Trouble importing photos and catalog files from the cloud to LR CC

[gregj57928960]

I lost my C: drive and all programs associated including LR & PS.  I installed LR on my new drive but do not know how to import my photos and connect LR to the catalogs that are stored on the cloud.  Operating in Windows

[GoldingD]

 I installed LR on my new drive

What is the exact Adobe program name and version

• Lightroom (Lr) v4.4
• Lightroom Classic (LrC) v10.4

and connect LR to the catalogs that are stored on the cloud.  

Is that your Adobe Cloud? Or maybe some other cloud?

Catalogs are not normally stored on the cloud

[gregj57928960]

Version LR Classic v 10.4

I have 2 hard drives, one for just programs and the other for just data.  LR is on the program drive, :C;  and data is on Drive 😄 of which all data is backed up to the cloud using SYNC as the cloud platform.  

I have downloaded LR, & PS to drive :C and am looking at now importing my photos and catalog etc into LR while still keeping all data on Drive D.

This all worked flawlessly until my program SSD drive, C crashed and was replaced causing me to download all of my program files again.  I haven't lost the data but I need to connect the data from D to LR on C shile still keeping the data files on Drive D.

I hope I have explained it well.  I am a bit of a technodope when it comes to things like this.

Thank you

[Jim Wilde]

What "data" is on the D drive? There are two main elements of a functioning Lightroom application, one is the working catalog database and the other is the set of images files which the catalog manages. So, where is the catalog stored, and where are the images stored? I assume the images are on the D drive, but we need to know where the catalog is/was located prior to the SSD crash.

[Theresa J]

Where was your Classic catalog? If you saved it on the D drive all you have to do is double click the catalog file (.lrcat) to open it in the newly installed application. Make sure you installed Lightroom Classic and not Lightroom though.

If the catalog was on the C drive I hope you have a backup of the drive. If so, find the catalog on the backup and copy it to the newly formatted C drive. If the C drive was not backed up maybe you saved periodic backups of the catalog to the D drive. If so you could recover your catalog from the most recent backup. If there are no backups you will have to rebuild your catalog by importing all of your data into a new catalog. Any work you previously did will be lost unless you saved the metadata externally.

If you used the sync function in Lightroom Classic you were not creating a backup. The sync function uploads smart previews so that your photos and edits are accessible online. If you lost your original catalog you will have to start over and completely rebuild the sync data. Unless maybe there is a way to trick Lightroom into thinking the new catalog is the old catalog. I doubt it though. 

[GoldingD]

all data is backed up to the cloud using SYNC 

I am not an Adobe Cloud user, I do not use the cloud for backups, but, does that copy the full photo, or just smart previews?

More knowlegable members please correct.

[Jim Wilde]

My assumption here is that the OP is not using the Adobe cloud, but is instead using Sync.com to backup data to the cloud. Either of us could be right (or wrong).

But to answer your question, syncing from Classic to the cloud does indeed upload only smart previews, so it would clearly nbot be a backup solution.

[gregj57928960]

Boy I wish I was even remotely good at software stuff.  Thank you to those who are replying.  You have no idea how utterly frustrating this is.  I just want to go out and shoot images, not mess around with software.

When I import files from my camera they all come in as a NEF file to my cloud, (sync.com), so I still have all of them.  I thought my catalogs were also on my cloud drive but I am seeing they are not.  What is on my cloud drive are a number of lightroom backups in 2018 from previous computer upgrades as well as a LR catalog.lrcat from 2020.  In addition I found catalog backup files up to 2021 named Lightroom Catalog-2-3-v10.lrcat.zip  2021-07-30 9:05 AM Compressed (zipped)  74,632KB.

Now, all I have done is installed LR on my new drive, (C) and have not imported anything, including photos as NEF files.

How do I get everything back in order and working while still having as much information on the cloud for backup if needed in the future.  

Thank you

[Theresa J]

The best option is to recover the catalog from the most recent backup. First, open the .zip file to find the catalog file. It has the extension .lrcat. Move the catalog file to someplace it can live for good. You can put it in your pictures folder. If you have a Lightroom folder in the pictures folder put it there. If not, create a Lightroom folder. Now double click on the catalog file to open it in Lightroom Classic. You may be asked to update the catalog. If so, answer okay or yes, or whatever the prompt is. This should recover your catalog. I'm not sure if it will automatically find your photos though. If not you can fix the link pretty easy, but that is another set of instructions. Let's see if the backup catalog is good first.

[gregj57928960]

Thank you to everyone who replied.  After trying many options I have not been able to find the applicable catalog to reinstall.  My photos are in LR but any catalog file doesn't work.  I have accepted the fact the catalog is now gone so I have a fair amount of work going forward.

Thanks again.

[richardplondon]

Your catalog backups will be each saved inside a dated "ZIP". This (even though it might appear to your file browser like a folder containing the catalog) is really a special compressed archive. Lightroom therefore cannot open a catalog from in there. But once you've extracted the catalog out of the ZIP, then Lightroom can open it normally.