Export

Developing a photo changes nothing on disk next to the original. An export is what turns the development into a file: a JPEG, with the photo’s recipe applied, written where you say. You can export one photo from the Export tab, or a whole selection from the grid.

What an export is

• A JPEG at quality 95, named after the original: DSCF4074.RAF becomes DSCF4074.jpg.
• Made from the photo’s saved recipe.
• The original is never touched.

One photo

Open the photo in Develop and choose the Export tab. It has four settings and a button.

• Folder: where the file goes. It starts on the Desktop; the button beside it chooses another folder, and Settings has the same choice.
• Size: the long edge of the exported image: Full (full size), 4096, 2048, 1600 or 1024 pixels.
• White border: when on, the picture is mounted on a border of warm white paper, 4% of the long edge, with a faint grain like a print’s. It is added around the photo, not cut from it.
• Editor: if Reveal finds other photo editors installed, an Open in… menu sends the photo to one of them.

Then Export writes the file. Exporting a photo again replaces the file of the same name in the same folder.

A selection

Select photos in the grid (see The grid), then press r or choose the export from the right-click menu. Reveal develops each photo with its own recipe and writes them all with the folder, size and border from the Export tab.

The work appears in the Activity panel as a single job, with its progress. Cancel Queue stops it between photos: the photo being rendered finishes, and the rest are skipped. Only one export runs at a time; start another once the first is done.

Photos that come from your Apple Photos library keep their name when they can, but two different assets can share a name like IMG_0001. Rather than overwrite one with the other, Reveal numbers the second: IMG_0001-1.jpg.

Publishing a photo

The Export tab also publishes the open photo to your Garden, as its own page.

1. Connect your account first (see Publishing to the Garden).
2. Decide whether visitors may Allow download: it adds a link to the full-resolution JPEG. Leave it off for a photo meant to be looked at.
3. Press Publish (Garden). When the page is up, the address appears under the button and Reveal opens it.

This is for one photo. A written-up collection of photos is a story, below.

A story

A story is a note made from a folder. It has its own export, in the Editorial tab of the sidebar: Develop every photo in the story, Export the photos locally, or Publish the note. All three are described in Stories.

The daily note

If you use Obsidian, the Export tab also has Daily note (Obsidian), which puts the developed photo into your daily note. It needs Obsidian turned on in Settings, with a vault chosen.

Multicast export (Immich & Google Photos)

The local folder on your disk or NAS remains the single source of truth. When Auto-upload on export is enabled in Settings for Immich or Google Photos, exporting developed JPEGs simultaneously uploads them in the background:

• Immich: Posts the JPEG with its capture date to your self-hosted Immich instance.
• Google Photos: Uploads the JPEG to your Google Photos cloud library using your OAuth credentials.

Both uploads occur seamlessly alongside the local file export, without blocking the interface or altering the original files.

What an export leaves alone

An export reads your recipe; it does not change it. Your originals stay as they were. Delete an exported JPEG and you lose only a copy: the next export makes another. For what Reveal does write next to your photos, see Files and sidecars.