LR Import from iPhone with "Optimize iPhone Storage"

[MarkSD]

If you import into LR directly from an iPhone with "Optimize iPhone Storage" set, will you get a full resolution image?

I've seen that several people import into LR by exporting images from the desktop OSX Photos application (after auto sync via iCloud or My Photo Stream.   For me this is more cumbersome than plugging in phones and importing, especially when you have multiple family members with phone and separate iCloud library but only one central LR repository to store all family photos.

-- Mark

[Ian Lyons]

"Optimize iPhone Storage"is a function of iOS, not Lightroom. There is no reason why the photos or videos imported into Lr would be anything other than the same resolution as normal for the device.

When 'Optimize Storage' is enable, your iPhone or iPad will store the latest photos and videos locally (phone or tablet). Older photos and videos are uploaded to the cloud, but can be downloaded again when you next want to view them.

[MarkSD]

Sorry, but are you saying yes or no?   You're correct that "Optimize iPhone Storage" is a setting in IOS and has nothing to do with Lightroom.   However, how it is implemented potentially does impact LR import.

My understanding is that the IOS device actively (iPhone in this instance) replaces full resolution images with reduced resolution images based on age (or potentially other Apple criteria).   Depending on the remaining capacity of the phone, images could be optimized in as short as a day.

The question is whether people have seen the behavior of receiving reduced resolution images from an iPhone when using LR import directly from the IOS device with "Optimize iPhone Storage" enabled.  Or whether IOS "serves up" full resolution images from iCloud during a LR Import even though the local device only has a reduced resolution image (implying IOS device would have to have connectivity to iCloud with is almost always true on phones).

-- Mark

[Jao vdL · Accepted solution]

As far as I can tell when you import this way and the phone doesn't have the full resolution image, the operating system will pull down the full resolution image from iCloud, import into Lightroom, after which Lightroom will upload the full resolution image to CC. I don't know what would happen if you have no internet connectivity when you do this. Also, people would usually do this with recently shot images, not images that are months old and the phone is highly likely to have full resolution versions of the last month or so even with optimize storage enabled.

[MarkSD]

I kept searching and saw some references to the idea that, as you mentioned, when a photo is requested (could be many types of requests), the operating system will request the full resolution image.   But as you say, not sure what happens if no 4G or WiFI connection.

-- Mark