Edit w. Lightroom iPad without importing (edit on external drive)

[davis_1312]

hi,

I kinda like to use Lightroom on iPad for quick edits when needed to be delivered fast, as I mostly have the iPad with me to do occasional backups from SD card to SSD drive.

Now does anyone know what Lightroom on iPad is exactly doing with the files when importing them? is there a way to leave the files on the external drive/ssd for the quick edit without having them to be copied onto the iPad itself? or even if I copy the few photos I want to edit onto the iPad into its Photos app, will Lightroom then leave them there or is it gonna make again new copies to its own location?

I have no idea what that app actually is doing in terms of file location tbh.

But since the new iOs is fully supporting external drives, that all shouldn't be that much of matter, or am I wrong?

thanks, d.

[Jim Wilde]

Currently, when you import photos into the Lr app on the iPad, the app copies them into its own space on the iPad. So if you import directly from SD card or external drive or even the Photos camera roll, those original images will remain where they are, and Lr uses the copy that it's made internally for subsequent syncing up to the Adobe cloud and for local editing on the iPad.

With the advent of iOS 13, some changes are apparently planned for the Lr app to allow direct import from external devices, rather than having to import via the camera roll, but I'm not expecting those changes to allow direct edit access to the original images on the SD card or external drive. I could be wrong of course, I don't work for Adobe so have no direct knowledge of their future development plans.