LR2.1 / CS4 Save Anomaly

[dougkurn]

Hi folks,

I've got a strange thing going on with Lightroom 2.1 and Photoshop CS4 on OS 10.5.4, which I would post on the Adobe Forum but there doesn't seem to be an Add Topic button on there at the moment.

I have a folder full of RAW files and when I export one of the RAWs, it opens in CS4 as it should, then I do some editing and go to File> Save As and save it as a PSD in a Sub Folder of the original folder (I like to keep the working files separate to the RAWs). It gets saved there and re-imported to LR as a PSD. All well and good so far, BUT if I do some further editing on the same file (which is still open in Photoshop) and then press Cmd S to Save it, what happens is that it gets Saved as another PSD in the original folder with all the RAWs and imported into Lightroom. So there ends up being 2 versions of the PSD, the one with the RAWs that gets updated every time I hit Cmd S, and another in my working files folder which doesn't get updated!

If I close the PSD after doing the Save As step, then it closes normally (no "Do You Want to Save" message) and I can then re-open it  and proceed normally.

Anybody else seen this?

Cheers
Doug

[Nat Coalson]

Doug-
This is expected behavior from LR/PS with the current releases and is not a problem. It's an issue related to the file system Save and Save As operations and how the two apps store shared files in system memory.

With LR v2, when you do a regular Edit in Photoshop, the file is opened into memory - no file has been saved yet (as was the case with v1.x).

So, when you're done working in Photoshop, just do a regular Save... (not Save As...). You will be prompted to give the file a name, choose the format, etc. This file gets added to the LR catalog. So you're done there... but don't close the file just yet.

Here's what's cool - with that file still open, you can do more work to produce derivative files (such as sized and sharpened for print; a JPG with custom watermark, whatever), each time doing a Save As...

You can use the History from your first (temporary) file to keep going back to various points, and each time you do a Save As you can get a new file automatically added to the Lightroom catalog - up until the time you close the original Edit file.

Working with files in two different apps can be a little tricky. Carefully consider what a Save vs. Save As will actually do (with regard to the dynamic links between apps) before choosing one or the other.

[dougkurn]

With LR v2, when you do a regular Edit in Photoshop, the file is opened into memory - no file has been saved yet (as was the case with v1.x).

So, when you're done working in Photoshop, just do a regular Save... (not Save As...). You will be prompted to give the file a name, choose the format, etc. This file gets added to the LR catalog. So you're done there... but don't close the file just yet.

Hi Nat,

Thanks for the help on this. However I'm not getting any prompt if I use Cmd S (a regular Save), the file is automatically saved as a PSD next to the RAW file with the Colour Space and Bit depth determined in the External Editor preferences in LR. So it seems that LR is giving me no option to Save the file where I want and continue to work with it, saving as I normally would (Cmd S) as I go along. I have to remember to close the document, and re-open it to carry on. This can be quite dangerous, in my opinion.

Do you see a dialogue when doing a regular save (are you on OSX?)

Doug

[Nat Coalson]

Hi Nat,

Thanks for the help on this. However I'm not getting any prompt if I use Cmd S (a regular Save), the file is automatically saved as a PSD next to the RAW file with the Colour Space and Bit depth determined in the External Editor preferences in LR. So it seems that LR is giving me no option to Save the file where I want and continue to work with it, saving as I normally would (Cmd S) as I go along. I have to remember to close the document, and re-open it to carry on. This can be quite dangerous, in my opinion.

Do you see a dialogue when doing a regular save (are you on OSX?)

Doug

Doug, yes, I am using OS X. And you're right about not getting a dialog - Photoshop actually will just save the file as per the External Editor preferences in Lightroom, and you don't have the chance to choose a new location. (When you're done editing in PS you can move the file to another folder from within Lightroom if you need to.)

When working on this file, if you continue to just press Cmd S then the version in LR will continually get updated.

It's when you close it that you need to be careful; to work on it more, rather than opening the file from within Photoshop again, you need to start from Lightroom by Editing the original PSD file. This way LR will retain the link to the changes you make in the new session.