How to enable smart previews for auto import?

[yodobe23]

i have auto import enabled in Lightroom to bring in iCloud photos. Is there a way to enable smart previews with auto import?

[JP Hess]

What if you went to the performance tab in  the Lightroom preferences and enabled using smart previews for editing? Would that do the trick for you?

[yodobe23]

Not sure, the reason for smart previews is to be able to use Lightroom on a laptop that may not have access to original photos. Main machine is a desktop. Would that work?

[JP Hess]

How are you proposing to get the Smart previews onto the laptop? Are you tethering the camera to the laptop? Not quite following the workflow here.

[yodobe23]

I will be using Google Drive sync which syncs the local Lightroom folder that contains the catalog and preview folders between computers.

[JP Hess]

Hopefully, someone else will step in here. I'm not comfortable giving advice on this process. I think isn't going to work the way you are expecting it to.

[yodobe23]

In retrospect, I think as long as the NAS I'm using is accessible by the laptop it doesn't really matter whether I'm using smart previews or not. I know I need to make sure that syncing completes before opening Lightroom on the other computer. It would still be good to have smart previews applied automatically during auto import so I can use on my tablet.

[Theresa J]

It sounds like you are trying to share a Lr catalog with two computers using Google Drive sync. I am not sure if this works, or how well it works so I won't comment on that.

If you want to use Lr Mobile on a tablet to edit images in the catalog you don't need to create smart previews, you need to put the images in a collection and sync it with Lr Mobile. You can import directly to a collection that has already been set up to sync.

[yodobe23]

I checked out How to sync Lightroom desktop and the Lightroom mobile app  but it's not making sense to me at all. I want to sync the last 365 days of photos to tablet. I must be missing something obvious.

[john beardsworth]

Tried this? In a web browser, log in to your page at Lightroom.adobe,com.

[Theresa J]

The images need to be in a collection. Then you turn Sync on for the collection. Have you done that?

[yodobe23]

I can't turn on sync for a smart collection. Can I have a collection for last 365 days photos? I only see a way to do that with smart collections.

[JP Hess · Accepted solution]

Smart collections cannot be synchronized. Only "regular" collections can be synchronized with Lightroom Mobile or with Lightroom.adobe.com.

[yodobe23]

Wow, just wow.

[johnrellis]

Wow, just wow.

Syncing smart collections with LR Mobile is by far the most popular feature request at the official Adobe feedback forum: Lightroom: Ability to sync Smart Collections to Lightroom Mobile / lightroom.adobe.com | Photoshop F... Please add your me-too vote and details of why you want it to the feature request.

Maybe Project Nimbus ("Lightroom in the cloud" that may or may not be released this year) will allow smart collections to be synced -- one can hope. Meanwhile, as a workaround, you could use the Any Source plugin.

[yodobe23]

It's ironic how I already have the photos on my iPad using iCloud Photo Library. Judging by the years that have gone by without a response from Adobe about this much requested feature, I'm not holding my breath and am actively searching other ways to accomplish what I want.