LR5 Locate Missing Photos

Noob here. I'm using LR5 from the CC.
I recently (days ago) had to reload all my RAW files from external media.
Back when they were originally ADDed to LR, they had been renamed externally. The newly reloaded photos have the original camera filenames.
LR show all the previews with the missing icon, but if I do a locate folder, it finds nothing.
If I do a locate file (with find nearby checked) it finds just the photo I select (not great as there are thousands to find).
When the files were originally renamed 'PreserveFileName' was set in XMP.
Unfortunately LR does not allow me to rename the previews back to the PreservedFileName, nor does it allow locate/find the photos by the PreservedFileName.
I don't want to loose all the Develop/Metadata changes that have to saved in LR.
Is there something else I can try?

It is amazing when you attempt to redo/rethink things, just how fallible the memory is!
Not that it mattered in the end, but he XMP tags had not been set in the file, as I had stated.
They had been set in the COPY of the originals, which of course no longer existed
Could not find ‘SubSecTime’ in the LR Import/Rename, which is what had been used when the files had been renamed originally,
so the external rename process was once again used, BUT
this meant modifying the original RAW metadata, so ENSURED my backup was backed up.
Using a subset of the original files, copied, and ran through rename script.
The rename script, worked, XMP:PreservedFileName and ObjectName are now both set (as seen by external EXIF/IPTC viewer) to the original file name, and the new filenames look like what LR has.
Imported to a new ‘TEST’ LR. OK,
Moved source location, locate files at new location. OK,
BUT, Alas ….
Although, as it has been said elsewhere in this forum, RENAME saves the original filename to XMP:PreservedFileName, LR does not appear to honor the same (so even tho XMP:PreservedFileName is set within the files metadata, LR does not appear to read it).
If you try a rename at this point (to Original File Name), the name LR gives is the name at time of IMPORT.
LR does not show XMP:PreservedFileName in the Metadata display, but it does show the original filename in the Title.
Unfortunately for me tho, the final step is to rename them back to way the camera named them, so this doesn’t happen again.
Using the LR Title won’t work as Title has been changed within the LR database in many of my files.

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LR5 Find missing photos - search nearby won't work consistently

LR5 seems to work inconsistently when locating missing photos and selecting "find nearby photos".
It has succeeded in finding nearby files but now will only locate one file at a time....a very annoying and time consuming exercise!
Any suggestions please?

Hmm, I'm still not sure about your situation. But if the entire folder was missing (before you started finding individual pics), then it's easy to find the whole folder. You can see if the folder is missing by looking in the Folders pane on the left -- it will have a "?" on it:
Right-click on the folder and select Find Missing Folder.

Missing photo links - changing name of external Hard Drive location

I have searched for the answer to this high and low without success if someone can help...
I have a large collection of photos that I store on an external firewire hard drive (too many to store on my macbook pro). My iphoto library is on my Mac and when importing photos to iphoto I did not import the files so the originals remain on the external hard drive and are therefore linked to in iphoto.
I did it this way, rather than storing the library database on the external drive, so that I could access the information and thumbnails when travelling and not connected to my external drive.
I've upgraded my external hard drive and it will have a different name. I need to transfer all the photos across to the new hard drive.
Is there a quick way to reconnect all my original photos when transferred to the new hard drive or a better way to transfer them? Having tried to copy them across manually, obviously as expected I get a missing photo exclamation mark and am asked to browse to the file to relink. This is OK to reconnect one or two photos, but would take me forever with 17,000.
I remember Adobe Photo Album had a command reconnect missing files, and it would go off and search for the files you may have moved location (or changed the directory name in which they were held). Is such a function available in iphoto? I've tried the iphoto re-build functions, but this doesn't look in other attached volumes for the photos.
Alternatively, is there a way to edit the iphoto library database to do a search and replace of the Volume name to the new name and reconnect the link to then photos? e.g. Can you manually edit the albumdata.xml file (and would this be the file to edit) for example, and rebuild the database with Photo Library Manager?
Can you re-import all the photos from the new location, and rebuild the links that way, or does this create duplicate entries and not merge album, keyword event data etc for each photo?
My last resort is re-importing all the photos again, but of course I'd loose all my keywords, albums, events and other info I've spent a long time entering into iphoto.
Thanks
Phil

