Lightroom Classic Backup

[Andrewjmarino]

Hi

It's been a while since I've done much photography and processing (Lightroom Classic). I realize that, perhaps, I should clean up some things on my laptop.
I attached a screenshot of my Lightroom folder on my D Drive.
Note, that I just changed/added the latest screenshot after I updated the catalog today 11/24.
All of this is backed up to 2 external drives. However, I think that I should also back up to the cloud.

What exactly can I delete?
What exactly do I need to back up to the cloud?

Secondly, I know that I'm supposed to rename (from within Lightroom) my catalog to something useful. Which file(s) again should I rename?

And, eventually, I should back up my photos to the cloud which are on an external drive too

Thank you
Andrew

[DanK]

The safest approach for backing up is no different for photography than for anything else: three copies (the original and two more), one of which is not local. For example, my approach for years has been a local backup to an external drive and an off-site backup via a cloud backup service (Backblaze). The local copy is actually a mirror, rather than a backup, because I find that easier to use, for example, if I accidentally overwrite a file. I go to the online backup extremely rarely.

The essential thing IMHO is that you have an off-site copy. Something that damages your computer might also damage an external drive sitting next to it. So IMHO, you should move one backup to the cloud.

Re renaming: if you rename the catalog from within Lightroom, Lightroom should rename all of the other associated files when you exit and restart. That will make it obvious which files are associated with the new catalogue. Then you can simply delete the older catalogs and their associated files. However, my procedure whenever I am concerned about deleting files is that I copy them somewhere else and then restart the program to make sure that I haven't accidentally deleted something I need. Once I know that everything is working right, I delete the copies.

You should set Lightroom to back up the catalog fairly often when exiting. I have mine set to back up weekly. Lightroom does not delete old backups, so these proliferate. Every so often, I manually delete all but the last two or three catalog backups.