What is that Sync Button for? | Lightroom Tutorial

So I’d been cruising along in Lightroom for a year…learning as I go.  And every once in awhile, when I was in the Develop Module, I would see the “Previous” button in the bottom right corner change…to the “Sync” Button.  Hmmm.  I was clueless and I just thought I was doing okay and that I probably didn’t need that little button. Well, when I found out…it ROCKED my Lightroom world!

SYNC is your friend.  You need to know what Sync is and I am here to tell you.  The Sync button is about workflow and working faster!  As I said the Sync button is not always there, and I did not even know why or how it got there!

So, the Sync button will show up any time more than one image is selected in the filmstrip.  Ah-Ha!  Now, what to do with it?  The suspense is killing me because you are going to love this.

IF you press the Sync button, all the settings of the first image in the line of images selected, will apply to all the other photos selected.  Huh?  Okay, do you have a trigger finger?  Yeah, me too.  So I usually come out of a session with many images taken in the same spot, in the same lighting.  Am I going to keep them all?  No!  But, it might help to look at them all with a clean edit.

So, I select the first one in the group of similar images and I clean it up…white balance, exposure, etc.  When it is cleaned up, I just select it AND the whole group of similar images (select the image, hold down shift and select the last image).  Then press Sync and they are ALL EDITED!  Oh my!  What did I ever do without Sync?

If you want a more in-depth tutorial of the Sync button, I recommend this article, Apply Develop Settings to Groups of Images by Laura Shoe on her blog!