This plugin was started in 2010 as a few lines of Lightroom LUA code. It was developed to encourage Meetup members attending photography events to share their images with the Meetup.com community for support, praise and friendly critique.
The plugin grew from a basic image uploader to also providing EXIF and GPS information. Later, we added the ability to import Meetup.com data into image metadata for easy searching. It has been a great 9 year and the plugin has uploaded THOUSANDS of images, supporting the Meetup.com Photography community.
On March 5th, 2017, Meetup.com migrated its hosting to AWS cloud storage. After that change, many 3rd party applications stopped working due to authentication errors, including this plugin. We worked with the awesome API team at meetup to get the issues resolved.
In November of 2017, Meetup.com was sold to WeWork.com and a significant number of changes to the platform have taken place. The team that supported 3rd party software developers experienced staffing changes.
In early September of 2018, faithful users of this plugin started seeing the authentication error again when connecting with Meetup.com's servers.
Unfortunately, the new API support staff at WeWork/Meetup do not interact with the development community. It has been several months since they participated in the official Meetup.com API Forum, or the Meetup App's Gethub issues queue.
After asking about authentication issues/changes via email, I received a reply on September 14th that the person I was contacting was no longer on the API team -- my email was being rerouted. On September 18th, I received an email that someone would be looking into the issue. I asked again about the issue on September 27th, and was told my issue will be "filed" for review.
It is now October 15, and WeWork/Meetup's API team is still not addressing 3rd Party developer issues.
The "Workaround" to get the plugin working again is to use individual user API keys. That means, having users request their own API key from WeWork/Meetup, then typing that key into the plugin. For those who used early versions of this plugin, you remember that's how we USED to do it. But it is significantly more complicated than the Facebook, Twitter, etc authentication model, which simply requires the user to provide the plugin "permissions" on the respective websites - a one-button click.
We aren't going back to teaching people a more complicated method. Its just not fair to the users.
The usefulness of this plugin is also in question. After WeWork/Meetup made significant changes to their platform, many Photography groups/clubs have transition to other platforms such as Facebook or a custom WordPress site. The number of photos posted after each event has also significantly dropped, as has image comments.
It is extremely sad and frustrating when things we love so much change in ways that no longer support us. However due to the lack of support for 3rd party developers, and WeWork/Meetup reduction in support for Photography clubs, I am forced to discontinue future updates to the Meetup.com Lightroom plugin.
This website will remain up in hopes that the API authentication issues are eventually resolved and we can start offering this for download again.
Thanks!
--Joe
Check out the new video for full details.
LightUp comes in two flavors, FREE and Registered. Start with free.
This is one of the hardest parts of installing the plug-in, where to put it? You aren't required to put it in any one specific place. Consider putting it in a location that is always available (not a shared or network drive, for example), and somewhere that doesn't get trashed. I installed mine in a special directory just for 3rd-party Lightroom Plug-ins.
Once you found your permanent location for LightUp and have unzipped the archive, open Lightroom.
Right-click on any photo and choose "Export" about halfway down the menu, and then "Export ..." from the flyout menu.
This opens the typical Lightroom Export Dialog Window.
Click the button at the bottom-left that says "Plug-in Manager ..."
Lightroom will now open a new window called the "Lightroom Plug-in Manager". This page will show you all of the plug-ins you have installed, and their status.
Again, look down at the bottom left. Click the button that says "Add". You will be prompted to locate the LightUp Plug-in (wherever you happened to save it). Remember: your plug-in needs to be on your hard drive somewhere that it won't be deleted or moved -- or it will stop working!
To configure the Plug-in, start your first export session. Right-click on any photo and choose "Export" about halfway down the menu, and then "Export ..." from the flyout menu. This brings up the Lightroom Export menu. Notice that the "Export To:" drop down now includes "Meetup Event Album" as an option.
Before using the plug-in with Meetup.com, you have to give it "permission" to post images on your account. Otherwise, it might posts images to my account. We may not go to the same meetups.
The first time you select "Meetup Event Album" from the "Export To:" option box, you will see that the "Login" button is available. Click that button, and Lightroom will ask permission to contact Meetup.com on your behalf. Click the button that says "View authentication page on Meetup"
LightUp for Lightroom will now open your default web browser, and take you to a special web page on Meetup.com. You can verify you are on Meetup by looking at the URL. LightUp for Lightroom is an approved application at meetup.com.
You can see LightUp listed under the Meetup Application Directory at http://www.meetup.com/meetup_api/apps/
Click "Allow" to continue.
CAUTION: This step includes a Lightroom Popup that might get "lost" under other windows. When you receive your app auth code from Meetup.com, minimize or close the Meetup.com window.
Meetup registers LightUp for Lightroom with your account and provides you a special key. Meanwhile, LightUp has opened another box on Lightroom with a special empty box.
Copy this string of numbers from Meetup and paste it into the special dialog box provided by Lightroom.
