Merge Photos from Two Folders with Same Name

[RealDavidArt]

Good Morning,

I have two drives with Lightroom created folder hierarchies on them that are sorted by date (year with month subdirectory with date sub subdirectory). I want to merge the photos in the 2010 directory with the nested subdirectories on drive A with the 2010 directory on drive B that already has some of the same months and date folders already.  Obviously if I click and drag in LR, I will get a folder already exists error.  And if I manually move the photos I will have to do so for each date sub subdirectory which for thousands of photos will take hours.  Is there a way to 'import' or merge the photos into on folder tree/hierarchy that will preserve the LR settings and metadata?

Thank you in advance,

David Art

[dj_paige]

I am not aware of an easy way to accomplish this.

A solution that is "outside-the-box" is to create a 2010A folder on drive B, then move the folders from drive A to the 2010A folder on drive B — and here's the key point — use the filter bar then to find photos by any year or by any year/month or by any year/month/day. The Filter Bar doesn't care what folders the photos are stored in, it will find photos taken on 11/13/2010 regardless of whether they are in folder 2010 or folder 2010A or somewhere else.

Importing is completely 100% wrong and will not solve this problem.

[RealDavidArt]

Yeah, I already have yearA folders and year-1 folders as a workaround. I am looking for a real merge.

[Munwetsa]

Are the images in the two structures unique or are there duplicates?

[RealDavidArt]

Unique

[JohanElzenga]

The only way to do this is a method that will preserve your metadata and edits, but you will lose some other stuff on these images (virtual copies, edit history, stacks, color labels, membership of collections, membership of publishing services). If you can live with all of that, then you could use the following method:

Select the top folder of all the images you'd want to move to the other drive. Select all the images and choose 'Metadata - Save Metadata to Files'. Then press the Delete key to remove all the images from the catalog. You'll get a dialog that asks you if you want to delete them from the disk too, but obviously you don't want to do that. Only remove them from the catalog.

Now you can import the images again, and use 'Copy' to copy them to the other disk during import. Because you use Copy, you can select the top destination folder and you can check the option that Lightroom should create (or use if they already exist) dated folders. Because you saved metadata to the files, the images will import with metadata and edits (which are metadata too).

[RealDavidArt]

These are two EXCELLENT workarounds... WOW. Thank you gentlemen!

[richardplondon · Accepted solution]

First backup all the files and your Catalog!

Say you have a 2010 folder and contents on drive X, and another 2010 folder and contents on drive Y, and the internal arrangements within each 2010 are essentially the same (consistent). And now you want to proceed with everything merged on drive Y.

The method I'd use, after backing up, would be:

• Use Explorer / Finder (outside LR) to move folder 2010 bodily from X, into the same parent folder where 2010 is located on Y
• The operating system will detect that some folders (including 2010) already exist, and ask your confirmation for merging folder contents - that's what you want.
• [Any conflicting individual files will be notified and you have the opportunity to skip those from being moved. Skip so that LR's addressing is not confused. Hence they will stay behind in drive X, along with the needed folders to contain them, after everything else has transferred. You'll need to review and make separate provision for these, but for now move these temporarily to another location entirely.]
• Open LR. In the Folders panel you see the images in drive X and the images in drive Y. The images and folders in drive X now show (?) offline because of the external move you have just done.
• Go to the "2010" within drive X: and right-click (cmd+click) and select Find Missing Folder. Navigate to the 2010 which is on drive Y.
• Lightroom re-connects latest edits etc, onto all the images you have just moved across.
• [If there were clashes of filenames found: move those back where they were on drive X. Lightroom still refers to those. Now you can rename things as needed (within LR) to avoid the clash. Then repeat the above process.]

[Redflagphoto]

easier way is this: open LR and go to the folder you want to move to the new destination. Right click on that folder and select "remove". LR will tell you that the photos will be deleted from the catalog but not erased from the drive. Click OK and then go to "import" like you always do and import from that folder that was just deleted from the catalog and select all the photos inside to import them in the folder destination that you wanted them in the first place. Easy peasy. If you select "move' instead of "copy" in the import dialog you don't even need to go and delete the original folder. Just remember to switch back to "copy" next time that you import from your CF or SD card.

Ciao

[Rob_Cullen]

easier way is this.......

WRONG WRONG WRONG!

I repeat the words of dj_paige​   Importing is completely 100% wrong and will not solve this problem.

To use the Import (or Synchronization ) process will DELETE ALL INFO about those images- All Editing work, all Keywording, all entries in Collections, all entries in Books, all Virtual Copies, etc.

Please RealDavidArt​ -Do not use "Import".

[Redflagphoto]

I understand your point. The process worked for me as I didn’t have any edits done on the photos on the folder I wanted to move. It Didn’t mention in the original post if the photos were edited in LR. If it was a straight import folder mistake (like I did) then my system works, if on the contrary the images were edited in LR then forget my  method.

[Lorenz5CF8]

C'mon, it's 2022 AD. A program like LRC should be able to do this kind of thing. It should be possible to select multiple directories and drag them to a new location. Only if there are files with the same name, LRC should ask what to do with it with the options "Keep destination", "Overwrite destination", "Keep both and rename the new copies" (eg add "-1" to the name. If the programmers can make such a magnificent program like LRC, I am sure they can do this as well.

[Zoe7traveller]

I agree...I'm here for this reason and am somehow annoyed at the hoops I have to jump through.

[Andreas321902320k8t]

I think I found a way to do it easily. The problem seem to lie in that you can´t move the folder. But you can move the photos inside. But you need to do it exactly the right way.

Highlight the folder you want to move files from. cmd/ctrl+A to select everything within it and then begin drag from a photo, not the part around the photo that is grey. On the actualy center of the thumbnail. Drag multiple photos to the destination folder and drop. Should be named the same as your other folder (date).

Wait for the process to finish, the photos have moved on your disks but all informatin remains tied to your photos within the Lightroom Catalogue (edits etc.)

[Melissa34808966ct0b]

Worked like a charm!! Thank you!

[Lorenz5CF8]

You are completely right, as long as you want to move only one directory. But if you have several directories you want to move (e.g from C:\ to P:\ drive) and in the source is a directory (or sub-directory) that already exists in the destination, the move action won't go. Then you have to do what you described and if I am not mistaken, you have to "Remove" the empty directories in the source location.