Skip to main content
Participating Frequently
February 20, 2023

P: No photos in selected folder (Mac)

  • February 20, 2023
  • 66 replies
  • 33040 views

I have over 60,000 images on an external hard drive.  Today when I opened Lightroom and tried to navigate to a recent image using the Navigator Panel, the folders and subfolders are all showing the numbers of photos inside the folder, but when I click on a subfolder it says "No photos in the selected Folder".  When I check the Finder they are there.  If I go to the highest level of parent folder on that external drive all 60,000 images are showing at that level and I can scroll through them.  But when I drill down to any lower level that the very highest, they are not there.  I have not done any moving of files or folders in the last several months and up until today everything was working fine.  I have not installed any new plugins or done anything out of the ordinary with Lightroom recently.  Any idea why this is happening and more importantly how I can fix it?  I've included a couple of screenshots to show what I'm talking about.

This topic has been closed for replies.

66 replies

johnrellis
Legend
February 23, 2023

"I tried your work around, but it didn't get rid of the "/" parent folder or the "Volumes" parent folder."

 

Which workaround: Using Import From Another Catalog in LR 12.2, or doing Hide This Parent in LR 12.1?  

 

"I still don't know how those got created as I never intentionally created them." 

 

It's clearly a bug. But there have been just a few instances of those symptoms reported over the years, so it must be some obscure sequence of events that triggers it.  Hopefully, Adobe will be able to infer the root cause by examining your catalog.

Participating Frequently
February 23, 2023

I tried your work around, but it didn't get rid of the "/" parent folder or the "Volumes" parent folder.  I still don't know how those got created as I never intentionally created them.  I've included a screenshot

Rikk Flohr_Photography
Community Manager
February 23, 2023

Logged bug
Attached catalog
Setting status to investigating

Rikk Flohr: Adobe Photography Org
Rikk Flohr_Photography
Community Manager
February 23, 2023

@julief57036690 @johnrellis  I will need a link to the catalog to review this. Can someone provide the link in a direct message?

Rikk Flohr: Adobe Photography Org
JohanElzenga
Community Expert
Community Expert
February 21, 2023

I am not sure if that is related, but Lightroom should not show you disks as folders. To correct this, right-click on the '\' folder and choose 'Hide This Parent'. Then do the same for the 'Volumes' folder. You may have to restart Lightroom after that. Now Lightroom should show you the external disk as a separate device, and perhaps that also solves the problem of not seeing the images.

 

-- Johan W. Elzenga
Participating Frequently
February 21, 2023

I do think you're on to something here, but when I right click and select "Hide this Parent" nothing happens.  That "\" folder didn't exist before and I have no idea where it came from.  The external hard drive displays as a separate device but only has the files I imported yesterday in it.  The files are all still sitting on the hard drive but Lightroom makes it look like they are elsewhere.

JohanElzenga
Community Expert
Community Expert
February 21, 2023

Try again, it should work. https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom-classic/kb/volumes-drives-display-folders-lightoom.html If Lightroom shows disks as folders, then MacOS might prevent it from showing the images in such 'folders' because Lightroom has no permissions to access root folders.

 

-- Johan W. Elzenga
Sean McCormack
Community Expert
Community Expert
February 21, 2023

Are there any filters on? 

Sean McCormack. Author of 'Essential Development 3'. Magazine Writer. Former Official Fuji X-Photographer.
johnrellis
Legend
February 21, 2023

To build on Sean's reply, double-check that filters are disabled by verifying that the menu item Library > Enable Filters is unchecked.

 

If that doesn't help, try this:

 

1. Do Catalog Settings > General > Show to open Finder on your catalog folder.

 

2. Exit LR.

 

3. In the catalog folder, delete "<catalog> Helper.lrdata".  LR caches information about folders in that file, and it infrequently gets corrupted.

 

4. Restart LR. It will rebuild the "<catalog> Helper.lrdata" file, and it might take up to a minute for it to repopulate the Folders panel.