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magicalbeard
Participant
September 21, 2023
Question

How do I manage this massive disorganized "Lightroom Sync" folder?

  • September 21, 2023
  • 1 reply
  • 215 views

1st Question:

Is there a way to mass edit files to re-point them to their "correct" location now that they are all stuffed into a single folder, and lightroom doesnt see any file/folder conflicts to fix? Other advice is deffinitely appreciated as well on how to fix/re-organize this.

 

2nd Question:

Can I force Lightroom to organize this sync folder by date? I saw a checkbox in the sync settings to do this, but it must just be for new files that are added. I suppose I could do this myself by writing a script, but it would be nice if the application could do it for me.

 

Some Backstory:

I have a large (well, large to me) 10k file Lightroom Sync folder that has ended up becoming my gold-copy source file location for a good portion of my photos. When setting up my new macbook I ended up doing an entire catalog export (files included) to start fresh, because any attempt to import my old collections and move their file locations didn't work, because so many files were now tied to the Lightroom Sync folder. My organized colllections with their image ratings and edits are the thing that is most valuable to me.

 

This is at least functional now, as my collections are all accurate and there are no missing file conflicts, I just dont like that the majority of their source files are pointed to a single massive un-organized folder of pictures, rather than the organized folder structure that I have to store these.

 

I think I tried out the new (non-classic) version of lightroom at some point on my iPad pro a year or two ago and ended up syncing a good portion of my photo library into this single unorganized sync folder. After that a catalogue got saved, and here we are.

 

This topic has been closed for replies.

1 reply

dj_paige
dj_paige
Legend
September 21, 2023

Is there a way to mass edit files to re-point them to their "correct" location now that they are all stuffed into a single folder, and lightroom doesnt see any file/folder conflicts to fix? Other advice is deffinitely appreciated as well on how to fix/re-organize this.

 

Are you implying that these photos were not in a single folder previously? Did you do the move in your operating system (Windows Explorer or Mac Finder); or did you do the move in Lightroom Classic?

 

If you did the move in your operating system, I don't know of a single way to bulk correct the location. You can click on the exclamation point icon and re-connect the photos individually, and there is even an option (I don't remember the exact words) that will allow LrC to try to find other photos in the same folder that it can reconnect. 

 

As a side issue, I would never recommend putting all photos into a single huge folder with no subfolders, rather than a folder with subfolders. Folders with huge numbers of files in it causes operating systems to slow down on some operations; and since LrC uses operating system calls, the equivalent operations in LrC will be slow as well.

M
magicalbeardAuthor
Participant
September 21, 2023

Correct - they were originally organized, but then at some point Lightroom synced all my files to a single Sync folder, and they somehow became the "Source" copy for most of my collection. I still have all the originals. The issue is that I dont have any "Exclamation Marks" since it can find all the files.

Should I just rename the Lighroom Sync folder so it can no longer find it, and force them all to be missing? Then attempt to fix them one-by-one?

dj_paige
dj_paige
Legend
September 21, 2023

If there are no exclamation point icons, why do you feel you need to reconnect?


Please show us screen captures (using the "Insert Photos" icon; not by attaching files) that will illustrate the problem.

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