Lightroom 1.3.1: Export/Import Catalog

I did a Catalog export of a folder with 2 sub-folders inside. Worked fine. When I tried to import the exported catalog in my home computer, Lightroom did not maintain the same structure with folder and sub-folders. All the files were imported in the same folder, so I lost the structure I had in my notebook.
Another thing:
1) The import window (home computer) didn't show the folder structure, just the main folder (root);
2)I did another test, trying to import the files in the notebook. The import window showed folder and sub-folders structure.
Any idea in how to solve this problem? Anything wrong with I tried to do?
Thanks for your help.
Sylvio.
Home computer with Windows Vista.
Notebook with Windows XP.

I had similar problems. It is not clear to me how it is supposed to work. I ended up importing the directories and then having to move them which I did not like.
I would like to get clarity on a good laptop - Home Base catalog workfolw if anyone has one.

Similar Messages

Correct procedure to export/import catalog

I took photos on my vacation and imported them into Lightroom 4 on my laptop. The RAW files are separated by Date folders. I have edited many of them and saved the resulting jpgs in a separate folder called jpg exports, as a subfolder in each date folder.
I have selected each of the date folders and the jpg export folders and selected "Export as a Catalog"
From that window, I have selected my external drive, created a file name Caribbean, deselected "Export Selected Photos only" as I want all of the photos I selected.
Export Negative files and Include Available Previews is selected.
The Catalog Export starts.
That process is underway as I type.
When I did this process in the past, my next step was to plug my external into my desktop, launch Lightroom 4 and import the catalog off of the external drive. When I did this before, the RAW files by date showed up in Lightroom, but each of the jpg folder didn't transfer.
What am I doing wrong or is it not possible to transfer the jpg edits over as part of the catalog?

"Import from Catalog" will only pay attention to images which are directly represented in the Catalog you have selected - which show a thumbnail there.
The fact that your JPG exports may be physically located inside the same folders as the Raw files that you have imported, or elsewhere, has no relevance here. If when you exported these JPGs, you selected the "import to Catalog" option then they will be represented in the Catalog and will therefore be included... but unless you actively want to see these exports next to the raw based images, in LR, with all the potential for confusion that brings - I am not going to suggest that as a good idea.
It is not necessary to first "Export as Catalog". You can directly put the Catalog you have already made, or a copy of that, onto the external drive. Also you can directly move (probably, Copy is safer) all the image folders bodily onto this external drive. These things can be done in your standard file browser (Finder / Explorer), when Lightroom is not running on the laptop.
Then you can connect your external drive to the Desktop, and start your main LR Catalog there. You can "import from catalog" (merge) all the images thumbnails, with their settings and metadata etc, into the desktop's LR catalog. All the images that you saw in the laptop, will now appear in the desktop too. If you only imported the Raws before, that is all you will see now.
The physical addressing information for each Raw file, as when originally imported, will also be transferred along with the other metadata.
So at this point the image thumbnails you have merged into your desktop catalog appear "offline" - the stored addressing they have, currently does not work in its new context. There will be a whole tree of date-based folders listed, corresponding to how things looked within the laptop, but at the moment showing "not found" so far as the desktop is concerned. This is OK - easily fixable.
You next need to decide where you want these image folders from the trip, to be located long-term. Transfer them bodily into that location (using Finder / Explorer). This should (in one go) include all the Raw files and the prior JPG exports, keeping the relative arrangement and naming of all these folders and subfolders intact.
Then in the Folders list of your desktop Catalog, you can right-click on the highest-level folder which is currently marked as "not found" with a ? icon. Then re-browse that to the new location where you have just put the transferred image folders. LR can then in one operation, not only update the file location information it holds for that folder, but also for all known contents of that folder - which means, all the imported images inside, and their containing subfolder "tree" - the whole trip. This will make all the transferred images from that trip "wake up again", and no longer be offline. You can now carry on editing them just as you did on the laptop.
If you have used a structured date-folder arrangement (such as, one of the automatic ones LR provides) in a 100% consistent manner when working on the desktop and when working on the laptop, your images from the trip can merge seamlessly into your main library.

