Single folder for sessions, or not using sessions

riw777

• February 01, 2016 20:49

Y'all --

My workflow doesn't really include leaving all my images on my main computer -- rather, I store them on a NAS on the network, although I edit them on my primary computer. Given this, I don't really use the catalog or session features... I'd really like just to have one session folder in one place, and clean out the trash/etc. when I exit.

But I can't figure out how to do this. Anytime I touch a new folder, CaptureOne creates a new "untitled session" folder, and stores odds and ends there. So using CaptureOne means editing the images, then going back through and cleaning the directory out, and the next time I open CaptureOne, it fusses about not being able to find the session folder again.

Is there a way to change this behavior?

Russ

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  Petr Odehnal

  • February 07, 2016 20:34

  And how do you organize your pictures at NAS?
  
  I'm using unique folder names in form "yyyy-mm-dd any text info I need to know what could be in this folder". So I created sessions with such name (which becomes also name of folder in which is session stored) and I'm not using Capture folder inside session to store pictures. Instead I'm creating there other subfolders, which I add as "session favorites".
  It allows me to work inside session with more different sets of pictures and still move whole session as one directory between my computers and NAS without any troubles.
  
  It isn't perfect but it works good enough for me.

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  SFA

  • February 07, 2016 21:27

  Russ,
  
  C1 will always provide a control file for you so one way or another you will always be using a catalog or a session.
  
  Sessions were the only option at one time.
  
  You can, if you wish, work with a single session and ignore all of the functionality that session management can provide if you are absolutely sure you are not interested in any of it.
  
  Simple allow C1 to create a default session. Do not import any files to it (there is a load of functionality there that may actually be useful to you but you are not forced to take advantage of it.)
  
  With the session open go to the Library tab and simply navigate to wherever the images you want to work with images are currently located..
  
  Open the folder (not an image, just the folder in which it resides) and C1 will identify any images in that folder that it can work with. It will start to display them and add a sub-folder structure to that folder wherein it will retain thumbnails, previews and the files required to store the edits that you make to the image files.
  
  You may find it makes sense to add the folder as a Favourite whilst you are working with it.
  
  The folder could be on your NAS but usually things work a little faster if everything is on an internal drive. That may not be an issue for you or your system.
  
  Basically that is it for a very simply and manually managed way to use C1.
  
  So, to summarise:
  
  Add a new session that you will use for everything.
  
  Save it so that it become your "Recent" session and will re-open by default (windows allowing) next time you open C1. That way you will not be asked to create a new session each time.
  
  Don't worry about the automatically created folders. Just leave them where they are. They are empty. They do no harm. You may find them quite useful once you get your workflow sorted out.
  
  With the session open navigate to a folder that contains some files you wish to edit. Open the folder (do not try to select a file at that point.) C1 will show you the files and you can edit them wherever they are located. Adding the folder as a "Favourite" should be useful at that time. Once done with editing you can remove it from the favourites if you feel the need.
  
  All of the edits that you make will be saved in a subfolder to the image location folder. They would therefore be accessible to a different session should you feel the need to create one or from a different machine on the network should that be helpful. However do not work with the same file files at the same time on two different machines.
  
  Also local to the files will be the thumbnails and preview files. It makes sense to keep these while you working with the files for otherwise they will be re-generated when you open the folder again.
  
  However once you have finished with the editing and no longer expect to work with the images regularly you could tidy up, should you chose to, by removing the thumbnail and preview files since they can be regenerated if required from the original files and the edit instructions. Be sure you understand which files are which if you dive in to maintenance. It's not difficult but then, speaking personally, I don't really see the point in removing them unless for some reason you have ended up with huge preview files that are taking up a lot of disk space that you need for other things.
  
  HTH.
  
  
  Grant

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