Editing off of a hard drive

Question

So I recently began editing off of a hard drive, I am pretty new to photography. I have found multiple issues along the way. First, my original catalog synced with Lightroom cc, which I have had since I was young and it had many random photos in there, I deleted those but I could not delete the collection, so after a photoshoot or two, I decided to just create a new catalogue. I exported the catalogue onto my hard drive, however now when I load up the hard drive, it says the original photo is missing, how do I get all of the original photos back?

Secondly, when I went to create a new catalogue it would not let me hit create. I put it under my ssd, then my Lightroom folder, then I hit create, there are a few sub folders in that folder for the two shoots I had previously done and that catalogue. It would not let me hit create, and it even showed me this screen once or twice. It seems to me like a lot of my needed data is missing on my hard drive. I have already gone into permissions and selected the read only button off so that way the write permissions is on. I am just needing to make a master catalogue that I can access on the cloud and on my hard drive, is there a different way I should go about creating it?

Rob_Cullen · Answer

I will start the thread by asking some questions to your post-

So I recently began editing off of a hard drive,

What does this mean? Are you photo files on an internal or external connected drive? Is the E: drive available, connected, with full read/write permissions?

my original catalog synced with Lightroom cc,

Using Lightroom-Classic does not require 'Sync' at all. Lightroom-Classic works with local files in your local system. What is "Original Catalog"?

many random photos in there, I deleted those...

Deleted how? Within the Lightroom-Classic catalog, or with Windows File Explorer? I hope you did not delete your original camera files. Do you regularly make backups of your camera files?

could not delete the collection

What are you calling "collection"? is that something you see in the Collections Panel while in the LrC Library view? Collections are only created lists of selected photos. Collections are easily deleted by a [Right-click] > [Delete]. Deleting Collections does not remove photos from the LrC Library, neither does it delete files from the hard-drive.

It seems to me like a lot of my needed data is missing on my hard drive

What "data" are you referring to? Your image files, a catalog, or something else?

I am just needing to make a master catalogue that I can access on the cloud and on my hard drive,

You do NOT need to keep creating multiple catalogs in LrC. The LrC catalog you have now can be considered your "Master Catalog" in which you import all your photos.

You cannot access a Lightroom-Classic catalog "on the Cloud". The Cloud version of 'Lightroom' uses its own catalog that is stored in your allocated Cloud space- unseen by you.

Also, if you want photos available in Lightroom (Cloud) by syncing from Lightroom-Classic, you can only do that from ONE specific catalog (set to sync). You cannot make multiple LrC catalogs that 'Sync.'

So I see a summary-

Continue to use your current catalog ("original catalog" I presume)

Import photos to the current catalog. (Use the ADD option if files are already on a hard-drive.)

Edit photos in the current catalog.

Let us know where you are at.

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