original.

Any new images, add to Cloudy, the original will then sync down into LrC via the sync.

Make sure you have enough space on the desktop, and in Cloudy. I was on the 1 TB Photography plan so I had enough space to do this, with only 500GB of keeper images.

Theoretically, there is a way to remove some photos from the sync and keep them only on LrC or only in Cloudy; however I did not need to do so, so i do not know the steps.

Tim