My Collections have disappeared

[free2australian]

Hullo



I have Lightroom 4 and IMac (Lion)

All my collections on the side bar have disappeared including the book that I made (Blurb)

Also when wishing to delete photos from  the Library it tells me unable to delete as can only be done through collections ( none of the collections are smart collections)


see screen shots

be grateful for some assistance -  Just to add I have an external hard drive and back-ups

Sue

[Simon Garrett]

Also when wishing to delete photos from  the Library it tells me unable to delete as can only be done through collections (none of the collections are smart collections)

Sue

Hang on, it's telling you you can't delete images through collections!  That's quite right, you can't. 

[francois]

Are you sure that you didn't use a filter?

[free2australian]

I have not told the whole story which is this.




some days ago when using  - Lightroom - on exporting a photo to my desktop - the export rendered not 1 put 20 plus photos taken from the Photo library at the size that I exported the 1 photo - all these photos plus were exported at 11x 14 . 


 None of these photos where of the original photo exported to the desktop.    On checking my applications filmstrip found that there were numerous photos sized at 11x14 - When deleting them - all my photos  (3,5000) disappeared off the Lightroom library.

checking my Lightroom filmstrip found that all the photos were at the size of the  photo sized to 11x14.

 I  deleted these photos from the library (not from the disk).


 The same evening my bookmarks and some other information were jumbled  on my computer - thoughts were that my computer was corrupted - so I took  my computer to the repair shop   

Today after receiving my computer back from the repair shop found that the all my edited photos that I had worked on etc. were no longer in my library - only the original ones that i had copied from the picture library.  This I did not realise when I copied the photos from my Picture folder.

My thoughts that the photos that suddenly disappeared  out of my Library  could be in the trash - how bad can my luck be the trash has been emptied by the repair shop ( via secure empty trash mode).

So my collections  + 95% of my edited photos have gone -

I am desperate - in complete shock as it seems all my hard work has gone.  Even some of the original photos are not there.

some questions -- can I find the files lost in the secure trash ?  or is there another way to retrieve what has disappeared.

I am in a mess and very upset.

hopefully somebody can assist


sue

[Alan Goldhammer]

I'm not a MacOS person so I cannot help you regarding that part of it.  It looks from the screen shot that somehow you deleted everything except for a small number of pictures.  If as you say in the first post that you have everything backed up to an external hard drive, you should be able to copy all of your images and LR catalog back to the original computer and everything should be OK.

[Mac Mahon]

Sue

I'm not clear whether your actual photo images (RAW or JPEG etc) have been trashed, or whether it is only your catalog that seems to have been lost.

On the other hand you did say the originals are all backed up so that can't be a bad thing!  In the very worst circumstance you could create a whole new catalog and start over.  But don't do that yet.

The challenge, as far as your editing work is concerned, is that the record of your edits is all contained in the LR library catalog (unless you were saving .xmp sidecar files back to the image folder)

However, the good news is that LR by default is set up to backup the catalog at regular intervals.  By default, under MacOS, the backups are stored in a folder called 'Backups' inside the 'Lightroom' folder inside 'Pictures' for your user name (~/Pictures/Lightroom/Backups).  Each backup is a copy of the catalog that's put in a folder that looks something like "2012-02-14 0838" - the first bit is the date of the backup of course, the second number a unique identifier.

With any luck* you will have a recent backup.  If you double click on the most recent backup catalog, LR will open right back at the point you were at, collections and all.

It is probably very good practice to copy your backups folder to a safe external drive too in case of hard drive failure.

FWIW Ithink your 'repair shop' has gone way beyond its mandate by throwing away stuff off your computer, especially as your description doesn't make it sound like there was a major problem.

Hope you find the backup catalogs.

Cheers

Tim

* Strictly speaking, you shouldn't need luck, because a decent backup strategy is important.  As the saying goes, "you never need a backup until you need a backup".  You need a backup!

[free2australian]

Hi Alan

Is it best to re-instate from a back-up /Lightroom or from Time machine?

Sue

[free2australian]

another question Tim  - the photos I have landed in my library at present - the ones that are not what I want - do I delete these?   If so before or after re-installing from Lightroom back-up/Time machine

Sue

[Mac Mahon]

Sue

Given that the data that's in your current catalog is not what you want, you can ignore it.

When you double click on the backup catalog, LR will close (but not delete) the current troublesome catalog.  I wouldn't bother to delete the current catalog unless it is huge and/or corrupted in some way that is affecting the functioning of your machine.  I think neither is likely.

In any case you always want to take one step at a time  .  Find, and open, your backup catalog first.  If all is well, then you can decide whether or not to delete the one with the info. you don't want.

Cheers

Tim

PS  1  Unless you've been backing up your catalog daily (I do), it's likely that you will have lost some of your most recent edits
      2  once you've opened the backup catalog and begin working from it, it becomes your default working catalog.

[free2australian]

I appreciate your input - I have gone back to the last LR backup and re-instated that and deleted the corrupted catalogue.  Everything to be working now - hopefully not more issues.


sue