P: Disappearing controls and metadata fields

[Chapps-LA]

I'm running LR 8.1 on a Mac (Sequoia 15.1.1), and there seem to be some really severe bugs. First off, some of the slider controls will suddenly disappear - I can see the number value, but not the slider itself (e.g. Temp under Color, but I can manually enter a new number for the temp, which is very time intensive when I'm trying to hit the sweet spot). In the Info section (metadata), the fields and their titles will initially appear, but if I've entered something, those fields may disappear and I only see the titles (and sometimes I can click on the solid grey area below the titles to make the text appear when highlighted, but not always). Closing and restarting LR seems to help for a bit.

Finally, the memory issue with LR has gotten even worse with this version. I have to close and restart the app a couple of times a day, and *never* leave it open overnight, because otherwise it'll freeze up, with a system message saying that it's using nearly *60GB* of application resources (!). Force quitting and restarting LR returns it to the normal range. 

I used to be in charge of app development for a few companies, and I know how difficult it is to QA in all sorts of environments, virtual or real, but this is one of the largest batches of bugs I've yet seen out of one of Adobe's products. They still haven't fixed the disappearing metadata in the iPad version ...

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

I am not able to reproduce the failures you mention. 
I would recommend a preference file reset. 

This procedure works for both Lightroom Classic and Lightroom Desktop.

If you are using Lightroom Desktop, it can change your local storage location. Please review this setting after resetting preferences. 

Reset Procedure:

1. Close Lightroom.

2. Hold down [Alt/Opt]+[Shift] while restarting Lightroom.

3. Overwrite the Preferences when prompted by the dialog.

4. Close Lightroom.

5. Restart Lightroom.

[Chapps-LA]

Thanks for this - unfortunately, I've already tried it twice and it didn't take. At first, everything seems fine. A few minutes into editing the piece, I'll get to the metatags, and suddenly the field for Caption disappears (blank grey, but if I click on the title 'Caption', the invisible text highlights). Also, more slider controls are fully disappearing, or I can see a tiny sliver of the slider button. See my attachments. I've seen a few other messages from today about parts of the interface disappearing, and this may be in that set of bugs. Unfortunately, this really affects my ability to work in LR, and now I wish I hadn't updated. Can I provide any other info to help diagnose this issue? The preference file has now been reset twice.

[Chapps-LA]

Sorry, duped one of the screenshots. Here's the one which shows the Highlights slider mostly hidden - just a little of the bottom of the button (or whatever you call the slider indicator) can be seen. Usually the full slider is hidden. 

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Are you working in the Local or the Cloud tab (upper left)? 

[Chapps-LA]

In the Cloud tab - always required for me, since I edit on both the desktop and the iPad versions. What I notice is that once again the syncing is endlessly spinning. This keeps happening, and I have to delete carefully edited photos, just to find the one that's causing the hold-up. And yet there are *no* files that are syncing, per the filter when it's set to syncing. I think it's another bug - the endlessly spinning sync icon which doesn't indicate reality. Either way, even if that were the case, and files were syncing, it shouldn't cause controls and fields to disappear. 

[Chapps-LA]

Ahhh ... huge clue to what's happening here. When I restarted the app, the window opened up in the same position that I had it before closing, on my secondary monitor. I hadn't moved it, as that's the optimal position and size for me. But when I did move the app on the screen ... it turns out that there's two grey fields/stripes that remain stationary on the screen. They were overlapping the same grey background on the controls previously. These stripes are definitely caused by the app as they disappear when LR isn't in the front. They stay on the secondary monitor in one position, so I can move LR slightly out of the way to reveal the controls on the right. A bug in LR, not working well with my graphics? It's never happened prior to the recent update.

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Thanks for that! Let me confer with the Dev team. 

[JulieKmoch]

I will reach out to you offline to gather more info about the sync bug you're seeing. There is likely some metadata stuck, which doesn't show in our filter. The fact that it seems to cause memory to explode is a good clue for us. Thank you. Please watch for an email directly from me. 

The grey bars you're seeing...it looks like they may map to the Title and Caption fields?

[Chapps-LA]

Thanks very much, Rikk - and to Julie. We have some very interesting clues. Those floating bars do map exactly to the Title and Caption fields and are triggered by using those fields the first time after starting LR. 

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Updating status

[brianmatiash]

I've been attempting to reproduce this on my Mac with multiple displays but have not been successful.

Would you mine sharing the resolution of your secondary display and conferring with @Rikk Flohr: Photography about it, we'd also like to know which input devices you have connected to your Mac (i.e. a mouse, hardware controller, etc). Thanks!

[Dan5UP]

I have a problem. When I'm in the info section. I get black blocks hiding my title, alt text, caption, description. I can click on the name and it shows up but then when I go into development the blocks remain. See the screenshots. Any ideas why? 

[Aleke]

Hi @Dan5UP! 👋

Let me see if I've got this right: when you click on the black boxes, does it let you edit the text fields? Or do the black boxes disappear when you click on the text fields in the Info section?

What version of Lightroom are you using? Do you remember when this issue started? Was it after a recent update to the app or your operating system? Also, have you changed the text size in your Mac settings or in the Lightroom preferences?

Thanks a lot!

Best, Alek

[Dan5UP]

i can edit the text but the black box remains. It just turns it white like it does when you select all. Then if I go to Any other tab, like edit, crop etc the black boxes remain. If i move my workspace around they stay there.  

I'm on 8.1, i talked to adobe thru chat but they just told me uninstall/reinstall and try again. But it is still doing it. the lightroom preferences kinda suck on this version, there isn't much i can do. 

[nickpittphoto]

I am experiencing graphics issues since updated macOS to Sequoia 15.3. Gray bars appear on the screen and obstruct the fields used for captioning and keywording. When I reduce the size of the app window these bars remain on the desktop. See attached example images.

[Aleke]

Hi @Dan5UP!

If you haven't tried this yet with chat support, could you please reset your Lightroom preferences? Just press Opt and Shift while opening Lightroom.

Sometimes, graphical bugs are related to GPU issues. Could you please go to Lightroom > Preferences > General and deselect "Use Graphics Processor"? If the problem goes away with this setting, it’s likely an issue with your graphics processor or driver.

Thanks a bunch!

Cheers, Alek

[Dan5UP]

Thank you, I'll try that. It doesn't do it all the time so I'll have to play around for a while and see if it comes back. But thank you for the idea. 

[nickpittphoto]

Hi, no input devices or second displays involved, this is happening on my MacBook Air M2. Attaching a short video which shows the error occuring on the caption field only but I have had up to three bars appearing over several different fields when working with metadata. Quiting app resets everything but this is getting annoying as it starts to occur soon after I start working. If I don't quit the app I instead move the window around so I can see what I have already written in the fields if anything. Best, Nicholas