Captioning both raw & jpeg files

[muranod]

I was using Imatch to caption my files and wrote the changes.

When I then opened them in Lightroom and had LR re-read the metadata, LR reset the orientation and all the develop settings for every image. These events happened far apart from each other, so it took a while to figure out why the file orientation and all the develop settings for hundreds of images were reset in LR.

So, what I gleaned from an older discussion here, the best way to caption is in LR, have LR save the changes, and then let Imatch re-read the metadata for the files?

I'm still using the LR v. 6 standalone version.

[muranod]

This seems to be working well:

Turned off 'protect unwritten metadata' in IM5

Captioned the files and set the orientation in Lightroom.
Saved metadata to files in Lightroom.

Select those files in IM5
Rescan / Reload metadata in IM5

Am I missing a better or any different ways of do this?

It's important to me to have the metadata in LR so I can output files for various uses and have the metadata remain intact.

[Mario]

If you work with multiple applications which manipulate XMP data, always make sure that each application actually commits changes to the XMP data before you read it into the other application.
Lr does not write XMP data back to the file by default. You need to manually trigger it or enable the automatic write (depends on your Lr version).
In IMatch it is the same.

See Using Adobe Lightroom® and IMatch together in the IMatch knowledge base.

Also, see Metadata Write-back in the IMatch help.

If you modify data in Lr but this data does not end up in the file, IMatch cannot see it.
And when you then write-back metadata in IMatch and let Lr import the modified metadata, it will replace the 'pending' metadata it has for the file in its catalog with the data from the file.

This is a limitation of the XMP metadata format. Adobe does not really design their software to be cooperative with non Adobe products.

[DigPeter]

I too use LR but only for editing and raw conversion.  I write captions, keywords etc in IMatch and write-back.  Then load the files into LR.  After editing, I export back to IMatch.  The export screen is set to 'All Metadata' and 'Write keywords as LR hierarchy'.  This preserves IMatch metadata and does not affect orientation.

[muranod]

Guess I need to adjust my workflow. I usually step through and rate in LR since I'm not sure which ones will work best until images are processed. Guess I should do all of that before importing into IM5. I was captioning in IM after the edits because I like IM's captioning process.

I didn't realize that making LR reload the metadata would cause it to reset the develop settings. It was frustrating that I had to go to each file in LR and step back from the reset for >2000 files. There was no bulk way of doing that.

Lesson learned.

:-)

[hluxem]

Hello,

I don't think that LR "resets" the development settings when loading the xmp file. The development settings are saved in the xmp file and it will reload the settings from the xmp file and overwrite development settings not saved to the file yet. You can switch between Imatch and LR, but you always need to make sure you write back and reload the meta data when switching between the programs.

Heiner

[Mario]

If you work with both Lr and IMatch on the XMP data of your files, either make sure you always manually write-back changes or you enable the automatic write-back in both Lr and IMatch.
Note that automatic write-back may slow down your workflow, which is why it is off by default.

Otherwise you prevent that IMatch sees the 'actual' XMP data Lr has in its catalog and vice-versa, which may result in data loss.

[muranod]

Yes, that's what was happening. I had turned it off because it was slowing things down. LR doesn't have anything like the helpful pencil icon as does Imatch.

[muranod]

So, just to be sure I have the setting right to caption everything in LR and not in Imatch:

Protect unwritten metadata: NO
Ignore minor metadata errors: YES
Preserve date/time of original file: NO
Keep existing XMP: YES
Preserve Original Filename: YES

I'm not sure which one(s) I changed before Imatch would load the captions for the raw files

[Mario]

Keep existing XMP is by default NO.

Usually you don't need to change anything in IMatch.
Just make sure you let Lr write-back changes to metadata so IMatch can see what Lr has written. And vice-versa.