Missing collections

[mo1419872]

I am new to LR, have been starting with 2 collections in 1 catalogue and was adding to the second - but apparently imported without assigning it to the second collection. Tried to reimport - the system would not let me. Found the images under missing photos and tried to move to the second collection in bulk, and at that point my system now says I have no photos left in any collection. I only have used 1 catalogue - so I do not know if the photos somehow deleted or if I somehow am in another catalogue. Is it possible to delete the prior collections by an import process? I did find the photos I edited in the hard drive, but they are all in saved with 3 times the photos used in my collection - but at least all the changes form LR and photoshop are saved there. Is there someway to go back and reopen the previous collections again? I have not found how to go back to possibly the other catalogue either. Or should I reimport the photos saved in photoshop to LR? That is the same collection as virtually all photos were changed there. 1 online sight said to try an Ircat file - did not bring anything back - and it appears to be stuck in the Ircat file. I did use a date with 8/5/16 to find the missing photos which saved as 8:5:16reception.Ircat at the top of lightroom - that is the only file open and it has no photos. My husband is concerned that the backslashes have caused the problem.

I am also having problems importing photos from iPhoto, the cloud and my phone. Each only shows part of the photos that are stored in iPhoto etc when I used the Plug in extras under File to import, and unfortunately the photos are newer than what is showing as available to import.

Any ideas? Thanks for any help you can offer.

[dj_paige · Accepted solution]

This is very difficult to understand what you did. However, importing a 2nd time is NEVER a good idea. In fact, when you import a photo, Lightroom thinks it is a brand new photo that it has never seen before and is not in any collection.

If Lightroom thinks the photos are missing, then you can fix this by following these instruction (and not by importing the photos again): Adobe Lightroom - Find moved or missing files and folders . But the problem is caused by moving or renaming or  deleting the photos outside of Lightroom.

Lastly, I strongly advise your read or watch some beginner's tutorials:

Getting Started with Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5 | Adobe TV

https://www.lightroomqueen.com/quickstart/

[mo1419872]

Thank you for your response. It appears that moving the photos as a group drag may have been what corrupted the other catalogues according to the reference you gave me. I still cannot find them in Lightroom at all - but everything is on the hard drive - just not in my collections.  Am considering deleting the lightroom program and then reinstalling it as I cannot access anything and only had 3 collections in the catalogue. Think I could reimport the photos  from the hard drive if it is reinstalled - is this correct.? Do you think this is the best option?

I have been watching tutorials, bought Martin Evening's book and U tube tutorials like phlearn - but unfortunately is a still learning curve, and not the same as what I was used to in iPhoto.

Thanks again for any help you can provide.

[mo1419872]

1 of the adobe tutorials discussed importing directly from the hard drive. Was able to do this - none of the old catalogue or collections were found - but it did allow me to make a new collection with a similar name and I added the same photos from the hard drive - should be Ok. Did not have to delete and reinstall the program.

Still do not know how to import photos from a shared file on iCloud. Do you know how to do this?

Thanks.

[dj_paige]

Uninstalling Lightroom and re-installing will not fix this problem.

The problem is that the photos are not where Lightroom thinks they should be. The link I gave can fix this problem.

If you'd like to start over from scratch (which means you would lose the collections and you'd have to re-create them, use the menu command File->New Catalog and then import the photos again, add keywords and other metadata, perform edits, etc.)

However, you would be well advised to create a single catalog (not two, not three, but one and one only) which contains ALL of your photos. This is the easiest thing to do, and for beginners, causes the least problems. Furhtermore, you would be well advised to not move the photos any more. Just leave them where they are and use keywords and other metadata to help your organize and search.

You cannot import photos from iCloud or any other cloud service. Photos must be on one of your hard disks, or on a network drive, in order to be imported into Lightroom.

[mo1419872]

I did make a new single catalogue with 2 new collections and that did work. I read several places that you cannot merge a larger group of photos into an existing collection without the risk of corrupting the photos - maybe that is what happen as the original collections are lost- but the new ones are basically identical so I didn't lose any edited photos.

This system does seem glitchy at times- will drop a photo that had previously been added, then I have to add it again to the collection- seems worse in the smart collections. Can u use the star rating system to make a collection outside of the smart collections? When I edited photos in Photoshop from a Lightroom smart collection and used the bandaid correction tool it left long lines on the photo when the cursor just moved to another area. R u not supposed to edit photos from a smart collection? It did not happen in the regular collection edits ever, but did happen consistently with the smart collection and then the system just crashed. Adobe sent me a upgrade for Photoshop 15.2 that I downloaded. Do u think it was just that I needed an upgrade, or that u cannot transfer photos to photoshop from a smart collection or edit from a smart collection? I am getting sick of redoing the photos at this point.

Thanks for your help

Sent from my iPad

[dj_paige]

I read several places that you cannot merge a larger group of photos into an existing collection without the risk of corrupting the photos

I disagree with this strenuously (and I have never heard this either). Photos cannot get corrupted by merging catalogs or by merging collections.

Yes, you can edit photos in a smart collection. The only issue is that if you change the metadata (for example, edited date/time) in such a way that now the photo does not meet the smart condition criteria, then the photo is automatically removed from the smart collection.

Please take some time and read or view some tutorial videos about Lightroom. The time you spend in tutorials is well worth it.

https://www.lightroomqueen.com/quickstart/

Getting Started with Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5 | Adobe TV

Adobe sent me a upgrade for Photoshop 15.2 that I downloaded.  Do u think it was just that I needed an upgrade, or that u cannot transfer photos  to photoshop from a smart collection or edit from a smart collection?  I am getting sick of redoing the photos at this point.

I have no idea. I can't answer Photoshop Elements questions.

[mo1419872]

Thanks- I do have 1 catalogue with several collections in it - was able to just recreate. Everything was deleted with that merger like your link described. Did not reinstall the program. Also figured out how to take IPhoto into a hard drive file and then import- thanks.

Am still having a lot of weird glitches especially if I use a smart collection to edit. Can u make a collection using the 5 star system other than in a smart collection?

You have been very helpful - thanks

Sent from my iPad