LR4 Export - Import Catalogs

When I export a catalog, what naming convention and folder structure do I export -to-?
That is, I have a My Documents\Picture Folder\05_MillerPhotography\20120930_MarlboroughSoccer (containing the images) hard drive-Lightroom4 folder structure and I want to export the Marlborough shoot to a temp folder and then import it (in the exact same structure) to a different catalog that does have the My Documents\Picture Folder\05_MillerPhotography\ structure, but not yet includes a folder for Marlborough.
It seems that when I do the import, it sends my new folder way down past 05_MillerPhotography\, such as repeating the entire structure -starting at- my 05_MillerPhotography folder in the new location.
I can be exporting from a Catalog on an external drive or different desktop drive, or particularly my laptop to my desktop.
Thanks.

I assume you ment Export-SPWeb not Export-SPSite command.
There is no known limitations in file size, except the compression file size that is set to 24MB by default. If you exceed 24MB, the cmp file will be splitted into several files. You can change the default 24MB value up to 1024MB, using the -compressionsize
parameter.

Lightroom 5 amazingly slow to import catalog

updated yesterday from LR 5 beta on my Win 8 machine.
LR 5 took over 8 hours to update the LR 4 catalog, and has taken another 8 hours (so far) to import the photos. It looks to be about 2/3 done as i write.
i'm confused about why this process is taking so extraordinarily long. Can anyone enlighten me?

mnashp wrote:
thanks Jim. I wish there had been instructions, or if there were, i had actually read them.
I understand. I've been making this point about the loss of Publish Services on an "Import from another Catalog" at every opportunity since LR5 was released. I even contributed to Victoria Bampton's blog post about upgrading catalogs into LR5:
http://www.lightroomqueen.com/2013/06/12/confused-upgrade-catalog-lightroom-5/
Just wish perhaps Adobe would include something along these lines in their documentation.

Export as catalog does not work

When i try to export as catalog, i get a message "Lightroom was unable to export the catalog" & the process ends there...
BTW, i get the message but no explanation... would be nice if the message could say "unable to create the catalog because of..."

I've seen the error message before, but can't recall in what circumstances.
You should try again with a new catalogue, importing images so you know for certain that they are online, and exporting to a place where you know you have write permissions.

Export Catalog from PC Photoshop Elements 10 and Import Catalog to Mac Lightroom CC - How please?

Hello
I am running Photoshop Elements 10 on a Windows 7 PC and I want to move it to my Mac Lightroom CC / Photoshop CC.
I understand I need to export the catalog from PSE 10 and then import it to Lightroom or Photoshop CC.
I wonder if I could get some advice on how to do this?
Many thanks
Ben

Duplicate post -- already answered here.

Lightroom 4.1 continually crashes on import/export of catalogs

I have images that I export as a catalog from my notebook and external drive to my desktop . Did this all the time before the release candidate 4.1 without a hint of problems.
With 4.1, it crashes 90% of the time....average export/import of a catalog I am running is about 3000 images. What is particularly wierd is that it crashes on multiples of 500. Normally first crash is at 500, the next at 1000 or 1500 and so forth. any thoughts?

thanks, Cataog exports were Smart Collections of a days worth of images. From the Smart Collection, I selected export as a Catalog so all things associated with it would go.I do not opt out of anything. After a LR4.1 uninstall/install we were able to get pass the 500 series issues but after importing all the images, the programs crashes every time...images to move and they look okay...we have taken out IE9, optimized all catalogs, tried totally new catalogs, large catalogs, small catalogs, all with the same result of a crash now just after the last image moves.

Losing collections when I export/import as catalog???

I have 174k photos in my LR3 catalog and am finally getting to the point where I'm seeing serious slowdowns. For the past month or so I've been backing up and optimizing my catalog VERY regularly -- which helps at least temporarily -- but it's time for a better solution. I shoot a lot of road races (5k, half marathons, etc.) and I'd like to be able to archive old race photos to a separate catalog and then periodically move additional batches of photos there. After bouncing this off the folks at lightroomforums.net, here's what I ended up doing:
1. Backup and optimize main catalog.
2. Select photos from old races, making sure to have all filters turned off, so as to be able to grab ALL relevant photos with certainty.
3. "Export as Catalog..." and specify a name ("OldRaces") and location. I'm checking the first box ("Export selected photos only") in the dialog and leaving the other two unchecked, because I don't want to do anything with the photos/negatives themselves.
In the future, I'll want to be able to move more races from the Main catalog to the OldRaces catalog be exporting/importing as catalog, but for now I have a more pressing concern. When I followed the steps above, my Collection Sets appear in the OldRaces catalog I just created, but they don't contain any of the Collections they're supposed to, and therefore no photos. Here are a couple of screen captures to illustrate, looking at part of the photos from 2008...
The original "Main" catalog: http://grab.by/7ObA
Same thing in the new "OldRaces" catalog: http://grab.by/7Oby
Note that ALL photos from 2008 have been exported/imported as catalog, following the steps above, and should show up in their respective Collections. On the advice of LightroomQueen, I've since made a couple of changes, all to no avail:
- Using the 08DD Set as my test case, I removed "08DD-" from the name of each of the 3 Collections, so that the first few digits DON'T match the name of the Set.
- Same thing at the next level, renamed the "08" Set to "2008" so the name of a Set didn't match the first two characters of it's child Set.
- Updated from LR 3.2 to LR 3.3 (on a mac, btw).
After each of these changes, I've exported/imported as catalog. Sorry to say none of this did any good. The "2008" Set is nowhere to be found; the "08DD" Set now sits at the top level of my collections, alongside "08" and "09" and it contains no photos.
LightroomQueen also suggested right-clicking on a Set and choosing Export as Catalog, but that's not an option for me. I can do it with Collections (same miserable results) but not with Collection Sets. Similarly, I don't see this option when selecting multiple Collections and right-clicking.
From everything I've read, I'm doing precisely what I should do for the results I need, but something's clearly not working properly. Any ideas?
Thanks!
Dane

