# Lost thumbnails and images, only in All Photographs



## Harmany (Dec 29, 2009)

Hi all
here is a wierd problem. At least to me. I upgraded to 2.6, do not know if i had this problem befroe, but do not think so. Did some reorganizing, then went to the All photographs to correct some keyword metadata that did not import right the firt time (old problem, jsut addressing it now). 

All looks great when i go to each hard drive where the photos are stored, i can see all the thumbnails, can access the photos for developing, etc. But in the all photograph section at the top or the library, for most of last eyar's photos i see every other or every third thuimbnail. Sometimes a conisistant pattern, see 2, miss 2, other folders have an inconsistant pattern.

if i click on the ? at the top right (in All Photogrpahs), it will ask if i want to find the photo, gives me its previous location. i go to that hard drive (bottom portion of the library) and click on that folder and that photo, i see all photos from that day and see that one, and it is normal. The one that was "found" by clicking on the ? will not be seen or allowed to reimport. If i drag it to that disc, it is already in the folder. But i still canot see it in the ALL Photographs section.

is my file corrupt? I have optimized it, backed it up, verified it, etc. Turned computer on, off multiple times. OS Snow Leopard, very new Macbook pro, lots RAM, HD space etc. 

Any help would be appreciated, applogize for the spelling, this site does not have spell check and i think i am dyslexic, cannot type.

Joyce


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## Denis Pagé (Jan 12, 2010)

Joyce, what if you select a bunch of those in Grid and in Menu -&gt; Library -&gt; -Previews... -&gt; Render Standard-Sized Previews?

Seem not only your previews got lost but your inquiry too!


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## Kiwigeoff (Jan 12, 2010)

Joyce, I'm wondering if somehow there may be more than one copy of some files in the catalog.I would look at Synchronising a folder and see it that works when you see the files from that folder in All Photos. If so work through Synchronising all your folders.


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## Victoria Bampton (Jan 13, 2010)

Hey, be a bit careful recommending synchronizing without specifying Geoff. I've heard of way too many people who allowed it to delete and reimport files and losing all their settings in the process.


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## Denis Pagé (Jan 13, 2010)

[quote author=Victoria Bampton link=topic=8759.msg59961#msg59961 date=1263419628]
Hey, be a bit careful recommending synchronizing without specifying Geoff. I've heard of way too many people who allowed it to delete and reimport files and losing all their settings in the process.
[/quote]

Agreed!

I am myself very wary in its use and only try that after a proper backup. Sh*t happens as they say.


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## jimtron (Apr 25, 2010)

I'm having this problem as well. Clicking on "all photographs" shows no images. In the filmstrip I see empty gray placeholders where the images should be. I tried rendering previews to no avail. I can view and access the images perfectly fine every other way--clicking on collections, hard drives and hd sub-folders, Quick Collection, and Previous Import. But nothing under "all photographs." Also just tried synchronizing my most recent folder. I've used command-L to make sure library filters are off. 

I've tried optimizing the catalog and deleting prefs. Using 2.7. Anyone else experiencing this?

eta: I just noticed that I can see filtered photos via All Photographs. IOW, if I highlight All Photographs with no filters, I see no images. If I add a text filter, images with that text do show.


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## Victoria Bampton (Apr 26, 2010)

Jim, do you see the cells where the photos should be? What if you leave All Photographs and go look in the individual folders instead? And what if you go to All Photographs and press Cmd-L to disable all filters?

Oh hang on, I've just spotted the beta in your profile - is this a catalog upgraded from beta 1 to beta 2 Jim?


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## jimtron (Apr 26, 2010)

Hi Victoria:

This is with 2.6--not a beta version. I do see cells in the filmstrip--gray boxes. In the main window I don't see anything. I can view and access the images perfectly fine every other way--clicking on collections, hard drives and hd sub-folders, Quick Collection, and Previous Import. I tried command-L to turn off all filters--no dice.


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## Victoria Bampton (Apr 26, 2010)

That's quite bizarre!

Ok, I'd try 2 things:

1. Close LR, find the catalog, move the *.lrdata file somewhere else, and restart LR. It'd have to rebuild previews, but I'd hope that'd work. If it doesn't...
2. Select all &gt; Export as Catalog (no previews, no negatives) and then open that exported catalog. If that works, remove the old catalog (perhaps put it with your backups and move that exported catalog to become your working catalog.


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## jimtron (Apr 26, 2010)

Victoria:

I tried 1 with no luck. Then I tried 2, and the export started, but after a while I got an error saying "could not export" or something similar. By the way, I have over 26',''' images--is this size an issue?


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## Victoria Bampton (Apr 26, 2010)

Size shouldn't be an issue, but that "could not export" is worth investigating. Try number 2 again, but export to a few different chunks... we can merge them back together if we can get it to work.


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## jimtron (Apr 28, 2010)

OK, I'm working on exporting as catalog in chunks. My photos from the LR catalog in question are on 5 different drive, so I'll do 5 exports by selecting each drive and exporting as catalog. I'll report back. Is there a way to export my collections--or will that happen automatically after exporting images that are in collections?


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## Victoria Bampton (Apr 28, 2010)

Collections should go automatically with the catalogs, and I'm pretty sure they'll merge back together when we merge the catalogs later. But obviously don't delete the big catalog yet!


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## jimtron (Apr 28, 2010)

eta2: I guess I spoke too soon--once the import finished the previews showed up, even when I click "all photographs." So far so good--it appears that this should solve the problem, but I'll update the thread once I get everything imported.

