[Lowell Goudge]

I would agree with Marc on this issue.

Although I shoot almost exclusively JPEG, my originals are stored in a directory structure of \photos\year\month with additional sub-directories as necessitated by any special events that take place or if, for example I go on a trip, where I may add multiple sub-directories for locations etc.

when it comes time to do any editing, for a specific project, like a photo book, or for ongoing projects I have such as one for neon signs and another for wall art, I copy originals into a new project directory and edit them from that point on, in the project directory. As I retain the file name, I know what the original is called, and the exif data has the creation date so I can easily go back to the master library if i screw something up.

It is simply a matter of management working in one directory originals in another

[emalvick]

Right, I didn't mean to imply I thought one must do this, just that *if* one is going to perform a separation, it's original versus derivative that has more value than raw versus JPEG. It only happens that original versus derivative may turn out to be raw versus JPEG in practice.

BTW, the main advantage as I see it to doing this separation isn't lessened by any sort of version control. It's a simple backup issue. By keeping originals separate from derivatives, it means you can More easily back up your originals and never have to update those backups, as the folders containing those originals will never change even if you subsequently generate or regenerate derivatives.

True, but I use a backup software that I'm confident in finding and backing up files as they are needed, plus by using LR the metadata gets updated everytime I make new derivatives (i.e. the develop settings) that I like to have backed up as well. It really gets tedious when I think about it too much. Thankfully, my DAM is fairly automatic these days, so I don't think about it that closely other than to check that things are working every so often.

[br.davidson]

Ok, here's an update:

Moving the files around worked nicely, but the JPEGs take up a lot more space than I thought they would. Also, I'm not sure how important it really was separate JPEGs and RAWs at the top of the directory structure. That's the part I keep going back and forth on. I think I need to rethink my approach. This is very time consuming.

Maybe I should use the shoe-box method that my Grandma has perfected.

[emalvick]

Ok, here's an update:

Moving the files around worked nicely, but the JPEGs take up a lot more space than I thought they would. Also, I'm not sure how important it really was separate JPEGs and RAWs at the top of the directory structure. That's the part I keep going back and forth on. I think I need to rethink my approach. This is very time consuming.

Maybe I should use the shoe-box method that my Grandma has perfected.

It is all very time consuming, but it is worth the effort to get it right once. Once you have it right, you won't have to mess with it again, and you'll feel confident with what you have.

[vladimiroltean]

Read the topic from top to bottom, still I can't tell what you are trying to do. It happens that I have the same issue as you.