Skip to main content
bdobyns
bdobyns
Participating Frequently
March 20, 2018
질문

LR Classic "original file could not be found"--using LRC on PC and MAC

  • March 20, 2018
  • 2 답변들
  • 3275 조회

I use LR Classic on a Mac in my college lab (3 hours per week) and at home and work (a zillion hours per week) on a PC.  My routine is this--take pictures, copy files from camera's memory card to an external hard drive with each photo-shoot in its own sub folder, which also is where I store all things Lightroom.  I then open up my master catalog from my external hard drive, and import to Lightroom--everything is on the same external hard drive.  At school, on the Mac, all files have an exclamation point indicating that the original file could not be found and it gives me the last known address, which would be J:\Original Pics\(unique name of shoot).  The Mac doesn't recognize that location.  I must go through each and every photo and reestablish the path, which now has a different address, Volumes\original Pics\(unique name of shoot).  Very tedious when there are more than 5000 pics for this semester!  So I reestablish the path, do my work, and go home.  And yes, now my home PC says that it doesn't recognize the path and now I must go back and and change from Volumes....back to J:\...! At least on the PC, once I change one path, it will recognize and change all paths for that specific folder, but once again, I have all my original photos stored in their own specific folder.

I guess if I was using the cloud to store my photos, using a PC or a MAC would not be such a big deal, but my college class only wants to use LR Classic.  Please tell me that Adobe has a quick solution for this problem?  Thanks in advance.

    이 주제는 답변이 닫혔습니다.

    2 답변

    JohanElzenga
    Community Expert
    JohanElzengaCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    March 20, 2018

    There is a solution for this, assuming that the Lightroom catalog is also on that external drive. If that is so, what you can do is the following: Using Lightroom, move the images to a parent folder inside the catalog folder. So place your 'Original Pics' folder inside the 'Lightroom Catalog' folder (or whatever the name of the catalog folder). That's all.

    The explanation: If the pictures are inside the catalog folder, Lightroom uses a 'relative' path rather than an 'absolute' path. So it no longer looks for 'Volumes\Original Pics\(unique name of shoot)' on the Mac and 'J:\Original Pics\(unique name of shoot)' on the PC, but on both machines it will look for '...\Original Pics\(unique name of shoot)'. And that path will be the same on both machines.

    -- Johan W. Elzenga
      bdobyns
      bdobyns작성자
      Participating Frequently
      March 21, 2018

      All right.  I took my EHD to work and did what you said--moved the original picture folder from where it was on the drive and put it within the catalog.  I spent a great deal of time going through each set of pictures and reestablished the path so that they could be developed.  Seemed good.  I took it over to a Mac, and I was able to go into the develop tab!!!  Yeah.  I am now at home and every single picture has an exclamation mark.

      This is what I noticed.  The USB port on my work PC is G:\ while the USB port on my home computer is J:\  well, according to what I read, I am know using a relative path and not an absolute, or does that just apply to Mac's?

      When it is all said and done, I want to be able to use Lightroom on my two PC's (what I am paying for) as well as on the school's Mac Computers.  I can set things up again if needed.

      JohanElzenga
      Community Expert
      JohanElzengaCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      March 21, 2018

      The name of the disk on the Mac, or the drive letter on Windows isn't relevant in a relative path. A relative path does not contain that. The path is relative to the catalog folder rather than the disk. That's why this works, and why it works on both Macs and PCs. And it works regardless of the drive letter that is assigned to the disk (letters can change).

      You say 'I am now at home and every single picture has an exclamation mark.' Could it be that you are using a different catalog at home? If you use a catalog that is located on the internal drive of the home computer, then obviously you will still have a problem because the images were moved. You have to use the same catalog on all computers and it must be that catalog on the EHD. Choose 'File - Open Catalog' and open the catalog on the EHD.

      -- Johan W. Elzenga
      ManiacJoe
      ManiacJoe
      Inspiring
      March 20, 2018

      Mac and Windows identify hard drives differently.

      You do not need to do a "find missing" on the individual files.

      You just need to do a "find missing folder" on the top-most folder(s) on the drive each time you swap OS types.

      약관 및 조건Accessibility statement
      Using the community Terms of use Privacy Cookie preferences Do not sell or share my personal information ad choicesAdChoices