Author Topic: Create XMP Sidecar on Memory Card?  (Read 2868 times)

Offline StickmanInDC

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Create XMP Sidecar on Memory Card?
« on: November 27, 2014, 11:38:50 AM »
I'm curious whether there's an option I'm missing that allows me to create XMP sidecars on my memory card? At the moment PM seems to only create them on my hard drive after I've ingested the files. I understand the philosophy of "you shouldn't edit your photos on the card so that the original is always pristine", but it seems to me that adding a sidecar doesn't alter the original.

I just got a Nikon D810 and with 36MP RAW files the import into Lightroom before I can cull them takes forever. So I'm looking at PM as a possible front-end for Lightroom. My preferred workflow would be to use PM to quickly look through the images on the memory card and rate/flag them (in an XMP sidecar), then import only the "keepers" into Lightroom (taking the ratings/flags with them via the sidecar). If I'm shooting sports there may be hundreds of files on the memory card but only a few dozen that are ever going to see the light of day. If I have to ingest *everything* into PM before I can rate them, I may as well just wait for the Lightroom import...

I see a reference in the wiki to a setting "Allow modification of files on Camera Disks" but don't see it anywhere in the current settings menu.

Any ideas?

Offline Kirk Baker

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Re: Create XMP Sidecar on Memory Card?
« Reply #1 on: November 27, 2014, 07:13:33 PM »
I'm curious whether there's an option I'm missing that allows me to create XMP sidecars on my memory card? At the moment PM seems to only create them on my hard drive after I've ingested the files. I understand the philosophy of "you shouldn't edit your photos on the card so that the original is always pristine", but it seems to me that adding a sidecar doesn't alter the original.

I just got a Nikon D810 and with 36MP RAW files the import into Lightroom before I can cull them takes forever. So I'm looking at PM as a possible front-end for Lightroom. My preferred workflow would be to use PM to quickly look through the images on the memory card and rate/flag them (in an XMP sidecar), then import only the "keepers" into Lightroom (taking the ratings/flags with them via the sidecar). If I'm shooting sports there may be hundreds of files on the memory card but only a few dozen that are ever going to see the light of day. If I have to ingest *everything* into PM before I can rate them, I may as well just wait for the Lightroom import...

I see a reference in the wiki to a setting "Allow modification of files on Camera Disks" but don't see it anywhere in the current settings menu.

That preference is in the Preferences dialog in the Files section.

But why not simply select the images on the card that you want to keep and then copy them to your hard drive with the Copy Photos command and then import them into Lightroom?

http://wiki.camerabits.com/en/index.php?title=User_Manual_Flat_View#Copy_Photos_2

You can then rate/label/keyword/caption, etc. on your hard drive with PM and then import those images into Lightroom.

-Kirk