# Folders issue in Lightroom..



## Loose Canon (Mar 20, 2018)

Hi All, wondering if anyone has a handle on this one, please? I have a folder in LR called 2017 - at the same hierarchical level there’s a folder called 2017_05_13 which I wish to nest within 2017; when I attempt (within LR) to drag that folder into 2017 I get an error message advising that there’s already a folder of that name in folder 2017 although there is no folder of that name listed in 2017 in the folders pane within LR. When I select the “Show in Finder” option I am indeed shown a folder in Finder with this name and with different images to those in the 2017_05_13 folder. The path in Finder to this location suggests that the folder is indeed in 2017. Can anyone advise why it is not visible in LR’s folders pane?

Many thanks,

Eugene; (27” iMac High Sierra 10.13.3 / LR 6.14)


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## Gnits (Mar 20, 2018)

Check what images are in the sub folder. If you want to add these images into Lr simply use the import feature.

The images and the sub folder should now be visible in Lr.

Now you can just select the images from the top level folder and drag them to the sub folder.

(ie drag the images ,,,, not the folder).

There are other ways to deal with this and your view of what you want to do may change depending on what files you find in the sub folder.


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## Johan Elzenga (Mar 20, 2018)

Loose Canon said:


> Hi All, wondering if anyone has a handle on this one, please? I have a folder in LR called 2017 - at the same hierarchical level there’s a folder called 2017_05_13 which I wish to nest within 2017; when I attempt (within LR) to drag that folder into 2017 I get an error message advising that there’s already a folder of that name in folder 2017 although there is no folder of that name listed in 2017 in the folders pane within LR. When I select the “Show in Finder” option I am indeed shown a folder in Finder with this name and with different images to those in the 2017_05_13 folder. The path in Finder to this location suggests that the folder is indeed in 2017. Can anyone advise why it is not visible in LR’s folders pane?


Lightroom is not a browser, it's a catalog application. That means that only those folders are visible that were imported. And so it's still possible to have a subfolder that Lightroom does not see, if that subfolder was added (manually) *after* Lightroom imported the parent folder. If you then try to move a subfolder with the same name into that parent folder, you'll get a warning (that basically comes from the OS) that a folder with the same name already exists.


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## Jim Wilde (Mar 20, 2018)

An alternative thought would be that you've encountered the "capitalisation" bug, i.e. because LR is case-sensitive, and the OS isn't, any case change on any character in an existing file-path, can cause the problem you may be describing.

To check, in the Folders Panel hover the cursor over the "2017" folder and the file-path will be shown. Write it down carefully, paying attention to get the case of each letter correct. Then repeat for that "2017_05_13" folder, and then compare the file-paths, looking for a case difference. Let us know if there is, and we can help you fix the problem.


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## Loose Canon (Mar 22, 2018)

Thanks for the considered responses and I suspect the issue above relates to how LR was handling imports from my phone (unwanted and constant up to the point where I disabled this activity). In any case I think the conflict arose where images imported from my camera and card were stored in a higher level folder and when I attempted to nest this folder into a same-level folder the OS would prevent the integration as it recognized a pre-existing non-LR subfolder containing phone images already in the Finder - if that's all that's going on I should be able to resolve with a little basic housekeeping. HOWEVER, I appear to have another more serious problem which may or may not be related to the above. I imported a batch of images in recent days and established them in a folder within LR called 2018; my catalog resides in the Mac and the images on one of 4 EDs, in this case ED1. The evening after import and following my standard backup on exit I opened LR to find the images missing (thumbnails visible but with the greyed out ?mark). I had a little exploration and couldn't find a corresponding folder in my Finder. I feared that ED1 might be at fault and re-imported the images into a newly created 2018 folder in LR and stored these on ED4 instead. I duly backed up and have only got back to my computer this evening to find them not there again - same story, thumbnails available in Library but images not there. I did a search in Finder for a sample folder name and found it in a Carbon Copy Cloner backup from the previous night. The entire .dng file seems to be there and intact but is A) not in LR and B) appears not to be in ED4 (although Finder is quoting ED4 as the last known location for the file). I hope I've outlined the issue clearly and simply enough to get your heads around and wonder if it prompts any thoughts. Many thanks again for sharing your wisdom, Eugene.


