Catalogs Missing Photos after computer rebuild.

[bobbabe]

Operating System:Mac OS Sierra

Lightroom Version: 6.0
(Please go to Help menu > System Info to double check the exact version number)

Question or Description of Problem: Missing photos throughout Lightroom- Hi- Due to some problems with my iMac freezing, and generally not working well, and a number of long conversations with Apple tech support, we had to purge the drive, reinstall the latest operating system- and then drag back in to the computer all our folders and files from a backup I made just before the process began. Now, the computer is working well, but I've found that a huge number of photos are missing. I assume I did not bring over all the photos during the rebuild process. I would like, at least for now to have all my shots on the main computer, perhaps changing that down the road.
The real question for me is, should I remove the all the photos I dragged in before and start from scratch after making sure all the shots are back in my iMac as before or try to look for the individual folders and bring them over and then create a new catalog? My gut feeling is that I should start from scratch( I don't have a huge number of edits to worry about) rather than doing it a folder at a time. Looking for suggestions.Thank you

 

[Johan Elzenga]

If you start from scratch, all your edits will be gone too. It's better to rebuild the photo folder structure on your hard disk by copying any missing folders from the backup to the internal disk.

 

[bobbabe]

If you start from scratch, all your edits will be gone too. It's better to rebuild the photo folder structure on your hard disk by copying any missing folders from the backup to the internal disk.

Johan, That sounds better.. I found what looks like the latest full catalog on the backup I made just before rebuilding the iMac. Brought them over and after checking that backup drive again and bringinf over any stray folders or files, Ill try to organize everything better and then create a new catalog in Lightroom. Thanks much but if that dioesnt sound right I'd love to hear a better solution.

 

[Johan Elzenga]

Ill try to organize everything better and then create a new catalog in Lightroom

No, don't create a new catalog! When you've recreated the folder structure, your existing catalog should be up and running again. That's the whole point. Creating a new catalog would mean you'd have to start importing all the photos again and so you lose all your edits and metadata.