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Catalog question

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brewer

Member
Joined
Jan 18, 2016
Messages
76
Lightroom Experience
Beginner
Lightroom Version
Lightroom Version Number
9.2
Operating System
  1. Windows 10
I seem to have two catalogs - second one appeared when I got a new computer (I believe) I tried to combine them last night after the upgrade because for one thing I noticed that I had a lot of ? on photos. Right or wrong I tried to combine the two catalogs. Now I have ALOT of photos that say copy-1. Basically doubled my catalog. So, obviously I did something wrong. I can find them and delete them but what did I do wrong? And why do I have so many missing photos all of a sudden. Did I change something I shouldn't have. My catalog is on my internal hard drive and now all of a sudden there are missing photos??? To reconnect?? ugh. LR drives me crazy because there is such an assumption that the user is computer savvy. oh well. I will struggle on... Thanks in advance for direction.
 
How did you try to combine them? One of these catalog files is the master. The other is merged into the master using the "Import from another Catalog" function. This is the only way to properly merge catalog files. before you do that make a copy of each so that you can start over if you somehow screw up. After you have merged the catalog, check to see if there are any Missing Photos. If there are, come back here for additional help
 
I used the merge function. I also see a #3 catalog now And yes I see some ?
 
When moving to a new computer you will have to redirect LR to where all of your photos are located, which is why you would see “?” on the photos.
I recently built a new PC and kept the directory paths the same, but I still had to tell LR where to look again.
If your file structure on the left panel has ? on all the folders, right click on the root folder and select Find Missing Files. Show LR where that folder is and, assuming all of your photos are within that folder and subfolders, LR should find all of the individual photos.

Also be aware that occasionally an LR update requires the catalog to be updated to a new format, and the update process will create a second catalog while keeping a copy of your old catalog. This happened to me upon installing on my new PC as well.
 
It is not because of a new computer. I mis-spoke regarding the ? they are actually ! on the upper right corner of the photos in question. It isn't on all of them and I think some are a result of the merge of the two catalogs because some of the photos have been removed from the catalog or deleted as rejects. But not all of them are because of that. As for the duplicates of the photos - why? What did I do wrong in the merge? Also, why so many metadata conflicts? I can clear them by telling LR to overwrite with the LR data but is that because of the update to 9.2? Curious. Thanks
 
It is not because of a new computer. I mis-spoke regarding the ? they are actually ! on the upper right corner of the photos in question. It isn't on all of them and I think some are a result of the merge of the two catalogs because some of the photos have been removed from the catalog or deleted as rejects. But not all of them are because of that. As for the duplicates of the photos - why? What did I do wrong in the merge? Also, why so many metadata conflicts? I can clear them by telling LR to overwrite with the LR data but is that because of the update to 9.2? Curious. Thanks
If Lightroom detects two different develop histories when an image is imported from another catalog, it will preserve both develop histories and create a Virtual copy. This is not a duplicate. It is just Lightroom's way of maintaining divergent develop instructions a Virtual copy can be identified by looking for an upturned lower left corner of the thumbnail for that image. So you end up with a master copy to the development and a second copy of development. Both point to the same original file in the file system.
The Merge that happens with the "Import from another Catalog" won't import images IF the underlying source image file is missing. It probably was already missing in the master catalog before the "Import from another Catalog".

If you do have true duplicates, it might have been because the original file cataloged in the "Import from another Catalog" catalog was stored in a different path from the same copy listed in the master catalog.
 
Thank you Cletus - that makes sense. I suppose I could delete the virtual copy correct? None of my work is important enough that I couldn't recreate the edit and actually probably do a better job later as my skills in PS & LR improve. In 10 years or so....Thanks alot for the response.
 
Right click on the photo and click on show file location. Take note of the directory and filename. Then repeat for your “duplicates” of the same picture. If it points to the same file on your hard drive instead of ...-1 or ...-2 copies, they are indeed virtual copies and you can remove them from your catalog if desired.

The ! could also be related to the sync status if you had been syncing the the photos to mobile.
 
I don't use the mobile feature so the ! is not a function of that. thanks anyway.
 
As I asked above - why so many metadata conflicts in my catalog now. Also, I did a test - copied my lrcat 2.2 my current catalog. Then opened a backup from a couple of days ago and LR used that back up. I thought that I would not see the copies etc but I guess I won't because of the merge of catalogs I did. I guess at this point I am stuck with conflicting metadata and I will have to work on finding the missing photos. Again, they aren't missing on the left side of the screen just ! in the upper right of the photo. I also have gray previews which I would guess are the photos that had been deleted prior to the ill fated merge of catalogs. thanks for your help!
 
As I asked above - why so many metadata conflicts in my catalog now.
There are lots of things that cause metadata conflicts. I simply ignore them. First, the metadata in the original file will never get used unless I try to use that image file outside of Lightroom. In a word, Don't . Once you have chosen to manage your images with Lightroom don't access these cataloged files with any other app. There is no need. Second, all of the metadata is in Lightroom and maintained by Lightroom. The metadata in the catalog file is always the latest. Moving a file or "touching" the file with your system backup app will set the data modified tag and Lightroom knows the files different but it has no way of knowing if the difference is significant. Third Exports (derivatives) will take their metadata from the catalog and it you keep the catalog as the sole source of valid metadata, then you don't need to worry about what is stored in the original file.
 
I want to echo what Cletus said so well. When I first ran into seeing all those ! symbols indicating a metadata conflict I panicked, wondering how in the world that happened. And indeed, I do think it has to do with the backup routine I run. As Cletus suggested, I just ignore the apparent "conflict." There really isn't a conflict, because I don't edit images outside of LR (except occasionally I send images to Photoshop from LR).
 
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