Pixelmator Photo iCloud folder taking up 183GB of space?

[dantaylr]

I recently went through my iCloud storage to see if there were any sinkholes and noticed the Pixelmator Photo "Linked Files" folder was taking up 183GB of space.

Given that I already use iCloud Photos (I'm not storing my photos anywhere else), I assumed Pixelmator's edits were stored as little bits of extra information in Pixelmator and turning on iCloud sync would just sync the information to other copies of the app. But this appears to be storing whole copies of the raw photos. Is this necessary? Is there any setting I can change to mitigate this? I'd rather not have a partial clone of my photos library also being constantly synced.

[Ali Boyacioglu]

I brought up this issue a few times during past 2-3 years. The answer was always that they are aware of it but it’s not their priority to fix it. Let’s see what the answer is going to be this time.

[dantaylr]

I brought up this issue a few times during past 2-3 years. The answer was always that they are aware of it but it’s not their priority to fix it. Let’s see what the answer is going to be this time.

Oof. Is there a workaround? Are edits not stored as sidecar files? If I went ahead and didn't sync to iCloud what would happen? Cause my photos themselves still sync.

[Andy Hewitt]

Yeah, this has been discussed a few times, but it seems it's difficult to work around, and keep onto the non-destructive editing workflow.

The large files are created by using the non-destructive editing option, and they save all sorts of files inside them (they're really a wrapper containing many files). The size can depend on what edits you have applied (especially the AI ones, like super-resolution, NR etc.) It looks like it saves a kind of uncompressed TIFF type file, which can get huge when created from a Raw file - most Raws are actually compressed nowadays, usually using lossless algorithm. There are a few additional files included too, such as previews and thumbnails. I've seen a 27MB Raw file end up near to 200MB as a Pixelmator sidecar.

However, this isn't actually unusual, most apps that use a similar system, also end up with large sidecar files. I'd expect they are used to improve performance (being able to open a Hi-Res preview image, rather than render the Raw+edits on-the-fly, which takes a huge amount of processing power).

Some apps, such as Lightroom, offer options for the user to choose how this work. With LR you can choose their 'smart' previews, standard previews, full size previews, or no previews at all.

For my setup, I use Apple Photos as my DAM, and most editing, and this manages to use a system of metadata and a sensibly sized Hi-res preview image, with the editing data stored in it's database. The only other app I've come across that also uses a similar system is Raw Power, which doesn't create huge sidecar files either, and seems to store it's editing metadata within the JPEG preview image - but that's doesn't have any AI trickery either.

With Pixelmator, I tend to edit a bunch of images using the non-destructive editing workflow (I edit directly from the Photos library), you can choose whether to save the sidecars on the device, or to iCloud. Once I've finished with the editing, and happy with the final results (which are saved back to Photos as hi-res previews), I just delete the sidecar files. It loses the ability to utilise the non-destructive editing later on, but to be fair, I find I tend to revert to original and start again anyway. This does not affect the image saved in Photos.

It might be a different matter if you using a more traditional organising of your images (i.e. basic folders and files, rather than a DAM based system), for that I haven't used such a workflow myself with Pixelmator.

Hope that helps,

Andy.

[dantaylr]

Yeah, this has been discussed a few times, but it seems it's difficult to work around, and keep onto the non-destructive editing workflow.

The large files are created by using the non-destructive editing option, and they save all sorts of files inside them (they're really a wrapper containing many files). The size can depend on what edits you have applied (especially the AI ones, like super-resolution, NR etc.) It looks like it saves a kind of uncompressed TIFF type file, which can get huge when created from a Raw file - most Raws are actually compressed nowadays, usually using lossless algorithm. There are a few additional files included too, such as previews and thumbnails. I've seen a 27MB Raw file end up near to 200MB as a Pixelmator sidecar.

However, this isn't actually unusual, most apps that use a similar system, also end up with large sidecar files. I'd expect they are used to improve performance (being able to open a Hi-Res preview image, rather than render the Raw+edits on-the-fly, which takes a huge amount of processing power).

Some apps, such as Lightroom, offer options for the user to choose how this work. With LR you can choose their 'smart' previews, standard previews, full size previews, or no previews at all.

For my setup, I use Apple Photos as my DAM, and most editing, and this manages to use a system of metadata and a sensibly sized Hi-res preview image, with the editing data stored in it's database. The only other app I've come across that also uses a similar system is Raw Power, which doesn't create huge sidecar files either, and seems to store it's editing metadata within the JPEG preview image - but that's doesn't have any AI trickery either.

With Pixelmator, I tend to edit a bunch of images using the non-destructive editing workflow (I edit directly from the Photos library), you can choose whether to save the sidecars on the device, or to iCloud. Once I've finished with the editing, and happy with the final results (which are saved back to Photos as hi-res previews), I just delete the sidecar files. It loses the ability to utilise the non-destructive editing later on, but to be fair, I find I tend to revert to original and start again anyway. This does not affect the image saved in Photos.

It might be a different matter if you using a more traditional organising of your images (i.e. basic folders and files, rather than a DAM based system), for that I haven't used such a workflow myself with Pixelmator.

Hope that helps,

Andy.

This is a really good workflow considering the circumstances. If I delete the sidecar files in Linked Files, the previews still stay right? And I can still revert to the original if I want, yes?
Given my situation I’d consider doing that.

[Andy Hewitt]

I

This is a really good workflow considering the circumstances. If I delete the sidecar files in Linked Files, the previews still stay right? And I can still revert to the original if I want, yes?
Given my situation I’d consider doing that.

