How to get Lightroom to give you both "delete photos from disk" and "remove from collection" options

[AtlaHeilig]

I've reviewed all previous topics but they won't help.  I've used lightroom classic for years and never had this issue.

Lightroom classic will give me two different options at completely different times. The computer will either give me the option to:

Remove photos from collection
Remove photos from hard drive

However, the app chooses the options I have.  For a few days, I just wanted to remove photos from a collection and it took days for that option to come up because it would only allow me to delete photos from the disk.  Now I want to delete files from the disk and that's impossible, I can only "remove from the collection"

How do I get the app to allow me to have both options at all times?

[JP Hess]

A collection is simply another way of organizing images. If you want to delete the image from the disk it will be necessary to go to the folder that contains the image and delete the image from the folder that contains the image. Images cannot be deleted from colllections, they can only be deleted from the folder.

[AtlaHeilig]

I've always been told not to delete images through windows because the catalog won't be updated with it.  And these are BOTH features that lightroom classic has because I can do both.. sometimes.  But right now I can only seem to do one OR the other.  I need to figure out how to get lightroom to display both tools at the same time.

[AtlaHeilig]

I've even tried to delete images via rejecting them and then deleting rejected images, but lightroom won't do it now.  I'm not sure if it has to do with the update, but since lightroom has a way to remove images from a collection, and to delete images from disk, both need to work at the same time.

[Sean McCormack]

As per others, you may have an image in multiple collections and Lightroom always favours safetly, so only allows to remove from the current collection to prevent accidental image loss. It's been that way for 12 versions now. 

However there is a way to delete a file from within a collection. I'll tell you how, but first; This method has no warning. You use this and your file is gone. That's it, Goodbye. Kaput, end of. 

Shift Control Alt Delete on Win, Shift Command Option Delete on macOS. 

You can get the file back through trash/recycle, but not via Lightroom itself. 

[JP Hess]

I'm not referring to using Windows. I'm referring to going to the folder in Lightroom rather than the collection. There IS a difference. When you first import images they are in a folder. Then you organize collections, and those collections can contain images from multiple folders on multiple hard drives. That is why Adobe has chosen not to allow deleting  images from the collections.

[JohanElzenga]

What you get depends on where you are. If you have selected the images in a collection, then the option is 'Remove from collection'. You cannot delete images from disk when you are in a collection. If you are in a folder, or in 'All Photographs', then you get the option to remove the images from the catalog, and if you want also delete them from disk.

[DdeGannes]

At Johan, it's a bit confusing at times, if I select an image in a collection and hit the “delete key” on my iMac it's gone from the collection but the Original image is in the folder on the disk. If you use the menu Photo you will only get the option remove from the collection, no option to remove from the disk.

[JP Hess]

I suppose, if you want to, you can report it as a bug and see if Adobe wants to do anything about it. Just understand that it isn't possible to delete images from a collection.

[DdeGannes]

No, Jp Hess, it's not a bug I have been doing this for ages it happens automatically and the file is removed from the collection and remains on disk and in the Catalog.

If I select the image in the folder and hit the delete key there will be a pop-up with two options remove from the Catalog or Remove from Disk. If you select remove from Catalog it will do that and all collections including sync collections. If you select to delete from disk then everything is gone this action cannot be undone. Anything associated with the image is gone previews, smart previews etc.

[JP Hess]

In the library module of LrC you have the option of  viewing your images in All Photographs, or in the actual folder where the photographs exist, or in collections. The viewing option where you cannot delete images is in the collection.You are only given the option to delete images from the collection.

[DdeGannes]

Agreed, when I hit the delete with an image in a Collection it removes / “deletes” the reference in the collection, the original image on disk remains in place.

[TheDigitalDog]

Same (and not a bug) with Quick Collection. IMHO, the behavior makes sense once one considers a collection a “virtual folder” that totally differs from a real folder on a HD residing outside LRs catalog.

Kind of like a Virtual Copy. It lives only in the virtual world inside LR. IOW, a collection is just a construction of the Catalog. I may want to delete an image from a Collection but not from the Catalog or the HD.

[JP Hess]

DeDegannes, I believe we are on the same page as we have been in the past. I didn't mean to imply that it was a bug. I wasn't trying to argue. Maybe I wasn't thinking clearly when I wrote my last reply. I think we have all been attempting to clarify the issue for the OP.

[DdeGannes]

Things to keep in mind,

Folders on hard disks connected to your computer contain the original images that have been imported to your LrC Catalog.

Collections and Smart Collections do not contain image files or copies of image files they only contain data relative the image files assigned to the collection. When you remove / delete an

item from a collection you are only discarding data.

However when you delete an image file from the disk you are discarding the source image and all data stored in the Catalog, hence the data in related Collections.

[JP Hess]

Agreed. An image FILE only exists in a catalog one time. But it can exist in multiple collections based on how the user decides to organize those images. Therefore images can be removed from collections. However if a user deletes an image from the folder where it exists than that image file will also be removed from ALL collections in which that file has been added to.