Start Lightroom Classic from scratch

[John Melgun]

What is the best/easiest way to start using LR Classic from scratch (deleting current catalog and creating a new, empty one). Through my stupidity and infrequent use of Lightroom it seems I've messed up the catalog and collections when I attempted to import new images. I can't even explain what I did to create the mess.

I'm on an iMac running Catalina, have all images organized on an external HD with a separate backup for that drive, and I don't want to try to recover from the b/u. Leaving the images on their external drive and how they are organized, can this be done? I know I'll have to re-import all images but that isn't a deterent.

Any advice?

[gary_sc]

I'll give you two things, both from the same source:

lightroomqueen.com

When you sign up for her newsletter (there are very few of them), you get access to a free PDF that gives you the basics of how to use/work with Lightroom and Lightroom Classic.

Beyond that, the often told warning to never ever move images, folders, or catalogs in the Finder, ALWAYS do that within LRC. Think of it this way: LR is a dumb database that doesn't know what you did outside of LRC. It IS relatively easy to rejoin images to LRC but why add to any hassle in life. 

Enjoy and good luck!

[SeanMcCormack]

Starting from scratch, use the Add option in Import in a new catalog and point it at the external drive. If you've a lot of photos, I'd add it in sets as huge imports can kill Lightroom. I'd also initially set the Previews to Minimal so there isn't a huge CPU load with preview generation. Gary's recommendation is great as Victoria's work is top notch.