• Welcome to the Lightroom Queen Forums! We're a friendly bunch, so please feel free to register and join in the conversation. If you're not familiar with forums, you'll find step by step instructions on how to post your first thread under Help at the bottom of the page. You're also welcome to download our free Lightroom Quick Start eBooks and explore our other FAQ resources.
  • Stop struggling with Lightroom! There's no need to spend hours hunting for the answers to your Lightroom Classic questions. All the information you need is in Adobe Lightroom Classic - The Missing FAQ!

    To help you get started, there's a series of easy tutorials to guide you through a simple workflow. As you grow in confidence, the book switches to a conversational FAQ format, so you can quickly find answers to advanced questions. And better still, the eBooks are updated for every release, so it's always up to date.
  • 12 December 2024 It's Lightroom update time again! See What’s New in Lightroom Classic 14.1, Mobile & Desktop (December 2024)? for Feature updates, new cameras and lenses, and bug fixes.

Import Catalog mystery

S

Spiderbob

New Member
Premium Classic Member
Joined
Mar 30, 2016
Messages
10
Location
Kennewick, WA
Lightroom Experience
Advanced
Lightroom Version
Classic
Lightroom Version Number
14.0.1
Operating System
  1. macOS 15 Sequoia
I came back to my computer after a few days to work on some vacation pictures. I went to the folder and over 130 pictures show a question mark, clicking on them it says the proverbial can't find the file picture. I've done this hundreds of times but this is a first. I searched for the files at a loss. I eventually went to the CR2's and brought them back up into Lightroom , but once again a few hours later, back to the question mark on the 130 pictures in that folder.
I really need some thoughts.
 
Solution
clee01l
Spiderbob said:
I will check that out, which brings up another question, I've always used 'copy' but should I really be using a different option? At this point I prefer not to experiment with the options until I get this straightened out.
Thank you for commenting
Click to expand...
Copy is the expected option for images that are on a camera card. Apple treats some camera card types (like CF Express) as a mounted removable volume. Johan has pointed out one problem with this in the Destination panel.

If you use a date named folder scheme, All you need to do is select a parent folder (like "Pictures") in the Destination panel and LrC will automatically place them in the right folder by capture date. You use Collections to organise and group your photos...
Sort by date Sort by votes
Are you using ADD with import from the camera card? When the camera card is unmounted, the images are still on it. The solution to your dilemma is this or some variation there of. When you click on the {!} where does the "missing" dialog say the previous location is supposed to be?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
clee01l said:
Are you using ADD with import from the camera card? When the camera card is unmounted, the images are still on it. The solution to your dilemma is this or some variation there of. When you click on the {!} where does the "missing" dialog say the previous location is supposed to be?
Click to expand...
I use COPY with import, hoping to have originals in a different place. I don't know what I did this time that was different but what a loss of time only, I can deal with that. I imported the original CR2's and starting the whole process again. I just don't what to do again whatever it is I did and am trying to figure that out. I had been "trying" to clean up my files in the catalog and deleting those that I know I will never use again, perhaps it was something I did then. I just don't know. I am hoping to get information from others that I can pinpoint what I had done. Oh, to make matters worse, the file I had named for these images to be in had a whole different set of pictures unrelated??

I'm considering going back to a previous saved version of the nightly file, but will have to see how that works as I've never done that before. As I said earlier I'm hoping to find out what I did first before I do that.

Thank you for your reply
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
If you use ‘Copy’, then double check the destination panel in the import dialog. It is possible to choose a folder on the same memory card as destination, which means removing the memory card will make Lightroom lose the connection to the photos and come up with the dreaded ‘missing photos’ exclamation mark.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
I will check that out, which brings up another question, I've always used 'copy' but should I really be using a different option? At this point I prefer not to experiment with the options until I get this straightened out.
Thank you for commenting
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Spiderbob said:
I will check that out, which brings up another question, I've always used 'copy' but should I really be using a different option? At this point I prefer not to experiment with the options until I get this straightened out.
Thank you for commenting
Click to expand...
Copy is the expected option for images that are on a camera card. Apple treats some camera card types (like CF Express) as a mounted removable volume. Johan has pointed out one problem with this in the Destination panel.

If you use a date named folder scheme, All you need to do is select a parent folder (like "Pictures") in the Destination panel and LrC will automatically place them in the right folder by capture date. You use Collections to organise and group your photos.

I would recommend that you not combine importing and culling in the same step. For example, I import images in date name folders. After importing, I inspect each image with a decision to keep or reject, Rejects are flagged with (X). My workflow continues with keywording and develop steps. Doing this will determine some new rejects(X) Once my workflow is complete ai will review the finished images and may reject (X) more. The Last step is to delete from Lightroom and the disk the Rejected images.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Solution
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top