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## Johan Elzenga (Mar 23, 2018)

It's not entirely clear. First you talk about 'a batch of images' and a '2018' folder, but later you suddenly talk about 'the entire .dng file'. Is that one of the images or are you somehow confusing files and folders?

When Lightroom tells you it is missing some images, *do not reimport them*. That will not solve the problem, but create duplicates. Could you post screenshots of the Lightroom folder panel showing the missing folder(s) and your disks showing where they are?


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## Loose Canon (Mar 23, 2018)

Hi Johan, thanks for bearing with me; I'll try to clarify:
The 'batch of images' was a number of new images from my camera's CF card.
The 2018 folder was a folder I created within Lightroom into which I directed the imported images.
My clumsy reference to 'the entire .dng file' meant to infer that one randomly chosen file (image) from the Carbon Copy Cloner backup was indeed a whole/proper file or image.
I'm afraid I *did* reimport that batch and must assume they they are - or certainly *were* knocking about my ED somewhere although I can't find them now and, as I say, they are now missing (greyed out and query-marked) in LR. I kinda get it that they are not visible in LR - something is obviously not right in that process but I think it's most odd that I can't find them in my ED4 drive but can see them in the backup on another drive. As mentioned this has happened twice now so I don't think I'm dreaming.

I've attached 4 screenshots:
1) a screenshot of the top of my Folders pane showing the years in top level format 2004, 2005 etc up to 2017 when my phone images started to appear in subfolders at the top level. 
2) Next is a shot of the bottom of that pane (it's very long) showing the end of the 2017 subfolders, still at top level, and the greyed out 2018 folder from which the images mentioned earlier have disappeared.
3) A shot of the Finder path to where I normally store my images - I'm showing the top of the columns here - i.e. no 2018 
4) A shot showing the path to the images in my CCCloner backup - just about everything here is wrong - for a start, these are now in ED1 (not ED4 where they definitely were 2 nights ago).  Also, the 2018-03-05 (March 05) 21-33-29 folder in the 3rd column is the first one from the top that features a Lightroom folder - there are other oddities too.
I think I'm in some bother..


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## Johan Elzenga (Mar 24, 2018)

Well, the screenshots don't tell me how you got into this mess, but it's clear why Lightroom can't find the images. They are not where Lightroom thinks they should be. The folder hierarchy is not (exactly) the same, and they are not even on the disk that Lightroom thinks they are. At least that's what you tell me (you do not show the contents of that disk in a screenshot), but I find that hard to believe because you say this is a Carbon Copy Cloner backup. CCC makes copies of disks, so why would the original be any different from the copy?

Anyway, it's up to you where you want to store the originals, I will only explain how to 'reconnect' a missing folder in Lightroom with the real folder on a disk. That's easy to do. Right-click on the missing folder and choose 'Find Missing Folder' from the contextual menu. You will get a standard 'Open' dialog. Navigate to the current location of the folder and select it. Done, the folder is now 'reconnected'. The question mark will disappear and the images won't have an exclamation mark anymore.

If you do this with a missing parent folder, you will reconnect the entire subfolder hierarchy in one go (assuming you didn't change the hierarchy on the disk).


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## Loose Canon (Mar 31, 2018)

Hi Johan, apologies for slow response to your message. I have been very busy and unable to devote much time to the issue beyond some stolen late-night hours. I'm delighted to report that all is restored. The process was a bit of a nightmare and I can't say for sure what the issue was but was ultimately resolved through creation of a new catalog and a combination of reworking a bizarre folder arrangement in Finder and staying in touch with that through LR. I am a little spooked by the process since some of the conditions I encountered remain completely unexplained and were definitely not instigated by me. 

However, in any case all is not resolved and I am very grateful for your assistance, forbearance and time. Many thanks.


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