Inspiring

P: LrC 15.2.1 Edit a copy in PS writes changes to the Original

Forum|Forum|3 days ago
April 2, 2026
2 replies
97 views

I made a virtual copy of an image in LR and then chose “edit a copy in PS with lightroom adjustments”. When I sent the image back to LRc, there was no copy made and the new image overwrote the .TIF file original. My original (with Google AI adjustments that cannot be replicated ‘cuz I’m out of usage tokens) is ** COMPLETELY GONE **. I am quite beyond irritated. Yes, I still have the pre-Google raw file, but I am very much not happy. What should I have done?

P.S. aside -- why would my community page not have a “post a question” button on it? I’ve been hunting around for over an hour and it only just now showed up.

brucekorbAuthor

Inspiring

This problem now has confirmed reproduction instructions and should be moved into the BUG category.

AxelMatt

Community Expert

I’ve tried to reproduce this on my machine. But all it worked as expected. Perhaps I make a mistake. Can you please repost your procedure step-by-step

Do you have tried it with another image?

Which version of Lightroom and Photoshop do you use on which operating system?

My System: Intel i7-8700K - 64GB RAM - NVidia Geforce RTX 3060 - Windows 11 Pro 25H2 -- LR-Classic 15 - Photoshop 27 - Nik Collection 8 - PureRAW 6 - Topaz Photo AI

brucekorbAuthor

Inspiring

Your reply tells me that I did it properly. It ought not have clobbered the original, but it did anyway. This is called a “bug” then and is likely not readily reproducible. To give you the precise steps, I’d need to start with the .TIF file that was clobbered and is now irreproducible.

Anyway: an Apple M4 Max Studio w/ 64Gb RAM running Tahoe 26.3.1

The original .TIF had about 3 layers in the image hidden underneath a flattened version of them,

but then I made a virtual copy and edited that virtual copy using “edit copy with LR adjustments”. PS saved the editing result to the original .TIF and poof, my work was gone.

SO: this is a *** BUG *** which is likely irreproducible. I recommend that Adobe file the bug and immediately close it as irreproducible. A data point for possible future reference.

Jim Wilde

Community Expert

I can confirm your results:

Edited a raw file using “Edit in PS..”

In PS, made a couple of minor tweaks, then saved.

In LrC I now have a tiff stacked with the raw, as expected.
Then created a VC from the Tiff and turned the VC to monochrome.
Selected the VC and used “Edit in PS”, selecting “Edit a copy with Lightroom adjustments”
That action resulted in a colour version of the file being opened in PS...so at the very least I was not working on a copy of the VC with Lightroom adjustments. In fact I think I am working on the original master Tiff file.
In PS I converted the Tiff to monochrome, then saved it
In LrC observed that the original master Tiff was in monochrome, along with the monochrome VC.

I’ve repeated that workflow a couple of times with the same result.

Using “Edit in PS...” on a Tiff (non-VC) and choosing “Edit a copy with LR adjustments” worked as expected, so the problem seems confined to working on a VC. Not sure what I would expect when using “Edit a copy with Lightroom adjustments”, the VC is not a physical file so to get a file with adjustments to PS it would presumably be necessary to copy the master then apply the VC adjustments to it. Whatever, I would not have expected the master Tiff to be overwritten when trying to edit the VC.

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