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DAR3
Known Participant
January 17, 2020
Question

Restore photos from back up

  • January 17, 2020
  • 3 replies
  • 377 views

Lightroom Classic user.  My catalog is on my MacPro.  My photos on an external hard drive.  The drive has crashed.  What is the easiest way from me to restore my photos from a backup to a new drive? Appreciate any help. 

 

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3 replies

D
DAR3Author
Known Participant
January 27, 2020

Thank you for the input.  Very helpful.  I renamed the new external disk exactly the same as the failed disk.  It worked very well with LightRoom and Time Machine.  

 

I am now working with support from BackBlaze as this software is now struggling to recognize the drive and is no longer backing it up.  

 

 

GoldingD
GoldingD
Legend
January 19, 2020

Are you trying to restore the catalog or the photos, What drive failed, the one with the catalog, or the one with the photos?

 

dj_paige
dj_paige
Legend
January 17, 2020

Copy the entire folder hierarchy — unchanged — from the backups to a new drive. Then you will have to reconnect the photos in Lightroom via these instructions: http://www.computer-darkroom.com/lr2_find_folder/find-folder.htm

 

Its even simpler if you can name the new drive the exact same name as the old drive, and put the photos in folders of the exact same name and location; then you won't even have to reconnect.

    N
    Nick5
    Participant
    January 19, 2020

    I import by DATE YYYY-MM-DD through Lightroom Classic into a Folder named LR Pictures 2003-2011-2015. I then add description, 2011-12-25 Christmas Day.  All images are on LaCie External Rugged 2TB Thunderbolt, USB-C HardDrives. I then have several back up (Copies) although they may not be LaCie Brand 2TB Drives, they are named the same as working Drive along with Folder LR Pictures 2003-2011. 
    The same applies for 2012-2015, 2016-2019 and now 2020-20. 
    After each import I grab one of the copies that are at one of our two homes, open compare and drag the newer dated folders into the Copy folder.

    two houses, two copies each, plus two to travel with to update at other house location. 
    so that is six external hard drives per year grouping, 2003-2011, 2012-2015, 2016-2019 and you guessed it 2020-20.... that's a lot of External Hard Drives. If working in 2016-2019, I can disconnect the appropriate HD and get one of the two copies and connect, all just like that I am connected like previous drive. 
    yes a ton of Drives, but it allows me to keep on working. 

    dj_paige
    dj_paige
    Legend
    January 19, 2020

    "I import by DATE YYYY-MM-DD through Lightroom Classic into a Folder named LR Pictures 2003-2011-2015."

     

    This really is NOT restoring a backup. It is actually destructive in the sense that the old catalog (saved as a backup) is not used. When you import the photos, Lightroom treats them as totally new photos that it has never seen before, and (unless the metadata had been saved to xmp by the previous catalog) the imported photos will have no edits and no user-provided edits and things like collections and virtual copies and photo books and web pages (and some other things that I don't remember now) will all be gone.

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