Make Lightroom Your Default Import Program for Photos

Joe Collins - September 17, 2012 | Lightroom, Storage, Workflow

Normally, when you attach your camera to your computer, by default, a program opens (Mac), or a dialogue window pops up (Windows). Most of the time this isn’t what we want. We usually want a specific program, like Lightroom, to open when we connect our cameras for easy importing, and optimized workflow. We can change this behavior in Image Capture on Mac, and with Autoplay on Windows. In a few simple steps we will be able to make Lightroom our default image importer.

Mac:

On a Mac (OSX 10.5+) you first want to make sure your camera is connected to your computer, otherwise you won’t be able to change the default behavior for that device. Next open up Image Capture, either by opening the Applications folder and double-clicking on the icon, or by doing a spotlight search for “Image Capture.”

Once Image Capture is open, you will see your device in the left panel. Below that panel is another panel that says the name of your device, and “Connecting this camera opens:” with a dropdown list.