adding another catalog on top of existing one

[gils3758504]

Hi

i have a large catalog but recently i found out i have another one which i wanted to merge with the existing one.

from what i understand there is no such option as "merge" 2 catalogs..

so i'm looking for other solution...is there a way maybe i can import that other catalog into existing one? without overriding the existing one?

or maybe there is a way to take all the pictures with the tags from that other catalog?

many thanks!

[MichelBParis · Accepted solution]

This is an old issue (merging catalogs in Elements):

Photoshop Elements 6/7/8 Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

In short,

- you have to 'write metadata to files' in the catalog you want to merge

- You have to import the files in the second catalog into the main catalog (or a main catalog copy if you want to keep a copy before the merge).

What if:

- you have the same images in both catalogs? The import function should not import duplicates.

- The files to import are not in a different folder tree than those of the main catalog?  Then it may be worth to move the files of the second catalog to a different location before importing. Or you trust the duplicate import protection and import everything, which should ignore files already in the catalog.

The import of files with the metadata written recovers tags, captions, notes and ratings. Not stacks or version sets, not albums. If albums are important for you, assign a new keyword for files in each album (alb_xxxx), this will enable you to reconstruct your albums after the import.

Another problem when you import is that the keywords are recovered, but the keywords hierarchy is ignored. Before importing, you might save the hierarchy of the second catalog into a text file and add that hierarchy in the main catalog before importing. Otherwise the recovered keywords are to be found under a single flat category:  'imported keywords'.

This should give you an idea of how to best merge your catalogs.

[gils3758504]

Thanks! so i tried this. and i think it worked! but i will have to verify it a little bit before i can close this issue. hope this is ok