Smart Preview workflow have missing edits

[ashleyd97312893]

Hello, 

I am a professional private photo editor and work with wedding photographers. My wedding photographer clients send me their galleries as smart preview catalogs, I edit them, and then export them as a smart preview catalog once more and return to them via WeTransfer (similar to dropbox). From there, my client imports their edits by "importing from another catalog" and then applies my smart preview edits by clicking "Replace: Metadata and Develop Settings only." Then all of the smart preview edits are applied to their original images and they will export as JPEGs on their own computer. Anyhow, with the recent update my photographer clients are finding that many of the photos are showing up as unedited on their end when they import the smart preview edits. However on my end, all photos are 100% fully edited. My clients have been with my for over a year and this has never happened until updating to Lightroom 12.2.1. It is almost as if my smart preview edits are not being saved in the files and they are recieving an older version of the catalog prior to me completing the edits - I do not even know how this is possible if the catalog is showing every photo edited on my end and that is what I am exporting. 

This is a major issue and I am not sure how to resolve it other than hoping that Lightroom finds a fix to this bug. Does anyone have any suggestions for the meantime? Thank you. 

[JohanElzenga]

Edit aren't saved in files, they are saved in the catalog. I'm not sure if this has anything to do with it, but why do you export again as catalog? Why do you not simply return the edited catalog? That eliminates a step where something could go wrong.

[Ashley28996819ifwj]

The only reason I export again is so that I can rename the catalog as _FinalEdits. This is something I have done for as long as I have had my business and nothing has gone wrong ever. When I say they are saved in files, I am referring to the metadata that is written into the files. (Smart preview data and lrdata)

[JohanElzenga]

XMP is not written to smart previews, and as you do not have originals, it's not written to anything. Only the catalog file contains your edits. You can simply rename a catalog file if you want to. No need to export a new catalog. If you used AI masks, then do return the .lrcat-data file as well, otherwise your client will have to update all the masks. Just rename it the same way.

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Greetings @ashleyd97312893 

As a test if you select five of your images with edits, export them as a catalog and then open the exported catalog, do you see the edits? 

It would also help in diagnosing the issue if you could include OS Version Numbers and Lightroom Version Numbers for both your and your retouching clients systems. 

I've tested the workflow and it appears to be operating normally. 

[Ashley28996819ifwj]

I did a complete test run on my end with the entire workflow and the edits are showing up. If it were just one client I would say maybe she did something wrong on her end but this is the second client this has happened to in 1 week and they have both imported my edits many times before. The only common denominator is we all updated to 12.2.1 since this started.

[Rob_Cullen]

"When I say they are saved in files, I am referring to the metadata that is written into the files. (Smart preview data and lrdata)"

With Smart Previews only- nothing is saved in the SPs. (They are merely 'proxy' previews)

As @JohanElzenga states above- Why do you not simply return the edited catalog?  You do not need to return any other ..data, ONLY the .LRCAT catalog file need be returned, for the Client to [Import from another Catalog].

[henriqueribas]

Hello, did you manage to solve your problem?

Your workflow is correct and in my view without problems.
I'm also an editor here in Brazil for other wedding photographers and my flow is pretty much the same.

- I receive the catalog with smart views
- I open it on my computer and edit the images
- I return the catalog to my client (I do not send the smart previews, since there is no need because the client has the originals)
- The client opens his original catalog (without editions) and uses the import of another catalog to replace the editions of the original with the new catalog received.

There is no need to upload any files other than the .LRCAT (as mentioned above by other users).

But it would be interesting, to have a view of what is happening if one of your customers could record the screen showing the step by step what he is doing and what is generating this problem.

As you also did, I reproduced it here on my station with my images, following the same flow, and having the integration of two catalogs (one with editing and the other without) so that the procedure could be carried out and the result was as expected and explained above .

I'm using W11 and LR 12.2.1 and I haven't had any problems or I couldn't reproduce how you are reporting the problem.

I am available to help you and if you have more information, a video of how your client is trying, etc, it would be very useful to help you better

Henrique Ribas