P: AI Masks Require updating and/or disappear

[Shelemiah]

Hello,

I recently had a call with Adobe support with no luck. I have found some threads on this but nothing presents a solution and it seems hard to find what the actual issue is.

If I edit a client gallery and use any healing brush tool or AI masking tool, the mask or healing brush/generative AI will get a red dot underneath after going back to the start of the gallery, my AI edits are gone....

I also noticed this happens 100% of the time when I quite and reopen lightroom, I can fix the mask, update ai settings but it just resets each time I open lightroom.

We tested a new catalogue, we tested a bunch of things with no luck. 

We really need a fix on this Adobe it is killing workflow, not sure what broke this setting. I can't revert to an old version because I have lots of photos (I do 1 catalogue per year) and can't go back weeks of client work.

Also this catalogue was started at the begining of 2025 so there is no version 13 of this catalogue to revert to and test.

PLEASE HELP ADOBE!

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Try the steps listed in this post: https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-discussions/masks-in-lrc-need-constant-updating/m-p... in this thread. 

[Wim15C3]

Thanks, Rikk! I followed the steps in the post you linked, and it solved the issue. Much appreciated!

[Wim15C3]

Thanks again, Rikk. I truly appreciated your quick response and was initially relieved when the suggested solution seemed to work.

However, I now realise I was too quick to celebrate. A few days into post-production — after everything appeared resolved — the issue came back. Suddenly, all AI-based masks needed updating again. I went through the long update process once more, only to find that it didn’t hold.

What’s even more frustrating is that the problem doesn’t affect all edits at once. It seems to hit at random — here and there — which means I have to check and update every single image manually, one by one. By the time I reach the end of my shoot, the images I started with are sometimes already back to needing updates again. It’s madness.

This honestly feels like carrying water to the sea.

I’m in the middle of my busiest season as a professional photographer. Time is critical, and I need my software to be rock-solid. I simply can’t afford to lose countless hours on something that should just work. I rely on Lightroom for my livelihood — and right now, that trust is being tested.

Could you please escalate this or let me know if there’s a durable fix in development? This urgently needs a permanent solution.

Best regards,

Wim

[luzye_photo]

I am equally frustrated during my busiest month of the year.  In the end, creating a new catalog for each assignment is what worked for me.  Larger catalogs will not hold the (repeatendly) regerated edits.  Good luck!  

[brent_9982]

I am having this same issue. I moved the data file to my desktop. This resolved the issue temporarily, but several days later the issue happened again. I can't afford to do this every few days. Adobe, please dig further into this issue for a solution. 

[leslier60869033]

Same issue. It's infuriating. Busiest season and I have to create a new LR catalog for every wedding plus constantly delete the data file and rebuild the AI assets - it's absurd. Ready to ditch Adobe altogether if this keeps up. 

[tom_8429]

I'm also having the same issue and it is significantly impacting my professional workflow and output. What's doing on Adobe?

[KAKP]

Same issue here, large wedding catalog and I'm having to update AL on EACH individual photo.   This needs to be fixed as soon as possible please.  Please advise what action is taking place to fix this issue.  

[johnrellis]

@KAKP: "Same issue here, large wedding catalog and I'm having to update AL on EACH individual photo."

Have you tried these steps, which help many but not all with these symptoms:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-discussions/masks-in-lrc-need-constant-updating/m-p...

[jamie_7571]

This also is not working for me. Kind of at a loss of what to do from here now that these suggested steps are not solving the issue. 

[Jb _estudio]

Hi, I've also been experiencing the same issue for the past two weeks, and it's quite frustrating. I tried everything. I contacted Adobe support, but they couldn't access my machine. I installed updates, uninstalled and reinstalled, restarted, and even restored a backup of my computer—I tried everything, and nothing worked. When I reopened LR, it asked me to update the last catalog I was using, and the same problem occurred.

Solution? I just created a new catalog since someone mentioned that the previous one might be corrupted, and voilà—it seems to be working fine now. This is something that tech support could have told me. As mentioned earlier, it's disappointing to pay for a subscription and not have effective solutions.

[Moved to Lightroom Classic forum by moderator]

[kglad]

assuming a lr question.

in the future, to find the best place to post your message, use the list here, https://community.adobe.com/

p.s. i don't think the adobe website, and forums in particular, are easy to navigate, so don't spend a lot of time searching that forum list. do your best and we'll move the post (like this one has already been moved) if it helps you get responses.

<"moved from cc desktop"> 

[johnrellis]

These symptoms can occur when LR can't write the .lrcat-data file for some reason, either because LR has corrupted it or there is a permissions issue. LR stores computed masks in that file. Creating a new catalog would have created a new .lrcat-data file. 