I just wanted to close this off to say that my solution worked fine and my iphoto libraries are up and running in perfect order again. And to summarise the solution so you don't have to read the entire post above.
This solution is for those wanting to have the iphoto library on your Mac and store the original photos linked elsewhere on an external / network drive (i.e. not imported into the iphoto library). Then you want to change the location where the originals are stored (say for example you get a new bigger external Hard Drive - like I did), and that new location will have a different name. Most people recommend importing the photos into the iphoto library, keeping everything together, and this can then be moved anywhere and accessed.
So to summarise, if you are moving original photos linked into iphoto:
1. Back up everything you can first...
2. First try moving the files (not copying and deleting) - the aliases may reconnect, especially if they are on your main HD. You may need to manually reconnect one file in each sub-directory.
3. Move your photos to your external HD / network drive. Note if the new place has the same name as your old external HD then the aliases probably won't need to be fixed.
4. Download and install File Buddy or similar Alias 'fixer'
5. Go to your iphoto Library, right click, "Show Package Contents"
6. Copy the "Originals" directory to another location so that file buddy can read it.
7. Run File buddy, fixing the aliases in your copy of the Originals folder, pointing to where you've moved your photos too (restrict the directories as much as possible where you point file buddy to search for the missing files to speed it up). You will only have issues if you have multiple copies of the same file - i.e. that have the same file name and creation date, and file buddy will give you a list of these. This in itself is a good check to see you don't have the same file in two places - I only had issues with folders of photos that I'd been given from family in which there were multiple copies of the same photo. I've now cleaned these up, saved space and ran file buddy again to finish the job off.
8. Finally, move this now fixed "Originals" folder back into your iphoto library (package contents) - writing over / replacing the original "Originals" directory.
All being well, should be fixed!
Just to share with you the benefits I find of having my photos stored on an external HD and the iphoto library on my Macbook:
-- Saves space on my limited internal HD
-- others can access the photos, set up and manage their own iphoto libraries pointing at the same originals, and we don't need two copies of the original files
-- I can access the iphoto library and manage albums, add keywords, titles, etc when not connected to the External HD, though you're limited to viewing the (not too small) thumbnail pictures iphoto stores in its library
I'm loving iphoto even more now, it makes managing and viewing my 1000's of photos a pleasure.
Cheers
Phil

Missing photos. Won't show me a path to Locate Photos

Hello
I have 3 folders marked as missing. When I click on the question mark, and say Find Missing Folder, it brings up the Mac Finder window, with a list of all the contents in my external hard drive. It does not navigate me to the missing photos. When I search for the name of the folder, nothing comes up, nor when I search for names of individual missing photos, by searching for the IMG_xxx numbers. These supposedly missing folders are on my
external drive called ``Backup'', which is weird, because I usually don't import photos to that drive, i import them into my external ``Photo Library'' drive and make a backup copy to the ``Backup'' drive (I use Super Duper, which does a copy-erase thing, where it erases the backup drive and writes over it with the new stuff). Maybe I made a mistake and opened Lightroom from my Backup drive one day and imported to there, and then when I made a backup of all my photos, by copying the ``Photo Library'' onto the ``Backup'' drive, it didn't save my photos because they got erased since Super Duper would have replaced what was on the Backup drive with what is on the Photo Library drive. That is my fear. Because I can't think of anything else. But it's strange because I never go to my backup drive. I always open Lightroom from the icon on the bottom of my desktop..... But I have looked all over the place for these photos or these folders. and no luck.
But shouldn't my photos be somewhere if I can see them in Lightroom in thumbnail view (or even normal view, but they all say this photo is missing......? They must have been saved somewhere on one of my drives right?
Any guidance appreciated. Thanks.
I'm using Lightroom 4 and an iMac.

From what is shown in Lightroom the missing folders were originally on the backup drive.
You need to manually need tell Lightroom where those files/files are now by using finder, it will not automatically tell you where they are now.
They are currently missing in Lightroom as they have been moved elsewhere, the files/folder were renamed outside of Lightroom or they have been deleted.
If you can find the files and relink them, then everything will be restored.
Though, if as you suggest the files were originally imported to the backup drive and then your backup process overwrote that drive then I am afraid you are out of luck.
Lightroom may still have lower res previews of those files in the "YourCatalogName Previews.lrdata" folder.
You may be able to recover those previews as last resort. (Search this forum for the process of preview extraction)
A Lightroom catalog does not contain the actual full-res files (It keeps a link to the file location, editing history/steps and metadata etc within the catalog)
Depending on how long ago your backup did the overwrite you may be able to also run Undelete software on that backup drive to recover some files. (If your backup overwrites each day since Oct 26th there would be a slim chance of recovery.)
Bruce

Locating Missing or Offline photos

Lightroom 4 can't located missing or offline photos, any suggestions?

You need to connect the external hard drive, disk or thumb drive where the images are held.

