gedurkee
George
- Joined
- Jul 11, 2020
- Messages
- 5
- Location
- California
- Lightroom Experience
- Beginner
- Lightroom Version
- Classic
- Lightroom Version Number
- Classic latest
- Operating System
- macOS 10.15 Catalina
Hi all. Using TeamViewer, I'm helping a friend set up his new iMac Pro. We used Migration Assistant to move files and settings. This brought over his entire photo collection (~20,000 images) into a single folder (Howard) on his desktop. I am a PC guy and have never used Lightroom before but we're chipping away at it! (My tech skills are way better than his...). Clicking on the LR Catalog ,which is in the Howard folder, LR Classic started up with his folder structure showing as well as images. Assume the images just the equivalent of thumbnails stored in the Catalog?
As the "how to" videos warn, when clicking on the image, the error message "file not found" shows up so obviously the path has changed. I thought, somewhere in the sequence, I had told the folder the correct path but may have messed up somewhere. In any event, still getting "file not found" for all of his images. As a test, I right clicked on a sample folder within Howard and used the Find Folder tool. It did so, the files were successfully found but the folder then appeared outside the Howard catalog tree in LR.
Next, I right clicked on Howard and chose the Find Folder tool. I get the message: "The selected folder or one of its subfolders is already in Lightroom. Do you want to combine these folders?" Then a Merge button. I'm holding off for fear of totally screwing things up. What happens if I combine folders? We have two backups (Time Machine and the old computer) so it's not super-critical but, still... .
Would greatly appreciate anyone's help here. If I have to zap everything and start over, I think I'll avoid Migration Assistant and just transfer directly by external drive and put it, as recommended, in the Pictures folder. Overall, though, hoping the Merge doesn't put us in more trouble and that's the thing to do... . If so, with that many images, how long would that take? Assume it's just updating a database so should go fairly quickly (??). (The question is whether to set it to go overnight or, if fast enough, during the day).
Many thanks for your help!
George
As the "how to" videos warn, when clicking on the image, the error message "file not found" shows up so obviously the path has changed. I thought, somewhere in the sequence, I had told the folder the correct path but may have messed up somewhere. In any event, still getting "file not found" for all of his images. As a test, I right clicked on a sample folder within Howard and used the Find Folder tool. It did so, the files were successfully found but the folder then appeared outside the Howard catalog tree in LR.
Next, I right clicked on Howard and chose the Find Folder tool. I get the message: "The selected folder or one of its subfolders is already in Lightroom. Do you want to combine these folders?" Then a Merge button. I'm holding off for fear of totally screwing things up. What happens if I combine folders? We have two backups (Time Machine and the old computer) so it's not super-critical but, still... .
Would greatly appreciate anyone's help here. If I have to zap everything and start over, I think I'll avoid Migration Assistant and just transfer directly by external drive and put it, as recommended, in the Pictures folder. Overall, though, hoping the Merge doesn't put us in more trouble and that's the thing to do... . If so, with that many images, how long would that take? Assume it's just updating a database so should go fairly quickly (??). (The question is whether to set it to go overnight or, if fast enough, during the day).
Many thanks for your help!
George