Previews Unavailable

Question

I just got back from a photo safari in Africa. I used my Canon 70D and a brand new canon 80D. I used a combination of SD Cards both new and old. I am not sure which card I placed in which camera. I never formatted the new cards - I simply put them in and started shooting. I do not recall ever formatting a card before using it.

I import by putting the card into my iMac and opening the import dialogue box. Before I do this I check in finder and I see where all of the photos I took are present. I can see the photos in the finder. I took everything in Camera RAW and there is a mixture of stills and video on all cards.

On three cards Lightroom shows the number of the photo and a note in the photo box - PREVIEWS ARE NOT AVAILABLE FOR THIS PHOTO. I can see the movies, but not the stills. At this point, I am reluctant to import the photos.

Any idea why there are no previews for these photos? Is there any harm in importing them at this time, even though I basically do not know what I am importing, because there is just a image number. If I do import will I be able to build previews afterwards?

Does this mean the camera failed to build a JPEG preview? This makes no sense as I could see each photo on the LCD screen as I took it.

Thanks for your help.

Steven

Rob_Cullen · Accepted Answer

I doubt you could import the photos from the 80D. I would like to know the exact wording of any error messages you get. (or screen-clips). Sometimes "PREVIEWS ARE NOT AVAILABLE" can mean other errors.

The 80D requires Lightroom version 6.5 or higher to import its CR2 files.

There are three options for you-

1. You can buy an upgrade to version 6.12 (as perpetual / stand-alone version) (is version 7 due soon???)

2. You could convert the CR2 files to DNG raw files using the free Adobe DNG Converter, then Import in LR5.

3. Subscribe to the Creative Cloud Photography Plan.

Personally- I would suggest option 3. I resisted for a long time but have since never regretted subscribing for the latest of Lr & Photoshop.

When you upgrade (to v6.12 or CC2015.12) Lightroom will ask to "seamlessly" upgrade your LR5 catalog, and it will first make a copy then do the conversion. You then have two catalogs (the 'old' version for LR5, and the 'new' for LR6).

Note: the converted LR6 catalog uses the same filename with an added extension "-2" and is not 'backward' compatible with LR5

GovtLawyer · Answer

I just read some other posts regarding the same problem. I have LR 5. It probably does not support my 80D. I guess I will update to creative cloud at $9.99 per month. Will it seamlessly incorporate my existing LR 5 file structure?

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