I have suddenly got missing photos and cannot find locations

i have suddenly got 64 missing photos which i cannot locate also where is the get photo button

Missing photos in Lightroom can be reconnected via http://forums.adobe.com/message/6296339
I have never heard of a "get photo button"

Lr5 missing photos

I have Lightroom 5 and I moved some photos onto a new hard drive and now when the new hard drive is connected I can't see the photos I moved, but I can see other photos I've added to the drive since the transfer. I get a message that says missing photos and in the virtual copy there is an exclamation mark in the top right hand corner. Any suggestions as to how I can view the photos I moved?

Adobe Lightroom - Find moved or missing files and folders

How to reset paths (NOT missing photos)

I have created a new folder with all my photos. Within it are individual folders named by year (2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009...).
I have several old catalogs with photos pointing to different files on several external HDs. I want to relink them nice and neatly so that they all point to the photos on my newly created folder on a dedicated external HD.
How can I relink all the photos? I've searched all over the internet but the only information that I can find are those related to "missing photos and question marks in the corner (and not just "resetting paths" as in Expression Media/iView). I have attempted to FORCE the question mark and relink it that way but Lightroom will not find nearby files. It only finds photos taken on the same day.
There must be some easy way like in Expression Media/iView to simply reset the path, i.e., manually relink in big batches (all photos in one folder).
I'd be so grateful for any insight and solutions anybody could offer me.

You've a couple of routes - for individual images, or for folders.
With individual images, it depends on the image being missing. If it has a little question mark or exclamation mark in the corner in grid view, click the missing file marker and point to where the photo is now located. Ensure "Find Nearby" is ticked, and press OK. LR will read the filenames of other missing files and try to find them too. This route is no use if the image is not missing.
With folders, you can right click any folder. You get a question mark if the folder is missing, and right click - "Find Missing Folder". If the folder is not missing, the context menu is "Update Folder Location". In each case you can now point to the new folder location.
To make it easy on yourself, right click a parent folder and update its location. Its child folders will then be updated too.
Does that help?
John

Problems with "find nearby missing photos", not working like it should in LR4

After I imported photos into LR4 I decided to split the event within the same folder creating 2 subfolders and proceeded to move the files within the finder. Went to LR4 and synchronized the folder but it didn't fix the file location on the missing files. So I tried finding individual files and checked the "Find nearby missing photos" but this doesn't seem to work like it did in LR3, because it won't find any nearby missing files even though they are right there new to each other in the same folder.
I don't want to dremove them and re-import because I have added ratings and I fear I would loose this info if I did that...

Your assumption that you would loose your ratings and develop settings is correct, if you would re-import.
Reimporting is never a good idea.
For the rest you have two alternatives: either you reconnect one image after another, or you undo on OS level what you did in the first place, then execute the move inside LR.
Depending on how many images you moved this could actually be the fastest route out.
"Find nearby missing photos" did not work reliably for me either in LR3. I have never found out when it did and when not, so I have preferred to learn how to perform any such operation inside LR.
Another valid question is why you do not use collections for your desired split , and leave the folders as they were.
According to my prejudice MAC users would not be as conservative in sticking to folder structures as Windows users..;-))
Once you master LR folders could be very unimportant storage buckets, as every angle for organizing your images would be covered by (smart) collections and keywords and other metadata.
Good luck, Cornelia

Missing Photos Already in Catalog

Photos in one of my Collections are shown as Missing, and I can not update them because Lightroom thinks they are Already in Catalog. In fact there are two versions of all these photos in the Catalog grid view: one is shown as Missing and the other is not missing. How can I update the Collection photos without manually recreating the Collection?
In detail: I had some photos in my Lightroom Catalog. I added them to a Lightroom Collection. All was well.
Later, outside of Lightroom, I decided to copy the photos to a new folder on a new hard drive. Then I deleted the original photos and folder.
The LR Catalog now shows two instances of these photos, a good one and a Missing Photo. When I ask to Locate in Finder the good one, LR accurately shows it s location on my hard drive. Both instances of the photos have identical names and thumbnails. The LR Collection shows only one instance of the photos and they all show Missing Photos icons.
When I try to Locate the Missing Photo, I get this message "Already in Catalog. the file "xxx" is associated with another photo in the catalog. Each file can only be associated with one photo." In other words, I am unable to get the LR Collection to recognize the new location of the digital file.
If I delete the photo duplicate with the Missing Photo icon, the photo is removed from my Collection. This is not acceptable for two reasons: I have now 449 "Missing" images in this Collection and I do not want to manually list, delete and then replace each one. I think this is the job of an asset management database like Lightroom, and I depend on it to keep accurate track of everything.
It has been 17 days since I opened a Customer Support case and I have had numerous exchanges with the Adobe reps, including a 1.75 hr. phone conversation, and still no solution. Sometimes there seems to be a language problem but at other times a lack of product knowledge. Is there anyone out there that can help?

