Photo storage woes

[tolyto]

I am going bonkers with the lack of photo organization I have going on right now. I need some help...

I have a Mac. I have 1000s of pics in iPhoto organized by year and/or topic. When I started photoediting with PSE a year ago, I found that iPhoto would make a copy and store it in a hidden "originals" file - only sometimes would it work to save an edited photo in iPhoto (I have no idea what the secret to doing so was..which is probably why it was only sometimes).

So I started saving pics in folders on the hard drive. However, the photos import into iPhoto.

Then I started playing around with Lightroom (downloaded free version - not sure if I am going to purchase or not). And it imports, copies, and puts new files all over the place.

I am SO frustrated!

Anyone have a CLEAN system of storage on a Mac with PSE?

HELP!

[Nicole]

I don't use iPhoto any more, and instead I just manage my photos using LR and PS (though PSE will do the same thing in this scenario). I have LR set up to put my photos in a specified location by date. The only duplicate photos I have are when I make edits either in PS or another external editor that saves it in either psd or tif. So, I consider it a pretty clean storage system (aside from my mess of backup photos, but that's a whole other story )

[luminescent]

I use Lightroom. You really do need to learn how the import function works. Lightroom only puts photos where you tell it to during the import phase .. and that's only if you select "MOVE and import" or "COPY and import" in the import dialog. If you want your photos to be cataloged and left in their current location, just import instead of using move/copy and import.

I use Lightroom to manage my 1.5 TB collection of work (by YEAR/MONTH) from the last 8 years and I love it. I used to use iMatch but Lightroom is a much fuller featured solution.