Library size: what's "normal"?

I have around 13,000 images equaling 140 GB. When I first built a library, with normal rendered previews, the library was close to 19 GB.
I then rebuilt the library, I believe without previews, and it reduced its size to under 2 GB. Now, my libary has swelled to around 8 GB, even if I delete the 1:1 previews.
What is "normal" or reasonable when working with LR? How can I keep a balance between speed and reasonable library size? Is a new hard drive looming in my future?
I would appreciate guidance, clarity, and recommendations!
Thanks!
Reid

Hello, Reid. I recall your posting on this some time ago, and since then I concluded for the mix of images I put in, the library plus previews will equal somewhere between 8 and 12% of the overall. Recognizing milegae, of course, but it doesn't seem like you are out of line.

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http://img169.imageshack.us/img169/1261/picture16vg.png
http://img169.imageshack.us/img169/5755/picture22ql.png
http://img169.imageshack.us/img169/9955/picture32bj.png
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Hi,
I was hoping to reduce the size of my library by relocating masters to DVDs.
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http://www.imore.com/what-you-need-k...ut-photos-os-x
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Ah yes, I forgot about the iPod Photo Cache; I'm resyncing my iPhone and iPad with iTunes right now to sync photos from Aperture, and it's taking forever, since it has to resize over 12,000 photos. I can't imagine that would account for 26GB of data, though I guess those photos take up about 12GB on each device. I'll have to recheck the library sizes after both devices are done syncing.
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I just imported my iPhoto library (3.75 GB worth of pictures) into Aperture selecting the option to keep the masters in the original location. In Aperture's preferences, I have the preview size set to the default 5. After importing, my Aperture package file is 2.28 GB! This is quite unacceptable in my book...is this caused solely by Aperture creating previews and thumbnails?
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The unanswered questions here are: what are the sizes of your originals and how many do you have? If you have a lot of relatively small (in megapixels) JPEG files in you iPhoto library then you are not going to see a very small Library size. If you look in the Aperture Library package file you will see many housekeeping files are used to keep the necessary information for your images. Aperture does generate large thumbnails which I think are around 1000 pixels at the long dimension. You cannot turn these large thumbnails off. Then Aperture maintains additional files that keep the Keyword and Metadata information. Files are needed to keep track of what project each file is associated with, as well as any albums, etc.
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2) In the Smart Settings HUD, click on the "+v" button in the upper right corner and select "File Status". A new line is added that says "File Status Offline".
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http://homepage.mac.com/bagelturf/aparticles/library/library.html
http://homepage.mac.com/bagelturf/aparticles/previews/previews.html
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My library file sizes are getting out of control. I have multiple library's that are now over 3TB in size!
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I am using FCPX 10.2. I have three camera's (2x Sony Handycam PJ540 and 1x GoPro Hero 4 Black).
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No. Video isn't compressed like compressing a document. When you compress a document you're just packing the data more tightly. When you compress video you do it basically by throwing information away. Once a video file is compressed, and all video files are heavily compressed in the camera, that's not recoverable. That information is gone. The best you can do is make it into a format that while not deteriorate further as the file is recompressed. Every time you compress a file, especially to heavily compressed formats, more and more information is discarded. The more you do this the worse the image gets. Transcoding converts the media to a high resolution, high data rate format that can be manipulated considerably without loss, and go through multiple generations without loss. You can't go to second generation H.264 MPEG-4 without discernible loss in quality.

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Hello
Here is my Problem
I have an external hd with 500gb full with only imovie. It has been backed up with time machine to a larger hd together with my imac backup.
I have already deleted unused footage and now have only the minimum footage for watching old projects plus all footage from current projects. But I am still running out of room and would like to delete all the old projects so they are no longer in imovie. I Always make camera archives so if I ever need the original footage i have it.
What i would like to do.
I want export all the finished projects on to my computer. I have done some already but am not sure of the best way. Exporting full quality AIC format I am getting 1gb per minute of video, this is going to take up way to much space on my computer. I have tried to export to itunes in full quality, this gives better results on the file size, but I am worried if a put all my home video in itunes things will start getting slow.
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i've heard people have been able
to reduce their library size to only 30% of the size
of their referenced files...
When the originals are high-res RAW files or TIFFs, sure.
Even with Previews turned off and deleted, Aperture still contains three or more* small thumbnails for each Version - the smaller ones are what you see in the browser pane and the 1024px one is what you see when laying out books, light tables and the detail pages for web galleries. These thumbnails take up ~400-600Kb each, so 1GB for 1300+ thumbnails (plus extra versions and masters) is about right.
Ian
*If you've made adjustments to an image then you end up with more thumbnails as you can still view the 'master' unadjusted image by hitting 'M'.

Library size: what's "normal"?

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