Ok, thanks for clarifying.
Lightroom does not create duplicates on its own. They arise usually because the user did something, perhaps accidentally. By any chance, did you ever tell Lightroom to "Synchronize Folders..." ?
Lightroom does not follow or find your photos if you move them outside of Lightroom. My recommendation for newcomers to Lightroom is to always move or rename files and folders from inside of Lightroom.
If I understand your situation properly, I think the solution to your mess is as follows: First ... in Windows or Mac Finder (the only time I ever recommend moving things in WIndows or Mac Finder is to fix or unfix previous moves in Windows or Mac Finder) ... move (cut and paste, not copy and paste) the photos back to where they were. This should connect the copy that is now "bad", and fixing the problem in your collections. Second, in Lightroom, delete the copies on the new hard drive, which should now be disconnected. Now, you should have one copy of everything (including in your collections) that is connected and usable in Lightroom. Finally (optionally), if you want your photos to reside on the new hard drive, then inside Lightroom, move them to the new hard drive.

How do I recover missing photos in iPhoto 11?

HI!
     I recently upgraded to iPhoto 11 (from iPhoto 9, I believe). There are 12 photos missing from the 'Photos' section of my library. There are dashed lines around the locations where the photos should be (it is a sequence of 12 pictures), so I assume the originals are in the iPhoto Library somewhere. How do I have the placed back where they should be?
     Thanks for your help.
Doug Chisholm

Give these two fixes a try to see if they can recover those missing photos. But be sure to have a backup of your current library in case the results are not to your liking:
Using iPhoto Library Manager to Rebuild Your iPhoto Library
Download iPhoto Library Manager and launch.
Click on the Add Library button,
and select the library you want to add from those in the selection window.
Now that the library is listed in the left hand pane of iPLM, click on your library and go to the Library ➙ Rebuild Library menu option
In the next window name the new library and select the location you want it to be placed.
Click on the Create button.
Note 1: This creates a new library based on the LIbraryData.xml file in the library and will recover Events, Albums, keywords, titles and comments. However, books, calendars, cards and slideshows will be lost.
Note 2: Your current library will be left untouched for further attempts at a fix if so desired.
Starting over from scratch with new library
Start over with a new library and import the Originals (iPhoto 09 and earlier) or the Masters (iPhoto 11) folder from your original library as follows:
1. Open the library package like this.
2. Launch iPhoto with the Option key held down and, when asked, select the option to create a new library.
3. Drag the subfolders of the Originals (iPhoto 09 and earlier) or the Masters (iPhoto 11) folder from the open iPhoto Library package into the open iPhoto window a few at a time.
This will create a new library with the same Events (but not necessarily the same Event names) as the original library but will not keep the metadata, albums, books slideshows and other projects.
Note: your current library will be left untouched for further attempts at a fix if so desired.

Finding missing photos

I recently purchased a new Windows 7 computer and upgraded to LR3.3 at the same time. I used Laplink PCmover to transfer my files over to the new machine. I was using multiple external drives to store photos, I installed a dedicated 2 TB internal drive for photos only and moved all of the images onto one location for LR to reference. I will use the external drives for backups. As others on this forum have found, all of my LR files were grayed out. After doing some research, I have a better understanding of how Lightroom works and how to restore.
I have been using the "Photo is Missing" icon on individual photos in the gallery with the "Find Nearby Missing Photos" selected. Sometimes dozens of photos are restored, often all taken on the same day and in the same folder. However, too often...they come back only one at a time, even though there are others from the same date in the same file. Any ideas on why this happens?
I have over 22,000 more photos to restore! Has anyone found a way to automate this process?
Thank you in advance for your help.

I structure folders for ease of back up as I would always use LR to locate image files, far quicker than any other method. I have one folder called original files, with another folder for each year , all files are imported into date based folder under that. This is backed up to an external drive every week and an on line back up runs every night.
I have the same structure for other types of files such as videos (I don't use LR for videos as I shoot in AVCHD) and use Bridge for these searching by metadata again rather than by using folders. Folders are a pretty poor way of structuring files a left over from out dated operating systems., so just ensure that folders are kept simple and easy to back up, use more sophisticated metadata based searches through LR or Bridge for locating files when they are required.