Update...
After updating to 3.3 and renaming all of my collections and collection sets so there are no instances of parents/children sharing the first few characters of their names, I started over. In the Main catalog, I selected all 25000 photos I've tagged with the keyword "archived" and exported them as a catalog named OldRaces. Perfect. OldRaces has two top-level collection sets: 2008 and 2009. Each of those sets contains several appropriate sets corresponding to specific races. Each race set contains the appropriate collections, and those collections contain the photos they should. Done, right? Nope.
I next switched back to the Main catalog to continue where I left off with the 2009 races. I selected another 6000-ish photos from the next couple of races and exported them to a new catalog called "Temp." I then switched to the OldRaces catalog and imported as catalog from Temp. I now have around 31000 photos in OldRaces, but none of them remember that they belong in collections.
Those 6000 photos represented three races, each in its own collection set under the umbrella of the 2009 set. After importing them to OldRaces, those three sets are at the top level of collections rather than falling under 2009. Not a big deal as I can move them easily enough, but the real problem is that those three sets are empty. Each set should contain several collections which hold the photos from that race, but they contain nothing at all.
Next step, I relaunched LR with the Temp set I had used as an export/import middle ground. (As an aside, why in the world do I even need to do this? Why doesn't LR's Export as Catalog command have the capability to designate a target catalog so I can export directly from Main to Old Races? It seems unnecessarily complicated to have to export to a temporary catalog only to turn around and re-import into the desired catalog. Another question for another day, I guess.) In the Temp catalog, the 2009 collection set is conspicuously absent but the three race-specific sets are there. More importantly, each contains the collections -- and, in turn, the photos -- that they should. So it looks as though exporting from the Main catalog is relatively glitch-free. The missing 2009 set bothers me but doesn't cause any real problem that I can see. The problem seems to be importing from the Temp catalog to the OldRaces catalog. Given that the 2009 set didn't survive the export to Temp, I can't expect it to miraculously reappear in OldRaces. So the import to OldRaces gives me the sets it should but not the contents (collections filled with photos) of those sets.
Does this shed any more light on the issue for the gurus out there?
Thanks!
Dane

Catalogue Export / Import messes Folders structure

Hi,
I've trawled the net, searched forums and been told to go away by Adobe so I'm hoping someone here might be able to help.
We have a network drive where we store clients photos/images. When visiting a client we'll export as catalogue onto a MacBook. Whilst at the clients we review the images and make some adjustments to crop, color or whatever or maybe just some metadata info. We then return and import the amended catalogue back into Lightroom but when doing so Lightroom adds extra Folders into LR or doesn't put the folder back where it should be like this:
Network Drive is on Volume CPhotos which shows as a folder in Lightroom like this:
CPhotos
-ABC Client
--Shoot1
--Shoot2
-DEF Client
--Shoot 1
--Shoot 2
etc
We export ABC Client and folders to the Macbook. When we return we import the ABC Client catalogue LR does one of these two things to the folder structure so we're left with this:
CPhotos
-ABC Client
--Shoot1
--Shoot2
---CPhotos
-----Shoot 1 (if we've performed an edit at the client on these images)
-DEF Client
--Shoot 1
--Shoot 2
etc
OR if we remove ABC Client from LR before we import we get an extra CPhotos folder added with the client placed as a subfolder like this:
CPhotos
CPhotos <--Extra CPhotos folder
--ABC Client <-- ABC Client now lives under CPhotos/CPhotos
---Shoot1
---Shoot2
-DEF Client
--Shoot 1
--Shoot 2
etc
Removing the ABC Client before the import is the best option because we just drag it back to where it should be and delete the now empty extra CPhotos folder but in the long run it's just a pain and a time waste.
Any ideas warmly received - maybe there's something I'm missing or doing wrong?
Thanks for reading!
Chris

