Keeping LR edits when transfering to an external HD

hey PP Guru's

I was having a problem and was wondering if anyone has any idea how to help me

I've been transfering RAW images that i made LR adjustments to my external HD. Once done and re-imported to LR under the external HD they lose all the edits that i made. How do i transfer the images and all LR adjustments to my external so that i wouldn't have to re-edit the photo?

I'm hoping to free up some space on my laptop since it's nearly full... but i don't want to lose all the edits.

-Mike

You do not need to reimport your RAW files after transferring them to an external hard drive. Simply open Lightroom and in the Library Module it will indicate that your files are missing.
The missing files are indicated in two ways (1) a Question Mark (called a badge in Lightroom) appears in the upper right of the thumbnail for each missing file, and (2) If you click in the Folders Panel the missing folders are highlighted in Red.

Since you're moving all your files the simplest solution is to right click on the highest file in your folder hierarchy, select the "Locate Missing Folder" command and navigate to the new location of the folder. Of course this assumes that the external drive is plugged in.

Alternatively, you can right click on the badge on the thumbnails, and select the "Locate Missing File" command. The Locate Nearby Files command will also help you.

Unfortunately, if you jut move the folders then re-import them the edits are lost unless you have saved them with the original file with an XMP sidecar.

To prevent this, there are three ways that I'm familiar with. The most integrated way is to move the files in Lightroom. You can import a main folder on your external drive then select an existing folder on your internal drive and then right-click on the external main drive and select to move the selected folder into this folder and it will do it, metadata and all.

Or, you can just move the folders outside of Lightroom. When you start up Lightroom, the mising folders/pictures will turn red. If you right-click on the red folder and select Find Missing Files or Folders Lightroon can locate them if the external hard drive is connected.

The third way is less desireable because it is incomplete. You can select files and, in the Library module, select the files in a folder and go to Metadata/Save Metadata to File and it will write an XMP metadata sidecar for each file. After you move the files you can import them, then with all the files selected you can choose Metadata/Read Metadata from file. Your edits will all be there but things like keywords won't.

Like I said, the third option is the least desireable for moving the files withing Lightroom. It does come in handy, though, when sharing files across multiple users or with and Adobe application (Bridge->ACR->Photoshop). Bridge can read the XMP files (it may need to be directed to do this).

Hope this helps!

oh man you guys are great!

I updated the file location to my external and all the edits and keywords popped up . Easy enough, i can't believe i didn't think to do that on my own.

thanks for the help.

As Tony said above - Move the files from within Lightroom and all edits will follow them.

The only problem you might have is that if you look in the Develop Module...the Snapshots Panel will show that the photos were imported more than once. Its not a big deal but if you're concerned about little details like that you'd probably want to undo your imports and simply use the tools to find the new location of your files.

Alight, i got a new problem now... like the doofus that i am i removed a folder from lightroom... when i re imported to lightroom i lost my edits. Is there anyway of recovering that data?

What process did you use to remove the folder?

Once again, you do not need to "reimport" your files. Did you read all the previous posts?

oh i'm sorry, i forgot to say that this file was removed from lightroom awhile ago. i didn't do this when transfering files from my internal to external drive.

I'm pretty sure that i right clicked "remove" .

You will not be able to recover your edits...once you remove a folder or photo you also lose the edits.

damn, alright. Thanks Pixel.