Moving synced images between devices?

[Dan Walsh]

Good morning!

I use Lightroom CC on my iPad and Lightroom Classic on my MacBook.

When I sync Lightroom CC on my iPad with Lightroom Mobile, I believe the images physically remain on my iPad but become visible (and workable) via the cloud on my other devices?

To free up space on my iPad, how can I move the physical location of those synced images from my iPad to my MacBook without losing the edits?

Thanks in advance!

- Dan

[Theresa J]

Where did the images originate from that are in Lightroom CC? Did you import them into Lightroom using your iPad? Once the images are fully synced, after the import, they are now in the cloud. If you imported them from the camera roll, you can delete the images in the camera roll.

Another way to clear up space on your iPad is to clear the cache. This clears out temporarily stored previews that are created when you edit. This won’t delete anything from Lightroom. Go to settings, Local Storage to find the cache.

[Dan Walsh]

Hi Theresa, thanks for taking the time to help 😉

I was on holiday and uploaded the images from memory card to the camera roll. Then imported from camera roll to Lightroom CC and made my edits (for social media posting on the go). I'm now back home and although the images are showing in my Lightroom Classic library (as synced photos), ideally I'd prefer they were physically located on my MacBook (and associated ext drive).

So now that Lightoom CC has synced, the images (the whole CR2 file) is in the cloud and I can delete it from the camera roll without fear that it will disappear from the cloud or that I'll get some message about the file missing?

I just fear that losing anything I the event that I was to turn off syncing etc.?

Thanks again Theresa!

- D

[Theresa J · Accepted solution]

Dan,

I understand your fear. It is confusing. The good news is that right now you actually have three copies of your holiday images (maybe four if they are still on the memory card). First, they are in the camera roll on your iPad. Second, they are in the Lr Cloud. And third, they are already on the hard drive where your Classic catalog is.

Classic acts like a vacuum and copies down any full resolution files it finds in the cloud when it is synced to Lr CC. By default it puts these images in the Pictures folder, (but you could change the location for future syncs). To find the location of an image on your drive, do a control click on a photo in Lightroom Classic and then chose Reveal in Finder. This will show you where the images were downloaded to. Once you feel secure in knowing they are all there, you can go about deleting the other copies.

Start by deleting the photos in the iPad camera roll. Deleting from the camera roll is a two step process. First you delete them, then you go to the Recently Deleted Album and delete them again.

If you want the holiday images removed from the Cloud you can delete them from Lr on the iPad, or from Classic on your MacBook. You don’t have to worry about the warning message in Lr on the iPad, because the images were downloaded to Classic.

To delete them from the cloud using Classic, go to the All Synced Photos collection in the Library Module and remove them. This deletes them from Lr CC aka the cloud, but not Classic.

I hope that all makes sense.

[Dan Walsh]

I'll have another look when I get home from work!

Have a good one Theresa and thanks again! 😉

- D