Imported Photos Now Missing From Desktop Folder — LrC Says Originals Not Found

[uklizj]

Until this evening, I had 12,000 photos of my recent trip to Tanzania on Lightroom Classic. When I initially imported them, for some reason they imported to a folder on my desktop. However, I decided to go with this and have been editing without any issues. Today, when I went to edit some more images, it turns out that 11,000 of my photos now have missing originals. When I tried to locate them, LRC told me that the photos were in the folder on my desktop. However, most of the files have disappeared from that folder. For example, for one date when I have almost 3,000 thumbnails, there are only two remaining files in the folder for that date. 

I don't know if this is an issue with LRC or with my imac, but the original files can't have just disappeared into thin air. Or can they?? Obviously, I am desperate to get them back!

[JohanElzenga]

Is your Desktop folder synced to iCloud? If so, iCloud may have offloaded them to cloud only to save space on your Mac. Lightroom cannot deal with cloud only photos however.

[uklizj]

Thank you for your reply. My desktop is linked to icloud but there doesn't seem to be a thumbnail or any other marker than I can click on to bring them back, if that's where they are!

[AxelMatt]

I have never heard of Lightroom deleting original files unless you explicitly do so. This is very unusual and suggests a hardware error.

Check your hard drive if it's faulty. 

Do you find the files in the trash? Are the files moved to another folder ion the disk?

Is there a log file (like the event logs in Windows) where you can take a look what happens?

In Windows, it is not recommended to store large amounts of data on the desktop. I'm not so familiar with MacOS if there it's the same.

Do you've a backup of your files?

[uklizj]

Thank you so much for your response.

I've searched everywhere for them.I even did a search for some of the specific image file numbers and got nothing, so I feel as if they are truly gone.

I know that I really should be keeping them on an external disk but I am not very computer literate and am terrified about losing them (and all that work) if I move them. I don't even know where my other originals from Lightroom are stored! And until a few years ago, I was using Photos on my mac, and would have no idea how to merge all of those photos on an external disk.

Everything else on my mac seems to be fine. It seems only to have affected those images and I still have about 1000 of them in the folder, which makes me think that it might be a storage issue.

I have plenty of room on my desktop. I am wondering now if it is an icloud storage issue? When I first uploaded the photos to Lightroom, there were about 16,000 of them and I got a message that my icloud storage was nearly full. Since then, however, I have deleted about 5,000 (who needs 30 images of the same bird in the same pose on the same tree?) and have not had that icloud message again so I assumed that the icloud storage issue had been resolved.

I use Time Machine and can hopefully restore the photos from an older back up. I'm thinking of increasing my icloud storage to the next level (which will, unfortunately, cost me $40 a month, rather than the $10 I am paying now) at least to try and see if that will resolve the issue. Also I am so paranoid about losing photos (especially those taken during a once-in-a-lifetime trip) that I tend to copy, rather than move my images when I import them, so the images *should* still be on my SD cards, unless I accidentally moved them instead. I think I will buy an external drive and re-import them to there and hope I can figure out the rest later.

So, I'm not entirely panicking, but wondered if there was an easier fix (is there ever?) rather than having to go to a lot of extra expense and time (I will probably have to delete thousands of images again, although hopefully not re-edit!). Also, these other fixes are just "if"s and I have no guarantee that they will solve the problem. 

Anyway, I really appreciate your time in replying to me.

Thanka again,

Liz

[CMass]

Hey @uklizj,

I can appreciate how stressful your situation is, and I hope that the help from @AxelMatt & @JohanElzenga helped point you in the right direction. Photography is an beautiful way to capture the world around us, but the Digital Asset Management part can be overwhelming. Let u know how things go. Also, check out The DAM Book 3.0, which is a more recent version of a book I've used to help guide me through my own DAM (Digital Asset Management) journey. 😅

^CM

[uklizj]

This is an update to my earlier posts. I am now even more frustrated. I bought a 4TB external SSD drive and re-imported into Lightroom from one of my cards. The files imported to my external drive but it was only the files that I had previously deleted as part of my editing process, which suggests, to me, that the originals are on my computer somewhere. However, when I clicked on those newly imported images in lightroom, I got the same error message that the originals could not be found, even though when I asked for them to be located, I was directed to my SSD drive. So, it seems that whatever I do, Lightroom is not able to find the originals, so I can't edit them or export them or do anything with the images.

None of my previous imports, prior to this trip, have been affected, thankfully. And I still have all the original RAW files on my cards. I even thought of deleting the files that have missing originals (all 11,000 of them) but I get a message saying that they will be deleted from the lightroom catalog but will still be on my disk. If that is the case, WHERE ARE THEY???? I have even searched for specific files by number and they don't seem to be anywhere. 

Should I delete and reinstall Lightroom? 

[JohanElzenga]

Try this. Create a (temporary) new catalog, and import those same images. Select a different (temporary) folder on the SSD to copy them to. Does this give you the same error after they have been imported? If not, then your current catalog may be corrupted. If you do get the same error, then the application may not have installed correctly.

[dj_paige]

I bought a 4TB external SSD drive and re-imported into Lightroom from one of my cards. The files imported to my external drive but it was only the files that I had previously deleted as part of my editing process, which suggests, to me, that the originals are on my computer somewhere.

If Lightroom Classic doesn't import certain files that you told it to import, it is because the files are still indexed in the LrC database (also called catalog). It has nothing to do with whether or not the files are still on your computer somewhere.

However, when I clicked on those newly imported images in lightroom, I got the same error message that the originals could not be found, even though when I asked for them to be located, I was directed to my SSD drive. So, it seems that whatever I do, Lightroom is not able to find the originals, so I can't edit them or export them or do anything with the images.

This could be a symptom of importing files from your camera card accidentally using ADD instead of COPY when you import. So ADD leaves the files on your camera card, and doesn't copy them to one your hard disks or SSDs. Certain types of camera cards (like CFExpress and possibly others) are treated as a disk and not a camera card and so ADD is a valid selection (but probably not what you want). And once the camera card is no longer in the card reader, LrC thinks the file is missing.

WHERE ARE THEY????

I am guessing they are on your camera card and never got written to a hard disk or SSD. But ... please do a search using your operating system (not eyeball) to find a specific file somewhere on your computer, looking on all disks and in all folders and subfolders. For example, if you think there should be a file named DSC_2289 then have your operating system search everywhere (all disks and all folders and all subfolders) for a file with this name.

I even thought of deleting the files that have missing originals (all 11,000 of them) 

Do not do this.