How can I find my Lightroom Catalogue?

[alistairw72100433]

I recently had problem on my iMac so had to wipe the hard drive and reinstall files etc. from Time Machine backup.  I can't find the right catalogue for my photos. I have tried all those in the search ending .LRcat but none show the correct one, they show photos but not in the correct sort.

Other than re load a previous copy of the hard drive from Time Machine, which might give me back original problems I had, how can I find the correct catalogue.

I am on Light room version  3.

Any help much appreciated.

Alistair

[Akash Sharma]

HI Alistair,

Please refer this article Recover catalog and images after resetting preferences in Adobe Photoshop Lightroom and follow the steps mentioned to locate the correct catalog.

Let us know if that helps.

Thanks,

Akash

[alistairw72100433]

Many thanks Akash for the help. I tried the options suggested in the link but could only find a few Catalog.lrcat files and only a couple were created in 2010, when I set this IMAc up, and were modified in 2016. Each one only showed one photo when I selected it as the catalog.

There must be other catalog files because I update my LR most times before I leave LR when prompted to. SO there should be .lrcat files modified in 2017 but I can't find them.

I also looked in the default position as suggested in the link and the back-ups were not there.

Can you please suggest what I can try next.

Many thanks

Alistair

[dj_paige]

I have tried all those in the search ending .LRcat but none show the correct one, they show photos but not in the correct sort.

Can't you just change the sort order back to whatever you want it to be?

[alistairw72100433]

I have 10,000 photos so it would be massive job to re-sort.

[dj_paige]

are you talking about a custom sort order?

[alistairw72100433]

Thanks for your comments. Not sure what a custom sort order is?

I have placed photos in the catalog according to different locations, different dates, different subjects with sub folders in many cases.

[JP Hess]

At the bottom of the library module there is an option to set the sort order by a number of different settings. However, if the last catalog backup you have is dated several years ago it probably isn't going to do you any good because all of your recent work won't be in it. Do you have Lightroom configured to backup on a regular basis, like weekly at least? Where is that backup programmed to be saved if it is being backed up?

[alistairw72100433]

Thanks Jim. When I go into Lightroom and add photos or edit each time I close it down there is a prompt to update the catalog and I nearly always do that. So there must be somewhere on the system a recent catalog which will show the file was modified in June or July 2017. I have searched for all .lrcat files and can find none that were modified in 2017, the latest I have is Feb 2016 and that doesn't have the correct catalog not even close. I can't understand why when I search for .lrcat files in Finder I can't find one that has been modified in 2017?

[JP Hess]

When that prompt for backup displays, if you look closely you will tell you where the backup will be created. The complete path is displayed. If you want to change that path you can do so. It isn't something that Lightroom  does mysteriously. This is something that you can have complete control of.

[alistairw72100433]

Problem is I have had to clear my hard drive as was running very slow and when I have reloaded LR from Applications on my back up disk it did not have a catalog on it.

[JP Hess]

How long ago did this happen? Have you created any backups since the hard drive was cleared?

[alistairw72100433]

I cleared the hard drive on Monday. I haven't created backups as there were no pictures in any of the catalogs I loaded to back-up.

I did when trying to load an old .lrcat file clicked to upgrade from LR2 to LR3. So this created a .lrcat file in LR3 but again with no photos or catalog breakdown.

[dj_paige]

Unless you can find a recent backup of your LR catalog from before you cleared your hard disk, that has the information you need, I don't see any way to fix this.

[alistairw72100433]

I guess so dj.

I can't understand why I can't find the backups, I have tried searching with *.lrcat as this is meant to bring up all files I understand but no joy so far.

Only other option I can think of is to reload from a past Time Machine back up before I had the initial  slow running problem.

That should allow me to open up LR with the catalog I had but I may have the other slow running problems. I suppose I could at least take note of the catalog destination and clear the hard drive again and reinstall piecemeal as I am doing now. But thats a real hassle to do.

Any other suggestions would be most welcomed.

[bhousto90]

If you are using newer version of Lightroom the backup .LRCAT files are contained in .ZIP files.

So search for recent .ZIP files and see if you can find your most recent backup.

[alistairw72100433 · Accepted solution]

Thanks to all who responded I have now relocated the missing catalog. It was in a different file which I had now transferred from the Time Machine back-up and which for some reason didn't appear when I searched for .lrcat files.

All you comments helped me to get a better understanding of the problem and now resolved. Thanks to all again.

Alistair

[dj_paige]

I'm very pleased that the story has a positive and happy ending. Best wishes.