# Moving Collections Between Catalogs



## gagephoto (Jun 16, 2009)

Hello,

I accidentally deleted some of my collections.  I have them saved in older backed up catalogs and would like to update my current catalog.  Probably a quick fix (i hope).  Thanks in advance!

cheers,

Josh


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## johnbeardy (Jun 16, 2009)

No quick fix. You could select one item and do an Export as Catalog in an old catalogue, then Import from Catalog in your working one. That should bring across smart collections.

But there's a lot of scope for creating a big mess, so you may be better off creating them again.

John


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## Victoria Bampton (Jun 16, 2009)

Are they normal collections or smart collections?  Have you done anything else to those particular images since your last backup?  Mac or PC?  Which LR version?

I can think of a couple of solutions, but we need a bit more info.


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## gagephoto (Jun 17, 2009)

Thanks for the speedy replies.  These are normal collections.  I've not modified these images further since the last backup.  I have done a lot of other work on other images.  

Working on a PC.  Lightroom 2


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## Victoria Bampton (Jun 21, 2009)

Hi Josh, sorry for the delay in replying.

What I'm thinking is this....

Option 1 - use xmp
Open the backup catalog into LR and select the images of each collection in turn, assigning a keyword for each collection name.
Write to xmp
Open the new catalog, select all of the files that might be involved, and read from xmp.
That'll pull the new keywords in (but will overwrite anything you've done to any of the selected images since that backup, hence my question about changes to any of the files). 
You can then use the keywords to select the files to rebuild the collections.

Option 2
LR/Transporter is a very neat little plugin which can be used for this.  http://www.timothyarmes.com/lrtransporter.php
Open the backup catalog, select the files for each collection in turn, and get LR/Transporter to write out a basic text file list (.txt extension) for each collection in turn.
Open the main catalog, select all, and use the Mark Images using LR/Transporter command to mark all of the images from that text file.
Filter those marked images and create collection.
Repeat for each text file, each holding a different collection.


Does that logic work for you?  Shout if you need more instructions on either scenario.


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## gagephoto (Jun 27, 2009)

Victoria,

Thanks a bunch.  I am going to give these options a shot and let you know how it works. 

Josh


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## Vincent (May 20, 2011)

I have a similar situation with moving collections between catalogues using Mac OSX Version 10.6.7 and Lightroom 3.3 64 bit.

Scenario: 

I created a catalogue inside a folder that represented the first night of shooting for an ongoing project. Out of this catalogue I created a series of collections, representing first pass at edits, second and final -  there may have been a few other collections, the issue is all the same.... I've since gone back and shot again for the same project, created a new folder for these images and thought, hmm.. it would make a lot of sense to have one top catalogue above, or on the same level as, each individual shoots being fed by any and all folders - giving me one reference point for the entire project... problem is, I don';t know how to transfer the first catalogues collection information into the what I'm using as the project catalogue.

How do I get back to this post when someone responds, with a notification be sent to my email address? 
_Mod note - email address removed for security - replied privately by email
_

.vincent


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## Victoria Bampton (May 23, 2011)

Hi Vincent

Sorry for the delay in getting back to you, and welcome to the forum!

If you open the project catalog, and go to File menu > Import from  Catalog, you can navigate to that first catalog that you created and it  should be merged with your project catalog.  Once that's done, you can  remove the first catalog.  Obviously be sensible and make backups before  you try this for the first time.


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