Files not showing in LR

[GeorgaM]

Please help!!  My EHD had a meltdown, but has been saved.  All good.  However, when I plugged it back into my iMac, not all the files are showing in LR.  After I plugged it back in and then opened LR, the folders were there with the little question marks - I clicked on the the first one (a file I had named Lightroom 2015) and mapped it back to the EHD.  But then the next two files (Lightroom 2016 and Lightroom 2017) disappeared.  The are all still there on the EHD but how do I get them to show in LR again??  Do I import them all again?

Thanks in advance!

[Mohit Goyal]

Hi georgam,

You need to update the file location under the Lightroom catalog, therefor you need to map it again as you did for the first folder.

Refer the link to find the missing images in Lightroom: How to find missing photos in Photoshop Lightroom

Let us know if that helps.

Regards,

Mohit

[GeorgaM]

Thank you for your reply.  If they were sitting in LR with the question marks I could do that, but they're not there at all.  When I click on the EHD in LR that they are on, the files are just absent altogether

[Mohit Goyal]

Please check that your opening the correct catalog in Lightroom. You can hold down the "Shift" key while launching the Lightroom and it will show you all the recently used catalogs.

Thanks,

Mohit

[GeorgaM]

I only have one catalogue.  The folders that exist in that catalogue are not all there

[dj_paige]

GeorgaM wrote:

the folders were there with the little question marks - I clicked on the the first one (a file I had named Lightroom 2015) and mapped it back to the EHD.

The folders are now shown in Lightroom on a different hard disk. Why? Because you told Lightroom that they were on a different disk. That's what fixing the question mark means.

Please look in Lightroom under all disks shown in the Folder panel until you find the folders of interest.

Or show us a screen capture of your Folder panel.

[GeorgaM]

Hi dj_paige,

The EHD in Finder shows the 3 folders I want to map to Lightroom (and previously did have mapped). All three of these folders were greyed out and had question marks on them when I plugged my EHD back in yesterday.

I right-clicked the greyed out/question marked "Lightroom 2015" folder in Lightroom to "Update Folder Location" and mapped that folder to the EHD. It now appears in Lightroom, and the photos are all accessible. But the "Lightroom 2016" and "Lightroom 2017" folders did not appear ( I didn't map them so thats not a surprise) and the greyed out folders have disappeared.

What I am looking for is a way to either remap the "Lightroom 2016" and "Lightroom 2017" folders, or if need be, the entire 4TB drive. I'm guessing if I can't do that, I just import the folders again into the catalog.

[dj_paige]

Determine the file name of one of the photos in the Lightroom 2016 or Lightroom 2017 folder. Then in Lightroom, under Catalog, click on All Photographs, turn off all filters (Ctrl-L once or twice), and search for this photo by file name. Do you find it?

[GeorgaM]

Sadly no. DSC_6129 is the name of one photo in the "Lightroom 2017" folder; have searched as "DSC_6129 " and "6129".

[dj_paige]

In the above search, set the dropdown to "File Name" instaed of "Any Searchable Field". Turn off the Metadata search (just click on the word Metadata to turn it off, and it will be un-highlighted) Do you find it then?

[GeorgaM]

Unfortunately not 😕

[dj_paige]

So I know you said that you have only one catalog, however, I think it would be a good idea at this time to check for other catalogs (use your operating system's search feature to search for any file whose name ends with .LRCAT).

Also, it would be a good idea to make sure you can find a recent backup of the catalog file before this crash, just in case we need it.

[GeorgaM]

There is no other catalog (no other .lrcat files). If there is not a simple solution, I know its probably better practice to work with a smaller catalog anyway, so can just start a new one and import the current folder (2017).

[dj_paige]

Do you have a backup of this catalog file before the HD crash?

[GeorgaM]

(guilty face) I only back up when I shit Lightroom down... which is not often. Going back to the last catalog backup will mean it hasn't captured Dec and Jan.

Many learnings. At least I know the .dng files ares till safely on the hard drive, just not in the catalog.

[GeorgaM]

Shut down! I meant to type shut down!

[dj_paige · Accepted solution]

So, as far as I can tell, whatever happened means that certain photos are no longer in the catalog you are working with, and so it seems to me that the best solution is to use that backup, and then import the Dec and Jan photos.

You might want to develop a process where you back up more frequently, I do it weekly, that works for me, but I rarely take photos 7 days a week. You have a choice of monthly, weekly, once a day or every time you exit from Lightroom.