As long as you're using the Photos Library method, then yes, Photos manages the preview, and the original, so you can always revert back if needed. Once you've completed the edits in Pixelmator, and saved back into the Photos library, the sidecar files are redundant unless you go back into Pixelmator to re-edit the image.

So, in my case, I have all my images in my Photos Library, all synced to iCloud. I open these images in Pixelmator using its access to the Photos library. I apply edits, then click the Done button, and its asks if I want to allow the modification (so, yes, I click Allow). After that, the full res preview is saved into the Photos library, exactly as it would have done if you'd edited the image in Photos itself. After that you can safely delete the sidecar '.photo' file. It looks like a single image in the library, but you can use the revert to original, or even apply further edits if you really need to (these will be applied to the new Preview version though, not to the underlying original).

I suspect you could also do this with an external workflow, as long as you Export/Save the edited version as its own image. It's all a matter of saving the versions as rendered final images (as JPEGs or TIFFs etc.) before deleting anything.

Hope that helps.

Andy.

[PSS]

I am new to Photomator and so far it’s great, the main reason for me to use it is the apple photos integration. Other than iPhone pics I also want to work with 100mpix tiffs, which so far are handled extremely smooth on both iPad and MBP but there is that issue with the sidecar files, 11 items 5gb. I really dont need the non destructive edits saved since i am keeping my raws in C1. I unchecked the boxes but now i am wondering what files are actually stored? When i click the info button, I see jpeg, which i guess is the preview? Is the tiff file still saved with apple photos and in the cloud?

[Tony T]

Yeah, this has been discussed a few times, but it seems it's difficult to work around, and keep onto the non-destructive editing workflow.

...
With Pixelmator, I tend to edit a bunch of images using the non-destructive editing workflow (I edit directly from the Photos library), you can choose whether to save the sidecars on the device, or to iCloud. Once I've finished with the editing, and happy with the final results (which are saved back to Photos as hi-res previews), I just delete the sidecar files. It loses the ability to utilise the non-destructive editing later on, but to be fair, I find I tend to revert to original and start again anyway. This does not affect the image saved in Photos.

It might be a different matter if you using a more traditional organising of your images (i.e. basic folders and files, rather than a DAM based system), for that I haven't used such a workflow myself with Pixelmator.

Hope that helps,

Andy.

I do the same. Also, in the new Photomator for Mac, in Photomator->Settings->Edit->Manage Files, there is an option to delete Sidecar Files > 30 days (yes, its easy enough to just use Finder to do this)

[nigelw]

I'm ramping up my Photomator usage now that there's a Mac release, and the large size of Photomator sidecar files is an unwelcome surprise. It really chews through iCloud/disk space. I see this has been mentioned in various threads.

Part of Photomator's appeal is the tight integration with the built in Photos DAM. I don't have to think about asset management and it works similar to Photos.app's own editing workflow. But given the size of sidecar files, I find I need to choose between preserving non-destructive edits and manually managing/occasionally purging a shadow photo library.

I'm an ex-Darkroom user. Its sidecar files are tiny (only 4-30 KB each). I understand from a couple of posts by the Photomator team that edits like the Repair tool fundamentally need a large amount of space for Photomator's sidecar files. Aside from that, is the team looking into other approaches to reduce the size of sidecar files? The current approach will force anyone who uses Photomator at least a moderate amount to turn off "preserve edits".

[Shelton]

I agree Nigelw, I'm an ex-darktable user & their sidecar files were also tiny - just a few kb each, not sure if I'll buy pixelmator pro/Photomator as my raw files are over 60mp & the sidecars after editing are nearly 400meg each!

Shelton.

[Samanta]

We're currently working on making sidecar files take up less space, and these changes are coming later this year. After the update, images with color adjustments, and especially RAW images, will take up considerably less space. I hope this will help you to keep your workflows nondestructive.

[nigelw]

Oops just saw this after the other thread. This is wonderful to hear. Really glad this is on the team's roadmap. Thanks so much for sharing.

[Samanta]

Oops just saw this after the other thread. This is wonderful to hear. Really glad this is on the team's roadmap. Thanks so much for sharing.

Happy to help!

[dantaylr]

Happy to help!

Samantha this is excellent to hear. Any updates on this? This is the one thing that's preventing me from purchasing Photomator for Mac

[Martin Chalifoux]

We're currently working on making sidecar files take up less space, and these changes are coming later this year. After the update, images with color adjustments, and especially RAW images, will take up considerably less space. I hope this will help you to keep your workflows nondestructive.

Glad to ear that.. sidecar file size is a huge pain for anybody processing raw files.

[Shelton]

Really hoping for a nice Christmas pressie from the pixelmator team in the form of a big Photomator update!

[Titus Atomicus]

Are these linked/sidecar files stil RAW?

[Nadeem]

Are these linked/sidecar files stil RAW?

Sidecar files are not RAW. They can't be. RAW files are locked, changes can't be made to them. Photomator's sidecar files are their own proprietary format .PHOTO. Versus others such as Lightroom which use .XMP.

When you open a RAW file, the app looks for a sidecar with the matching filename from which it can reference the edits you've made. For example, if you RAW is image001.CR2 (a Canon RAW file), Photomator will look for a sidecar image001.PHOTO.

[Oscar Nnoli]

A lot of new vocabulary for me here. In “English” can someone breakdown how to fix this. It’s literally be taken up 384 gigs in my computer and I’ve barely used in maybe 10 times total. I’d delete the app if I didn’t pay for it in the first place.