LR4 not recognizing files/catalog

I made a new catalog in LR4 on a Mac at school using files on a flash drive. Everything worked fine. At home on my PC, LR doesn't see anything on that flash drive. It thinks 2 older files that used to be there should still be there but everything else is not showing up. Looking at the flash drive through Windows I can see that everything I did at school is still on the drive.

Any suggestions on what I'm doing incorrectly? Nothing like waiting until the last minute to do some homework...

Thanks

Did you create the catalog on the flash drive or, if not, did you copy it onto the flash drive?

If so, you first have to open the catalog in LR, using the File/Open Catalog function. Browse to the .lrcat catalog file you created, and open it.

From there, it will just be a question of whether the new catalog has the references in place for the images on the flash drive. If you had the catalog on the flash drive at your school, then the catalog should "remember" them. Otherwise, the catalog will show thumbnails and previews, but there will be a question mark, indicating that the catalog doesn't "see" the image files.

If you do see the question mark, then go to a "parent folder" in the Library Folders panel that has the question mark, and right-click and choose to "Find" the missing files/folders, browse to the proper place in your flash drive and select it.

Lightroom is "smart", in that once you locate an upper-level "chunk" of your missing folders/files it initiates a "smart search" of adjacent folders and files.

tonylong wrote in post #15595946
Did you create the catalog on the flash drive or, if not, did you copy it onto the flash drive?

If so, you first have to open the catalog in LR, using the File/Open Catalog function. Browse to the .lrcat catalog file you created, and open it.

Oh, good grief... Talk about doing it wrong. My sister might have been right all those years ago. Maybe I DO have rocks in my head!

Thanks TonyLong, you saved me from years of Adobe therapy.

Im Sasquatch wrote in post #15595976
=I'm Sasquatch;15595976]Oh, good grief... Talk about doing it wrong. My sister might have been right all those years ago. Maybe I DO have rocks in my head!

Thanks TonyLong, you saved me from years of Adobe therapy.

Heh!

Seriously, if you are aiming to be a "serious" Lightroom user, you owe it to yourself to "read up"! There are excellent books, "primers" on Lightroom that walk you through step by step, the various features/functions of LR. The LR Help is also excellent. Wade through these things a page at a time starting with Page One.

There are also good online training resources.

If you want to "get serious", chime in here and we can point you to some of the best stuff!

I've got a book by Scott Kelby that I used once or twice. I think I went through the first chapter last year and haven't really done much since. Not that it's a bad book, I simply didn't put in the effort.

My professor is using LR4 this semester so I'll learn a thing or two along with the class.

Computers and I don't see eye to eye sometimes. The biggest hurtle is going to be me putting in the time and effort.

Thanks again tonylong. I'll continue to lurk here and watch Adobe videos.

Hey, I admit, I had a bit of an "advantage" before getting into LR, because I became very interested in Digital Asset Management (DAM) back before LR first came out, feeling the "pinch" of my growing and disorganized library of photos.

There were discussions about this Adobe project, and also Photoshop Elements has had some basic organizational tools, and so I "whet my whistle"...then the first Kelby book came out, along with the LR1 Beta, I grabbed them. The Beta was pretty buggy, so I stuck to using Photoshop (CS2 then CS3) until LR1.2 came out, a lot of bugs fixed, and it's been LR ever since!

Just realize that the LR organizational tools are a fundamental part of the program! Take the Kelby book and go through it -- even if it's older, so much still applies!

I find LR catalogues an absolute nightmare. Especially on a Windows machine with a roaming profile,on a domain network. You log off and go back on and your LR install can't read your catalogue files or preview data because it's corrupted.

There's no way I can see where you can stop LR from saving in My pictures.

No doubt when I get into this a bit more seriously, rather than just firing off a few edits a week, then I'll probably find out there is a way, but for the average user it's not very easy to just set up and go.

Paulstw wrote in post #15597215
I find LR catalogues an absolute nightmare.

You and me both. Its supposed to be LR's big strength, but I see it as a major headache. To the extent that I dumped the software long ago. I much prefer software that is not "managing my digital assets".

Paulstw wrote in post #15597215
I find LR catalogues an absolute nightmare. Especially on a Windows machine with a roaming profile,on a domain network. You log off and go back on and your LR install can't read your catalogue files or preview data because it's corrupted.

There's no way I can see where you can stop LR from saving in My pictures.

No doubt when I get into this a bit more seriously, rather than just firing off a few edits a week, then I'll probably find out there is a way, but for the average user it's not very easy to just set up and go.

Well, it can do things however you want, but you do need to learn to work with the options. The Import function is pretty simple, and you can put your pics wherever you'd like, but you have to point LR in the right direction.

As to working with "a roaming profile,on a domain network", I don't know the details, but it's true that LR needs to be installed and have its catalog on one local machine, not a network "shared" drive -- you could share some specifics and maybe come up with working solutions...?