V12.5 upgrade and now a tale of LRc woes

[Beechtree]

Lightroom Version Number

v12.5

Operating System

1. Windows 11

I came in to search for answers and possible clues as to what had gone awry with my LRc. Clearly for me, following the latest update to V12.5 my latest catalogue has taken a hit in some shape or form. Despite thinking I had all bases covered with back-ups and back-ups of back-ups, alas, I now find I am about 3 months adrift on a proper back up of the current catalogue. Having followed through on a corrupt catalogue repair (I suspect having occurred due to one too many power outages whilst having the program open) I now find that major sections of my catalogue have missing edits. The images are there, although the previews appear to be screwed or missing, and unless I click on a frame to see the picture, I'm just looking at blank boxes on the screen.

My most recent work has retained the edits and so far all appears to be OK, but when I go back to earlier efforts from say before March this year, I find folders where the ratings are still in place, but the edits are gone. Hours of work just missing. My PC is pretty decent in respect of power/RAM and graphics card capability, but every folder is a chore to see load and it's truly like wading through setting concrete to try and do anything.

Really not sure how to best deal with this situation. Is it possible to selectively restore just one folders worth of data for a catalogue, or is it really a case of all or nothing? Not expecting miracles, and perhaps it is my fault for upgrading to the latest and greatest without making a back-up of the catalogue, but sheesh, I wasn't expecting to get caught like this.

Any advice gratefully listened to ....

 

[Beechtree]

Additional information - I have opened what I suspected was my last known good back up from May 22nd this year. It has shown to be good, and my work up until that point is solid. I have three separate folders from that date onwards that are good in the "current" catalogue, so is there a way to salvage what I have already worked on and add it to the "good" last back-up catalogue?

 

[Johan Elzenga]

Additional information - I have opened what I suspected was my last known good back up from May 22nd this year. It has shown to be good, and my work up until that point is solid. I have three separate folders from that date onwards that are good in the "current" catalogue, so is there a way to salvage what I have already worked on and add it to the "good" last back-up catalogue?

Open the ‘current’ catalog, select those images and choose to export them as catalog (so not as individual images). Do not include the ‘negatives’. Then open the backup catalog and choose ‘File - Import from Another Catalog’ and import the catalog you just exported. Leave the images where they are. This will merge the two catalogs so the backup will be up to date and can be used as the new main catalog.

 

[Beechtree]

Open the ‘current’ catalog, select those images and choose to export them as catalog (so not as individual images). Do not include the ‘negatives’. Then open the backup catalog and choose ‘File - Import from Another Catalog’ and import the catalog you just exported. Leave the images where they are. This will merge the two catalogs so the backup will be up to date and can be used as the new main catalog.

Question - when I export the images as a catalog, do I save the new catalog file in the existing images location (in my case on a standalone drive e:\picture vault\Images 2023)

 

[Califdan]

You can save it anywhere you wish. In general, I like to give each seperate catalog its own folder and all of those folders are within a folder I call "Lightroom Catalogs", but it's up to you. I'd create a folder for it next to whereever your master active catalog tends to live. Once the merge of the two catalogs is complete, this new one is no longer needed and can be deleted so where you put it is not critical. You'll get better performace (for the Import from another catalog operation) though if it's on your fastest drive which is usually your internal drive.

 

[Califdan]

One oher thing. As Johan's solution has you reverting to a backup catalog which will then become your active master catalog, it would be a good idea to move or copy the folder containing this catalog out of the backups folder and place it whereever you normally keep your active master catalog. Once eveything is working OK again, you should also move/copy/rename/delete the corrupt catalog so it doesn't inadvertantly get used again.

 

[Johan Elzenga]

Yes, two things. The exported catalog is just a temporary one to merge the new images into the backup catalog. Once you’ve done this you can trash it. The backup catalog is going to be your new current catalog, so place it where you always had your catalog, and rename it if necessary so it becomes clear that this is your working catalog from now on.

 

[Beechtree]

Thanks for all your assistance and pointers guys. Happy to report I am back where I need to be with (hopefully) everything restored and re-instated as required. Never having had to go through this export/import procedure before it was all a bit unknown, but thankfully the steps have restored my data. Old files to be cleansed and corrupt back-ups wiped clean. New backed-up files in place over three locations and a big post-it note to remind me to check the catalog back-up before doing anything else!