Unable to locate Deleted Edited Un-exported Photos from LR

[rinaldijp]

Hi Good People,

So, was working on some edits for about 700+ photos.
I was trying to select edited photos to export and after highlighting them (about 200+), I realized there was one I selected and needed to delete coz it was not edited because it was blurred.
I right clicked and hit the delete button, it asked if I wanted to delete from disk and I confirmed that. Well, all the selcted files went along with it to the recycle bin. I have managed to restore all the deleted 'original' photos from the recycle bin to their rightful location on the disk, however.

The only issue now is, the screen/folder in which I was working originally in LR, has the other 400 or so photos but the already edited versions I had made are not visible. From what it seems, I can re-import the restored original photos to LR, but, they will be un-edited and means all my hard hours of work are gone.

Is there a way I can have the edited versions back? I can't seem to trace them under catalogue. SOS

[Peru Bob]

I've moved this from the poorly named Community Help forum (which is the forum for issues using the forums) to the Lightroom forum so that proper help can be offered.

[rinaldijp]

Thanks Bob!

[ManiacJoe]

Unfortunately, when you selected "remove from catalog and delete from disk", all the edits were removed from the catalog when all the file references were removed from the catalog.

The only way to get the edits back would be to restore an older backup of the catalog that contained the edits. Sounds like that is not the case though.

If you previously turned on the option to "write edits to XMP files", you could get some help there. But most people do not turn on that option as they normally do not need it.

[rinaldijp]

How do I restore an older backup of the catalog that contained the edits? 
I am a new user, so, some of these processes are still not 100% clear to me.

I always save a copy of my catalogue on exit as prompted by the software. What might be a good thing is that, these edits are from about a week ago and had come in to export them so I continue with the others... (I don't know if this makes sense)

Also, after this happened, I did not save the 'current' catalogue where photos were deleted.

So, am I able to retrive edits of a week ago?

[dj_paige · Accepted solution]

You can locate where your backups are being stored by looking at the Lightroom backup dialog box:

In that folder, unzip the most recent file and copy the .LRCAT file in that zip archive to a brand new empty folder. Then double-click on the LRCAT file to open it in Lightroom. Your edits should be in there.

Advice: if the backup folder is on the same drive as your working catalog, change the backup folder to a folder on some othe drive. I consider this mandatory as backups on the same disk as the working catalog are not really backups. A word to the wise...

[rinaldijp]

Thanks @dj_paige!!!!! It has worked!!!

I cannot thank you enough for this eye-opener!

Truly appreciate the guidance

/RJ

[Bob Somrak]

This is easy to do even though Lr tells you how many photos are being deleted.  I wish Adobe would have a "dynamic" "Delete from Disk" button that would say "Delete 200 Photos from Disk" to make such a destructive operation more obvious.