For reference by future readers, it isn't necessary to create a new catalog. Instead, do these steps:

1. In LR, do Edit > Catalog Settings > General > Show. That will open Mac Finder / Windows File Explorer on the current catalog folder.

2. Exit LR.

3. Move the file <catalog>.lrcat-data to the Desktop (but sure it's the .lrcat-data file and not .lrcat).

4. Start LR.

5. In Library, select all photos and do Photo > Develop Settings > Update AI Settings. That will recompute all the AI masks, which could take a while. But it won't update Generative Removes, so you'll have to go to each photo with Remove, click on Remove, and then Update.

[samixolydian]

I'm having the same issue. It's a MAJOR workflow problem, come on Adobe... what are we paying all this money for? The solution on this thread doesn't fix it. 

[JohanElzenga]

@samixolydian I'm trying to identify this problem, because the fix does indeed not work for everybody. I have several images that also have this issue, and letting Lightroom Classic rebuild the .lrcat-data did not solve it for me either. And most of my images do not have this issue, so there is no general write or permissions problem with the lrcat-data.

So far I have found that I get this problem if the image has multiple Generative Remove patches, and at least one AI mask (sky mask, object mask). An object-detected Generated Remove and an AI mask might also do it. Can you confirm (or deny) that this is the case with your problem images too?

[samixolydian]

Yes, confirmed - that’s exactly right


~Sam

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Personal Information removed by forum moderator.

[Tricia5DE5]

I'm also having the same issue. Finally finished a gallery and was in awe of the technology...only to find out that it didn't save and now I have to go back and remember which ones I used regenerative AI on. Super helpful.

Following in hopes of figuring this out before editing the next gallery...

[johnrellis]

LR 14.0 introduced a bug that caused it to think that previously applied masks need updating. Adobe just released LR 14.0.1 to fix that issue.  See in particular Rikk Flohr's second reply at the top of the thread:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-bugs/p-subject-mask-from-previous-versions-are-requ...

[JohanElzenga]

I find Rikk's second reply not very helpful, to be honest. It is advised to upgrade again, but "If you did a lot of work in 14.0, it isn't recommended to restore from the 13.x backup." So what is it? Is it really necessary to re-upgrade your catalog? In that case you'll need to find a way to not have to do all the work in version 14 again. Saving metadata to files (in the current catalog) and reimport the images that you imported after the re-upgrade would save most of that work. Exporting the work as a new catalog, and importing that catalog into the re-upgraded catalog is another option. Or is it 'kind of necessary' as long as it does not require too much re-work? What does that mean? What are the disadvantages of not re-upgrading?

[Jhp2012]

Agree, this is absurd.  I'm already looking into new photo editing options.  

[Sky Photography]

So originally, I got nowhere with this online or in this forum. I eventually got a solution (for the most part) with a support engineer remotely connected to my machine.

Here's what solved the issue I had with ai not 'saving' and got me working again. It's a corrupt .lr-cat-data file that holds all the ai edits. seems like it corrupts after major LrC updates!!!!

Before taking the following steps, read through them as it's not a complete fix, but it will get it all working again.

1. Close Lightroom

2. Go to the folder that contains your LR catalogue.
3. Rename .Ircat-data file OLD.Ircat-data.

4. reopen Lightroom, lightroom will create a new lrcat-data file. 

5. Ai etc will now work. However there is a big but (excuse me). All the previous ai edits you had made will all need updating. Personally, this wasn't a biggie for me as customer delivery was important. Old delivered files I can update when & if required.

NOTE

I had the issue reoccur this week when updating to LrC 14, and it seems Adobe hasn't fixed this issue.  

[kristie71]

Thank you for this, I will give it a shot, this has been very frustrating. I wanted to deliver a gallery tonight and I'm not able to because I have to keep going back through the images and re-updating the masks and remove tool! Then when I do update it and it seems like everything is OK with that image, there's still a red dot underneath the mask icon even though they have been updated and there is no pop-up that saying I need to update...but the little red dot is still there, but only on some of the images, I'm so confused! I will try this trick tomorrow 

[Greg26448602yzsa]

THIS, this fixed it for me for the catalog I was working on. I was stressing big time so thank you!

[johnrellis]

@Greg26448602yzsa: "this fixed it for me"

To help others, can you clarify which particular steps fixed your issue?  Thanks.

[Greg26448602yzsa]

1. Close Lightroom
2. Go to the folder that contains your LR catalogue.
3. Rename .Ircat-data file OLD.Ircat-data.
4. Re-open Lightroom, lightroom will create a new lrcat-data file.
5. In Library grid view, select all photos and go to Photo > Develop Settings > Update AI Settings, wait the few mins for all AI masks to update.

AI mask edits are now sticking, it no longer is saying update masks everytime I click a photo to edit, even if I had just updated.