"We then return and import the amended catalogue back into Lightroom but when doing so Lightroom adds extra Folders into LR or doesn't put the folder back where it should be like this:"
It sounds like, when you do the import from catalog, you are importing the catalogue with the images. The steps would normally be:
1. Export from catalog, including negatives, and use this on the other machine
2. On other machine, export as catalog, but not including the negatives
3. On main machine, import as catalog.
In step 3, LR is importing a catalogue into your main one, and figures out the pics aren't where they were on the other machine. It then looks around its own database for the files and matches them up.
John

Import catalog from CD or DVD

To keep catalogs manageable I remove folders from my main file and export them to a catalog. This I then burn to DVD. Lightroom cannot open this file because it is a removable disk which cannot write changes to. Please can you add in a feature to import or load catalog from DVD?

It should be able to import Catalog from DVD. It won't open a Catalog on Dvd, just like it won't on a network drive.
Don
Don Ricklin, MacBook 1.83Ghz Duo 2 Core running 10.4.10 & Win XP, Pentax *ist D
See LR Links list at my
Blog for related sites.

LR 3.6 Export as Catalog fails

I have about 40,000 images and the Lightroom 3 Catalog.lrcat is about 390 MB.
I have removed the 1:1 previews.
I have quit LR and did the backup with all the error checking. No errors ... so the catalog seems to be well-formed.
When I do Export as Catalog (in preparation for going to LR 5) .. the process seems to create all the files/folders and then after starting "Copying new catalog to final location" ... it runs for a while and then pops the generic "error" with no details.
I have tried 3 times. Same behavior.
Any suggestions?
I have 100 GB free.

There are several Lightroom authors, some of whom I'm personally acquainted with, and none of them have suggested that particular upgrade method. No doubt Martin has his reasons, but I certainly wouldn't do it that way from the outset. Here are a couple of links from other authors with their suggested upgrade method:
http://www.lightroomqueen.com/confused-upgrade-catalog-lightroom-5/
http://laurashoe.com/2013/06/09/how-to-upgrade-to-lightroom-5/
Incidentally, at the end of Victoria's blog post is an addition that I wrote. Although it was mainly targeted at the early beta testers, the final paragraph explains why any Publish Services users should avoid "import from catalog" whenever possible.

Can I import catalog photos from a usb drive?

I have imported photos from a catalog into a new catalog. Some of the photos in the catalog are located on a remote drive. The drive is not listed when I select the photos to be imported. Is it possible to import catalog photos from a usb drive?
Howie

Hi Keith,
"Import from another catalog" is a selection found in the Lightroom "File" drop down listing. Sorry I wasn't clear in my reguest. I have used this function to import photos in to my new Catalog from my old Catalog. During the import process, Lightroom creates a working catalog from which photos can be selected. A file list on the left side of the window displays the available hard drive folders. Once the photos to be extracted are selected the source folder is checked. The import button, on the bottom right of the window, is highlited to execute the import function. Since the external USB hard drive is not listed, the import function is not available.
My question: how do I enable the import from my USB drive? Perhaps I will have to move the files back onto my internal hard drive using my Lightroom's old catalog.
Howie

Problem with "Edit in Photoshop" and Lightroom 2.1 failing to import new file

I am a new user to Lightroom, so I won't be surprised if the problem is at the dull end of the keyboard...
I am working with Lightroom 2.1 (still in my 30-day free trial), Photoshop CS3 with ACR 4.6, on Windows XP (fully updated). My image files are mostly .cr2 files (canon raw).
When I "edit with photoshop" in Lightroom, it fires up Photoshop and brings the file up for edit as expected. Photoshop shows the file name as something like _MG_2326.CR2, as (I presume) expected. When I'm done editing in Photoshop, and I save the file, Lightroom brings up a message "The file could not be imported because it could not be read." and "It may be an incompatible format." on a second line.
If I synchronize the folder in Lightroom it picks up the save file without issue (though its not automatically stacked with the original).
I have tried messing around with the different options in the preferences "external editing" tab -- file format, color space and bit depth (I can't imagine resolution would matter). No joy there.
I have also tried setting photoshop up as the additional external editor and if I do that it works correctly. However, in this case, it makes a copy of the file before opening photoshop which slows things down a little.
Is this a problem that anybody else has seen before? Any solutions or work-arounds?
Thanks,
Doug

