Skip to main content
B
Brad22414184ax00
Inspiring
September 18, 2025
Answered

Lost visuals for Catalog after LR update.

  • September 18, 2025
  • 2 replies
  • 229 views
Desparate for help here! Last April I formatted an external drive to use as a scratch disk for Photoshop. Two days later I opened my Catalog in Lightroom to work on some photos. I navigated to the photo but, when I went to go from Library to Develop I received a message saying the photo couldn't be found. I then noticed "?" by all my photos! Even though my Catalog with all my thumbnails, virtual copies, previews, etc.was totally accessible, my originals were gone. I realized I had inadvertently formatted my drive with all my photos on it!!! I was devastated but, at least I still had an intact Catalog of everything. Then Lightroom had a new update and luckily I took Adobe's recommendation and had it create a zip file of the existing catalog prior to update. I moved the zip file to a safe location and updated the Catalog. When I went to open the Catalog after the update there were no thumbnails, virtual copies, previews..... all had disappeared with the update. I assumed that if I installed the "older" copy of LR on another device I could unzip the file and point LR to it. After doing this on another device. I was still given the "no option" choice of upgrading the Catalog before opening it! The results of which were, still no images. What do I have to do to get LR to again read the Catalog? I realize I'm toast for my originals but, the loss of the Catalog after being able to see it after losing my originals due to error seems fixable. The size of the zip file (2.19 GB) would seem to accomodate more than an empty file structure. What other information do you need for this issue?? 
Correct answer Brad22414184ax00
quote

Johan, If I use this script to extract the previews, am I just getting a copy of the previews or will I no longer have them when I open Lightroom after running the script? I'd LOVE to have the previews but still want to see them in the Catalog. Thanks for your help, you can imagine my loss and concern to loose everything.


By @Brad22414184ax00

 

Nothing happens to the catalog, you can still view it. But like Rob said you would have a jpeg copy of the previews as well. That offers reassurance that you will not lose any previews when Lightroom is upgraded and that upgrade happens to mess around with the previews. You can create a new catalog with these extracted previews as images.

 


Thanks for the help. I will run the "extract" script after I buy an external drive to save them to. Good to know Adobe has a script to help out when accidents like this happen. This issue has been resolved.

2 replies

JohanElzenga
Community Expert
JohanElzengaCommunity Expert
Community Expert
September 19, 2025

When you say 'no images', do you mean that the catalog is really empty, or do you mean the images show only a grey thumbnail? The title of your question suggests the latter. A catalog backup does not contain previews, and the previews are what you see when you look at the images inside a catalog. Grey thumbnails mean the previews are no longer valid (or completely missing) and need to be updated. Lightroom Classic can and will normally rebuild those previews if needed, but without the original images it cannot do that.

 

-- Johan W. Elzenga
dj_paige
dj_paige
Legend
September 18, 2025

I'm guessing from what you wrote that you have not made backups of your photos. If that is true, use this as a learning opportunity in the future to make regular and automated backups of your catalog file and all of your photos, no excuses!

 

The updated catalog is empty because, possibly, LrC opened the wrong catalog file, this has happened to people, and so the catalog file you want is still there. Please use your operating system's search feature to search all folders on all disks for files whose name ends with .LRCAT and then open each one you find in LrC to see if you can find the catalog you want.

    B
    Brad22414184ax00Author
    Inspiring
    September 22, 2025

    Thank goodness, I tried another LRCAT file that was the correct one and all my previews, virtual copies, thumbnails etc. are back!!! Now my question to the Adobe gurus is... will I continue to see all this if I keep updating my versions of Lightroom?? Also, what's the best way to make a copy of this catalog so, I can move it to a safe place? If I can't update Lightroom and keep these visuals going forward I will just keep this Lightroom at this version on this device and update the versions I have on a second device. I had been backing up my catalogs right along but, as for more storage to backup my originals going forward, being on a fixed income, external hard drives are my only recourse. Cloud usage of any sort is wayyyyyy out of my budget!! Please let me know about my above inguiries.

    JohanElzenga
    Community Expert
    JohanElzengaCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    September 22, 2025

    As your catalog and these previews are the only thing you've got, you may want to try to extract the previews. That will give you small, preview-sized images. This way you do not risk losing the last thing you have in a catalog upgrade that resets the previews. There is a script from Adobe and a third party plugin that can do this. 

     

    -- Johan W. Elzenga
    Terms & ConditionsAccessibility statement
    Using the community Terms of use Privacy Cookie preferences Do not sell or share my personal information ad choicesAdChoices