Migration from IMatch to Lightroom

IMatch->LR Quick Guide

Since there was no useful guidance available on the web, [back in Dec 2008] I decided to publish and share my own migration steps. The whole process for the database migration of over 40,000 assets took about 48 hours. The guide may help with the migration to other DAM tools such as Expression Media, too.

1. Download and install the following IMatch scripts

LR-PM-IMatch Keyword Sync by DESGphoto
All Purpose IPTC Writer 1.10 by Khodadad
Copy Imatch Categories into XMP by elessar

2. Download and install ExifTool

ExifTool by Phil Harvey
Copy the tool to a local directory f.i. C:\Program Files\exiftool\

3. Setup IMatch XMP Preferences

In IMatch Scripting Manager edit all path information in the 'Copy Imatch Categories into XMP' script to the correct path of exiftool on your computer (f.i. 'C:\Program Files\exiftool\exiftool.exe'). As for V1.4 of this script this is one constant in line 39.

IMatch XMP Preferences (Options->Preferences->XMP): Disable 'Use asynchronous XMP updates', disable 'Favor external sidecar XMP files', disable 'Always store XMP data in external sidecar files', enable 'Allow to embed XMP data in supported RAW formats', enable 'Automatically import legacy IPTC data into XMP'.

Restart IMatch

Process pending XMP Updates: Image->XMP->Process Pending XMP Updates

4. Categories IMATCH Export & LR Import

Change family tree/sibling categories to standard categories first, since LR doesn't have support for this category type.

Use the 'LR-PM-IMatch Keyword Sync' script to export your final category tree and exclude unnecessary and data driven categories.

Open the exported file in a text editor like TextEdit, where you can save the file as UTF-8 txt file.

Now you are ready to import this category tree as hierarchical keywords in LR2.

5. Copy IMatch Database Properties to IPTC/XMP

Switch back to IMatch. Only if you had setup any IMatch database properties (otherwise proceed with step 6): use the 'All Purpose IPTC Writer 1.10' by Khodadad for transferring all your properties to IPTC/XMP fields. Map them accordingly in the script's dialog window. f.i.
{Image.Properties.Caption} => Headline
{Image.Properties.Description} => Image Notes

6. Copy IMatch Categories into XMP

Run the "Copy Imatch Categories into XMP" script on all your images/assets. But don't run a script like this on more than 20,000 assets at the same time, otherwise scripts tend to end up with an error in the middle of the process. Split them up in smaller groups in that case.

This can take several hours.

7. Embed XMP sidecar files information into files

Open a command prompt (Windows Start button -> Run -> cmd) and use the following parameter set in order to copy asset categories/label/rating/etc from the XMP sidecar files to the actual file itself for certain file types. Otherwise this information would not be available in LR, because LR ignores sidecars for certain file types (f.i. jpg, psd, ...). just replace X:\ASSETS with your own path to your assets (sub directories will be scanned automatically):

exiftool -tagsfromfile %d%f.xmp -r -m -overwrite_original -fast -P -q -e -n --ext crw --ext cr2 "X:\ASSETS"

This can take several hours.

8. Ready to import your assets into the LR catalog

The import is pretty fast, welcome to the DAM world of LR ;-).

First Impressions

Truly non-destructive editing, powerful library functionality, virtual copies, quick collections, stacks, filters, advanced export, plug-in support (flickr, metatags, etc.). Watch folders, fast import, super fast folder sync. A WIN/OS X migrations with LR are no big deal.

Still Missing: broader file/media library support (video, graphic file formats, audio, pdf, maybe office documents).

The Lightroom Queen LR Shortcuts Guide

Warning

Please be aware that in some cases XMP RAW processing data might get lost/overwritten during the migration process. Test all migration steps with dummy files/databases first.

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