Linking photos on a hard drive to Lightroom

[CatEarly76]

Lightroom Version Number

Lightroom Classic

Operating System

1. Windows 10

I've just upgraded from Lightroom 6 to Lightroom Classic. I previously used Lightroom 6 linked with photos saved on my laptop. I also backed the photo files up on a couple of hard drives, but did not link these with Lightroom. I'm now taking more photos (the dangers of wildlife photography!) and my laptop is getting full and slow. Is there a way of transferring the link ie so that Lightroom Classic is linked with the photos on my hard drive instead of with the photos on my laptop (so that I can then delete the versions on my laptop)? Or is it easier to delete the photos saved on one of my hard drives (they are backed up on a second hard drive for safety!) and start linking them from scratch? It's making my head spin!! Thanks in advance

 

[Johan Elzenga]

If you have a folder with images linked in Lightroom, and you have a copy of that folder in another location, then you can ‘relink’ the folder in the catalog in the following way. Right-click on the folder in the folder panel and choose ‘Update Folder Location’. In the dialog that follows navigate to the folder in the other location and select it. Done. Now you can delete the original folder to make room on your hard disk.

 

[CatEarly76]

If you have a folder with images linked in Lightroom, and you have a copy of that folder in another location, then you can ‘relink’ the folder in the catalog in the following way. Right-click on the folder in the folder panel and choose ‘Update Folder Location’. In the dialog that follows navigate to the folder in the other location and select it. Done. Now you can delete the original folder to make room on your hard disk.

Brilliant! That was so easy. Thanks very much, probably saved me hours of trawling the internet for the solution. Now I can focus on catching up on my massive editing backlog...

 

[BobMc]

Be aware that LRC is a non destructive editor. This means the edits you make to an image are stored in the LRC Catalog and the original image remains unaltered. Your LR catalog's Data Base system is where all edits to the images reside. This requires you to have a backup of the LRC Catalog in addition to backups of the original images.

 

[John Forgan]

If you have a folder with images linked in Lightroom, and you have a copy of that folder in another location, then you can ‘relink’ the folder in the catalog in the following way. Right-click on the folder in the folder panel and choose ‘Update Folder Location’. In the dialog that follows navigate to the folder in the other location and select it. Done. Now you can delete the original folder to make room on your hard disk.

I would also use "Synchronise Folder" (just above "Update Folder Location") after changing the folder just to make sure that the new folder contents really are an exact copy of the original.

Synchronise Folder will let you know if any photos are missing or if there are any additional photos.

For example, if you've done any editing using plugins such as Photoshop or DxO, Lightroom will have created Tiff files that may not be in your "new" folder structure.