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defaultf2xesqb98b5w
Participant
May 4, 2023
Question

Altered Folder structure for main collection of photos

  • May 4, 2023
  • 1 reply
  • 679 views

At some stage my catalog has developed two folder structures (or lack thereof)

most photos are in Year-month-day folder structure however at one point an external hard drive folder of older photos got imported and it put them in no particular arrangement(i.e. all files just in the parent/Photos directory).  My question is which would be the best way to move them into the existing folder structure based on capture date. Ultimate goal is to have all photos in a sub-folder by capture date.

Thanks

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1 reply

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defaultf2xesqb98b5wAuthor
Participant
May 4, 2023

I should have mentioned I was hoping for an automated way--I have read that exiftool can do this but my understanding is it needs to be done within LR classic.

Rob_Cullen
Community Expert
Rob_CullenCommunity Expert
Community Expert
May 5, 2023

Yes, it does need to be done within LR classic if you do not want to lose any editing work done with the photos.

If no work done, you could [Remove] the errant photos from the Catalog (DO NOT DELETE FROM DISK!!!)

Then re-import them again with the [Copy] option and a Dated Folder option in the Destination panel of the import. (Most important you check where they will be copied to.). Later you can delete the files that all went into the single folder. (And, of course, you have backups of all files- don't you!)

 

IF you have done lots of editing of these files- then a 'manual' method withon LrC would be needed to Filter for 'Date', then drag& Drop files selected by date to an existing 'Date' folder.

 

Exiftool plays no part in this exercise!

 

Regards. My System: Windows-11, Lightroom-Classic 15.1.1, Photoshop 27.3.1, ACR 18.1.1, Lightroom 9.0, Lr-iOS 10.4.0, Bridge 16.0.2 .
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defaultf2xesqb98b5wAuthor
Participant
May 5, 2023

Understood. Is there an easy way from within lightroom to select only those photos?

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