I'm back trying to sort this problem out (got distracted for a couple of days by trying to get my monitor calibrated).
Rearranging the folder structure didn't help. But I now have a better organized catalog, so that's ok :)
What I did find is that if I import files into lightroom using the "file/import photos from device", then I can edit them normally afterwards (that is, when I save the file in photoshop cs3, the new file gets picked up correctly by lightroom and gets correctly stacked with the original). This is true even if the new files get added into the same directory structure that I'm having troubles with.
So it looks like the directory structure is a red herring. It looks like the problem is in the catalog, with the way that lightroom originally imported my files. I created my original catalog by allowing lightroom to read my elements 6 catalog.
It seems that I have this edit problem with all catalog entries that were imported from elements 6, but I don't have any problem with catalog entries that lightroom brings in directly (either through "import photos from device" or by adding a new folder to the lightroom catalog).
So right now it looks like there is a problem with the elements catalog conversion.
Is this a problem that anybody else has seen? Any suggestions for getting around it?
Doug

How to import catalog structure in other machines.

Hi,
    I have two queries.:-
   1).   I have a Clothing Catalog on my machine which I created in ACC. How do I import this catalog structure in other machines as well.
   2). How to specify CatalogId in my project if I have multiple Catalogs in my project.
         For a single Catalog I used to mention catalog Id in catalogTools.properties in /atg/commerce/catalog/catalogtools.properties as :-
         defaultCatalogId=catalog30001
         How to I do it for multiple catalogs.
Please Advice.
Thanks

Go to dyn/admin compoent path,
          say in this case u created catalog data from acc, Go to /atg/commerce/catalog/productCatalog compoent
          and run <export-items item-descriptors=""/> Provide item descriptors name. under 'Run XML Operation Tags on the Repository' section.
         It will export all data for given component and it's dependancies.if u wan to disable dependancies specify skiP-references="true"
To import and export data u can use /ATG_HOME/bin/startSQLRepository command only in dev envirnoment.
startSQLRepository- m ModuleName -export/import export_file_name -repository repository_component_full_path
eg:-
startSQLRepository -m YourModule -export export.xml -repository /atg/commerce/catalog/ProductCatalog
startSQLRepository -m YourModule -import export.xml -repository /atg/commerce/catalog/ProductCatalog
Please make sure you module is able to connect to database,Otherwise jtdatasource exception will come, saying not able to connect datasouce atgmysqldb(default db configured in jtdatasoruce property)
Also if u want to export complete db,Use all argument.
startSQLRepository -m YourModule -export all export.xml
   2. U have multiple options to set catalogid in profile.
use multisite and assign default catalog to individual sites,
assign catalog to regiestered user profile.
Use scenario to assign catalog to profile based on some rules.

Lightroom 5.6 Win8 64 import of some photos are not possible

Lightroom 5.6 Win8 64 import of some photos are not possible: the photos are grey, the file name of the photos are already excisting in the catalog, older different photos, don’t Import Suspected Duplicates is not selected. There is no difference selected or not, the photos (Import are not possible) are always grey with the notice: These photos would be already imported! All other photos could be imported and gets grey.

my-wedding-foto.de wrote:
Lightroom 5.6 Win8 64 import of some photos are not possible: the photos are grey, the file name of the photos are already excisting in the catalog, older different photos, don’t Import Suspected Duplicates is not selected. There is no difference selected or not, the photos (Import are not possible) are always grey with the notice: These photos would be already imported! All other photos could be imported and gets grey.
When Lightroom greys out a photo in the Import dialog box, it means the photo is already in the catalog. It doesn't mean that it is matched with an older photo with the same name ... in order for there to be a match, the file name and capture date and file size must be identical.
So Lightroom thinks you have already imported the photos, and you think the photos have not been imported. Now I'm sure you are a very nice person, but I believe Lightroom. What you need to do is to find the photos in your Library Module and use them there. The photos can be found by searching for them by file name, after turning off all filters, and after clicking on All PHotographs in the Library Module.

Lightroom 1.3.1: Export/Import Catalog

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