Best process to recover raw-files from trash including development settings after dng conversion?

[TiredHornet22]

Hi,

I made a somewhat hasty discission to convert all my raw files (ARW) in Lightroom to dng. Reading I would save some diskspace...

After doing this I saw that actually the lossless dng file is rather a bit larger than the arw file. I therefore would like to reverse the process. Thankfully all the raw files are still in my recycle bin. I also have a backup of the catalogue from before the conversion.

What would be the best way to go about getting back to the state before the dng conversion?

• Just restoring the raw files from the recycle bin and re-importing does not work. As the raw files are added additionally and all the development settings I made are now attached to the dng instead of the raw. Syncing the raw and dng after works, but I only know how to do this manually for each pair (would take ages for the 6500 raws I want to restore).
• Could I just delete the dngs, restore the raws form trash and then restore the catalogue from the backup?

As you can see I am a bit unsure and could really use some help. Thanks a lot in advance!

Best regards,

TiredHornet22

[JohanElzenga · Accepted solution]

If you have a catalog backup from just before you converted, then the second option should work just fine. Restore the raw images, replace your catalog by the backup copy and all should be working again.

[TiredHornet22]

Thank you Johan, worked perfectly.