Finding missing photos when drive letter has changed

I have over 30,000 missing photos because LR only recognizes drive letters not names. All my drives have a master "Image" directory with folders and subfolders. Going to the LR online directory with name change and right clicking images and finding folder location does not work. LR does not recognize folders or subfolders in the drive with a name change. Usually none of the folder names are high lighted. By going to the "Missing Photographs" in the catalog menu and searching by file name I can find individual files but with over 30k missing files, this approach is not practical. I have an HP computer with Windows 7 and LR 5.7. How do I find the photos?

I think the most straightforward way to sort this out is:
1. Plug in all of your external drives. From the screen shots, it looks like you have at most 5 external drives of interest, 2 that are currently online and 3 that are disconnected. (I'm not counting the one external drive letter that has just one photo on it.) How many external drives do you actually have?
2. If you don't have enough USB ports, order a $12 USB hub from Amazon.
3. Make sure the entire folder hierarchy for each drive is showing in the Folders pane as described here. When you're done, each drive in the Folders pane should have a top-level folder labeled with a drive letter (as with your F: drive in the screenshot above).
4. Expand the entire folder hierarchy on each drive in the Folders pane by clicking the arrows to the left of the folder.
5. For each drive, find one or more folders in its hierarchy that are closest to the top that have a "?" on them. It may be the root folder labeled with the drive letter (e.g. "F:"), or it may be folders below the root folder.   For each such folder with a "?", right-click it and select Find Missing Folder. That folder should be somewhere on one of the drives. Use Windows File Explorer to help find where it is.
6. When you're done with step 5, you should have located all missing folders and told LR where they are currently located. But you may have missed some.   Do Library > Find All Missing Photos.
7. Pick a photo from step 6. Right-click it and do Go To Folder In Library. If the folder in the Folder pane is marked with a "?", right-click it and do Find Missing Folder.   Otherwise, click the "!" on the photo and then click Locate. Use Windows File Explorer to help find the missing photo by filename, if necessary. Repeat until there are no more missing photos.
8. Going forward, try to keep all your external drives connected. To minimize drive-letter confusion in the future, rename the drive letters of the existing external drives to start from the end of the alphabet, changing each drive letter as described here.   When you change a drive letter, you'll need to re-locate its root folder as described in steps 3-5.   (Windows tends to use drive letters from C onward.)

Missing photos in preview

I have a large photo book (100 pages, 647 images) in iphoto 11. I'm having two problems. First, when I export to iDVD or iMovie, 3 photos are missing from the files. The pix are on double spread page layouts, and only some of the small photos (not the one that traverses pages) are missing. The same photos are absent from a slideshow of the book and from the Preview and PDF. So, I can't order the book because I can't get preview to include these photos.
I'm using the latest version of iPhoto (all up to date), but have not upgraded to Lion.
I've checked the photos and they all work (used the "edit" function to check). So, I know they are not corrupted.
I've also removed the .plist file for iphoto and that didn't solve the issue.
Any other ideas??

Are you able to edit or view in full screen those "missing" photos in iPhoto? What do you see when you try?
Make a temporary, backup copy (if you don't already have a backup copy) of the library and apply the two fixes below in order as needed:
Fix #1
Launch iPhoto with the Command+Option keys held down and rebuild the library.
Select the options identified in the screenshot.
Fix #2
Using iPhoto Library Manager to Rebuild Your iPhoto Library
Download iPhoto Library Manager and launch.
Click on the Add Library button, navigate to your Home/Pictures folder and select your iPhoto Library folder.
Now that the library is listed in the left hand pane of iPLM, click on your library and go to the File ➙ Rebuild Library menu option
In the next window name the new library and select the location you want it to be placed.
Click on the Create button.
Note: This creates a new library based on the LIbraryData.xml file in the library and will recover Events, Albums, keywords, titles and comments but not books, calendars or slideshows. The original library will be left untouched for further attempts at fixing the problem or in case the rebuilt library is not satisfactory.
OT

Is there any way to turn missing photos back into printable jpegs?

Using LR 5. Lost about 1500 jPeg images due to corrupted disk drive. However, LR5 still displays a remarkably sharp image under "missing photos". Is there any way to turn these back into printable jpegs? These are family vacation photos that had not yet been backed up to additional drives.

You want to extract LR previews as images. Googling for this shows several links:
http://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom/kb/extract-previews-lightroom-4.html
http://regex.info/blog/lightroom-goodies/preview-extraction
http://photo.bragit.com/Lightroom/articles/RecoverFromPreview.shtml
http://lightroomsolutions.com/extract-previews-in-lightroom-4/
http://www.robcole.com/Rob/ProductsAndServices/PreviewExporterLrPlugin/

LR5 Locate Missing Photos

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