Completing Lightroom Cloud to Lightroom Classic migration

[johnl03]

I'm in the process of migrating from Lr (cloud) to LrC (classic). The initial Lr -> LrC sync completed, now I have it paused. From here I'd like to duplicate the photo organization I had on Lr on LrC. I'd also like to replace all the full-res/original photos on Lr with smart preview versions synced from LrC. I'd like all the photos in Lr so I can continue to use sensei search and people face recognition there. It's my understanding that those features will work with smart previews. Here's the steps I'm thinking of taking -

in LrC
unsync all the 'From Lightroom' collections
duplicate the Lr folders as LrC collection sets
move the 'From Lightroom' collections into these new collection sets
in Lr
delete all folders, albums and their photos
delete all the photos in All Photos (after exporting unsynced videos, in case they get deleted too)

start sync on LrC

Any thoughts, suggestions, or words of caution?

One more question... Is there a way to see what LrC photos aren't in collections, in case later I want to delete some photos from 'All Synced Photographs' (and Lr)?

[JP Hess]

To put it simply, in Lightroom Classic is necessary to create collections of images that you want to display in Lightroom. These cannot be smart collections, just regular collections. They can be comprised of images organized in any fashion you choose. Then you share those collections with Lightroom, and they will be uploaded as smart previews.

Lightroom Classic basically organizes your images in folders, and from there you can organize them in collections by subject or any other method you choose.

[johnl03]

Yes, I get that. I'm not sure what it was about my questions that made you think I didn't. My questions were  about how to get there. Thanks for taking the time to respond though.

[Rob_Cullen]

Migrating 'Cloud > Classic'

I think you have the method basically understood, but it might help to read the conversation at-

https://www.lightroomqueen.com/community/threads/deleting-photos-from-lightroom-cc-cloud-but-keep-th...

I like the words of the Lightroom Queen- "That's where it gets a bit more messy,.." but Victoria Bampton has some good advice.

[johnl03]

Thanks for the link to Lightroom Queen, looks like a helpful forum. I didn't realize you could drag your everything in All Photographs into All Synced Photographs to get all the photos in LrC synced to Lr.

[johnl03]

I'm going to experiment a bit more with sync, then give it a try. I feel safe with all my original photos in LrC now.

[johnl03 · Accepted solution]

Just to follow up, I basically just followed this well written tutorial by 'The Lightroom Queen' - How do I remove photos from Adobe Cloud sync? Here's the link:

https://www.lightroomqueen.com/remove-photos-cloud-sync/

This left me with only smart previews from my LrC collections on Lr (cloud). At this point you can drag additional photos from All Photographs into All Synced Photographs to sync them to Lr as smart previews. People and (sensei) search work on the smart previews. Before I started the photo removal process I did organize my collections into collection sets to mirror my albums/folders on Lr.

One problem I ran into was sync getting stuck on Lr a number of times. I was able to clear it by running a diagnostic reporter (now called Sync Issues Report after the latest 5.2 upgrade).
Preferences->Account <hold down option key on mac> Sync Issues Report
In the DiagnosticLog, click 'Lightroom Helper Diagnostic Log', then 'Syncing and Error Assets'. Track down the problem photos in Deleted and restore them and sync will complete. Then Delete them again so the problem doesn't reoccur.