Note: This small window may pop-up behind your web browser! Minimize windows to find it.
Did I mention that this little window pop-up from Lightroom might end up under your web browser? Close Meetup.com if you can't find where to paste the auth code!
After you authenticate with Meetup, the plug-in's first task is to grab and save a list of your meetup groups. Since this list is Cached to make LightUp for Lightroom faster, you will need to press the "Refresh Groups" button each time you join or leave a meetup group.
Right click on an image (or group of images), and select "Export", then "Export ...". When the Lightroom Dialog box appears, select "Meetup Event Album" from the "Export To:" drop down list. Your list of groups will appear in the "Groups" box.
Click on the desired group and wait a few moments for the list of events to populate, it won't take long. Once it populates with events and albums, select one.
The "Export" button at the bottom of the Export Dialog box becomes available. You can now export your image to this Meetup.com Album!
LightUp for Lightroom provides a unique (and cool) feature for photographers. It allows you to post select EXIF and Lightroom metadata as a comment on your photo. For photography instructors, or people interested in getting feedback, this is valuable information that people often request.
"Tokens" represent metadata information available in Lightroom. These are both EXIF image information and metadata you provided Lightroom about the image. Placing the tokens in the "Current Pattern" window update the "Example" below the box.
Select one of the "Tokens" from the three drop down boxes, and then press the "Add Token" button. This populates the large textbox with the tokens you selected. The "Example:" displays how your image comment will look when posted.
After each image is posted, LightUp will automatically create the first comment with the EXIF and Lightroom Metadata as you configured it.
Thank you to everyone who has downloaded my plug-in over the past 4 years, and provided awesome feedback. The plug-in remains free with an image upload limit, just like previous versions.
Donate $20 and I'll send you my personal thank you, and a copy with no restrictions.
The free version includes vanity links to my other projects:
| Trial Version | Full Version | |
|---|---|---|
| Donation | FREE | $10 |
| System | Mac / Win | Mac / Win |
| Full-Resolution Uploads | ||
| Multi-Image Uploading | ||
| List Meetup Groups and Events | ||
| Customizable Comment Posting | ||
| 25 Basic EXIF tags for Comments | ||
| New GPS EXIF tags | ||
| Duplicate Upload Checking | ||
| 45 Advanced Metadata tags | ||
| 8 Model / Portrait Meta tags | ||
| Automatically Update Image EXIF Data (Address, State, City, etc) from Meetup.com Event Location | ||
| Automatically Add Lightroom Keywords from Meetup Data (Location, Event and Group Name, etc) | ||
| Automatically Add Lightroom Keywords For Camera Data (Camera make, Lens, etc) | ||
| Share your Camera and Exposure Info in an Image Comment with NEW PRESETS! | ||
| Meetup.com URL to your image is saved in LR Metadata | ||
| Automatically add EXIF "Title" as meetup.com photo "Caption" | ||
| Uploads per Export | 10 Images | Unlimited |
| Ads | PrintDealsGuy Ad | None! |
| Current Version | 1.0.8.0 | 1.0.8.0 |
| Sorry, this plugin is no longer available for download. | ||
| Version | Details |
|---|---|
| 1.0.8 |
Version 8 is a hot-fix.
|
| 1.0.7 |
Version 7 is the biggest set of new features to date! (Note: Some features only available on the registered version)
|
| 1.0.6.1 |
Fixed an issue with version numbers that significantly angered one user |
| 1.0.6 |
Added Additional GPS options for meetup image comments. |
| 1.0.5.1 |
Final build for legacy Lightroom 5 Users
|
| 1.0.4 |
Final build for legacy Lightroom 4 Users. |
| 1.0.4 |
Build for Lightroom 5 Users
|
| 1.0.3 |
Added LR3 Support and better instructions for API
|
| 1.0.2 |
Fixed bug that caused assertion errors, added "albums" not just "events", display number of photos in each album. |
| 1.0.1 |
Added "Check for Updates", "Contact", "Donate" buttons |
| 1.0.0 |
first public release |
| 0.16 |
saving all settings as preferences |
| 0.15 |
ignored "The" when sorting group names |
| 0.14 |
added "LightUp" section with "check for updages" button |
| 0.13 |
resorted the meetup groups by name |
| 0.12 |
resorted the events by date |
| 0.11 |
added a test button so users can see they are "logged in" to meetup |
| 0.6 - 0.10 |
added checkbox options on the camera settings section |
| 0.5 |
added custom camera settings to the message text, added "label", "caption", and "URL" to the message |
| 0.4 |
added spooling off a custom message at the bottom of the image |
| 0.3 |
added dropdown for groups, added dropdown for events based on groups |
| 0.2 |
added "get api key" button for quick access |
| 0.2 |
added "get api key" button for quick access |
| 0.1 |
first initial build with actual photo uploaded to the meetup.com beta site using api key |
