Edited photos missing from Lightroom catalog—can’t find or reimport them, but they’re still on disk

[kev216]

For some reason some photos are not in my catalog. They were there a few months ago and I did edits and exported. I should have 352 photos, but on the bottom it says 329 of 352 as seen in the following screen shot:

The images are in the proper place on my disk. I know exactly which ones are missing since I've exported them a few months ago. There's no filters on in Lightroom either. When I search a file name in Lightroom, nothing shows up. I tried reimporting, but it looks like they're already in the catalog and doesn't let me import. 

Anyone have any idea what's going on?

[kev216]

For some reason some photos are not in my catalog. They were there a few months ago and I did edits and exported. I should have 352 photos, but on the bottom it says 329 of 352 as seen in the following screen shot:

The images are in the proper place on my disk. I know exactly which ones are missing since I've exported them a few months ago. There's no filters on in Lightroom either. When I search a file name in Lightroom, nothing shows up. I tried reimporting, but it looks like they're already in the catalog and doesn't let me import. 

Anyone have any idea what's going on?

[dj_paige · Accepted solution]

Most likely, you have imported the photos improperly, you accidentally used COPY instead of ADD, so LrC knows only about the copy, not about the originals which you are looking at. 

So, do a search in LrC, please follow all four steps and then let us know the results

1. Click on All Photographs
2. Turn off Filters (Ctrl-L once or twice)
3.  Expand all Stacks (Photo->Stacking->Expand All Stacks)
4. Use the LrC Filter bar to search for one of these photos by file name

[kev216]

Thanks for the step by step. Soon as I expanded the stacks they all appeared. I thought I had already done that. Thanks for figuring it out!

[Aleke]

Hi @kev216! Welcome to the community! 😊

Could you let me know which version of Lightroom Classic you're using? Also, do your files have repeated names? Lightroom Classic isn't case-sensitive, so duplicate filenames that differ only in case can cause issues. Have you moved or renamed your files in Finder?

In the Library module, check if you see the Photo is missing icon (an exclamation mark) in the Grid view or Filmstrip. This indicates that the link between the catalog and the photo is broken. If you do see this icon, you can follow this guide to solve the issue.

Thanks! Alek

(Mention me with an @ when you respond so I can get back to you quicker)