OK, thanks. I exported everything, and just created a brand new catalog. I'm importing the first hard drive (which I exported as a catalog), and there are no previews showing. I know the building standard previews comes later, but as I recall you should see some kind of preview image as things are importing. I'm jsut getting gray boxes in the filmstrip and in the main window, but with the filenames of the files. And some are vertical, others horizontal. I'll report back when the first import is finished, but this seems strange...

eta: the hard drive corresponding to the catalog I'm importing now is external but it is connected while I'm importing.


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## jimtron (May 1, 2010)

OK, follow up: everything's working fine after following suggestion #2 from Victoria (several posts up). I've got a new catalog working well, and I can see my pictures when "all photographs" is selected. Thanks Victoria!


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## Victoria Bampton (May 1, 2010)

Brilliant news Jim, thanks for the update!


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## jimtron (May 2, 2010)

I am still missing quite a few thumbnails (although the initial "all photographs" problem is solved). I've tried using "render standard previews" but its going very slowly. Is there a way to render thumbnails only?


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## Victoria Bampton (May 2, 2010)

Only scrolling through them Jim. Why not just leave it rendering overnight?


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## jimtron (May 2, 2010)

[quote author=Victoria Bampton link=topic=8759.msg65838#msg65838 date=127283'423]
Only scrolling through them Jim. Why not just leave it rendering overnight?
[/quote]

Actually I did that last night with one of my external drives, but only 16'' or so got done out of over 2','''. I have internal drives and FW drives, but this particular one is USB.


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## Victoria Bampton (May 2, 2010)

Seriously? 16''? All night? Is that drive running as USB 1.1 instead of USB 2.' or something? That's incredibly slow.


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## jimtron (May 2, 2010)

[quote author=Victoria Bampton link=topic=8759.msg6584'#msg6584' date=1272833248]
Seriously? 16''? All night? Is that drive running as USB 1.1 instead of USB 2.' or something? That's incredibly slow.
[/quote]

I thought so too. USB 2. I'm wondering if I have a bigger problem. Now I'm getting repeated freezes when rendering previews from an external FW8'' drive. Also, I get common freezes or crashes when exporting or uploading Web galleries (I started another thread here on that). I wonder if I should reinstall LR? Now I'm working with the new catalog that I made per your suggestions, but things still seem sketchy. 

I have recently run Techtool Pro on my startup drive, and use Diskwarrior on my external drives. Also repair disk permissions regularly. And I have optimized the LR catalog a couple times.


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## Brad Snyder (May 3, 2010)

For me, I've seen repeatably sketchy Lr behavior twice, and both times it was the very first symptom of a hard-drive dying. How confident are you with the external drive?


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## jimtron (May 3, 2010)

[quote author=Brad Snyder link=topic=8759.msg65846#msg65846 date=1272843189]
For me, I've seen repeatably sketchy Lr behavior twice, and both times it was the very first symptom of a hard-drive dying. How confident are you with the external drive?


[/quote]

I guess it could be dying, but it's not too old, and has not shown any signs of dying (other than what I've described here). It appeared fine when I recently ran DiskWarrior on it. Also, I'm using LR with 5 different drives, and the issues are not just with one drive. Any suggestions on how to determine if it's dying?


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## sizzlingbadger (May 3, 2010)

I had some problems like this and found removing the Previews.lrdata file while LR is shutdown fixed the issues. LR will rebuild the previews when you restart it.


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## jimtron (May 3, 2010)

[quote author=sizzlingbadger link=topic=8759.msg65858#msg65858 date=1272853631]
I had some problems like this and found removing the Previews.lrdata file while LR is shutdown fixed the issues. LR will rebuild the previews when you restart it.
[/quote]

Thanks for the response. I did try this--it was suggested earlier in the thread. It didn't solve the "all photographs" problem, but maybe it will solve other issues.


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## Harmany (Dec 29, 2009)

Hi all
here is a wierd problem. At least to me. I upgraded to 2.6, do not know if i had this problem befroe, but do not think so. Did some reorganizing, then went to the All photographs to correct some keyword metadata that did not import right the firt time (old problem, jsut addressing it now). 

All looks great when i go to each hard drive where the photos are stored, i can see all the thumbnails, can access the photos for developing, etc. But in the all photograph section at the top or the library, for most of last eyar's photos i see every other or every third thuimbnail. Sometimes a conisistant pattern, see 2, miss 2, other folders have an inconsistant pattern.

if i click on the ? at the top right (in All Photogrpahs), it will ask if i want to find the photo, gives me its previous location. i go to that hard drive (bottom portion of the library) and click on that folder and that photo, i see all photos from that day and see that one, and it is normal. The one that was "found" by clicking on the ? will not be seen or allowed to reimport. If i drag it to that disc, it is already in the folder. But i still canot see it in the ALL Photographs section.

is my file corrupt? I have optimized it, backed it up, verified it, etc. Turned computer on, off multiple times. OS Snow Leopard, very new Macbook pro, lots RAM, HD space etc. 

Any help would be appreciated, applogize for the spelling, this site does not have spell check and i think i am dyslexic, cannot type.

Joyce


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## Victoria Bampton (May 3, 2010)

I'm going to go back a stage and suggest there may still be something weird going on with that catalog. 

Once you'd finished importing all of the data, do you do an export as catalog with the whole lot to transfer it, hopefully without the rubbish, into a new catalog? If not, I'd do that now.

Also, have you run an Optimize Catalog on that new catalog yet?


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## jimtron (May 3, 2010)

[quote author=Victoria Bampton link=topic=8759.msg65869#msg65869 date=1272872594]
I'm going to go back a stage and suggest there may still be something weird going on with that catalog. 

Once you'd finished importing all of the data, do you do an export as catalog with the whole lot to transfer it, hopefully without the rubbish, into a new catalog? If not, I'd do that now.

Also, have you run an Optimize Catalog on that new catalog yet?
[/quote]

I have optimized the catalog, a couple times. I can export the whole catalog, if you think that might help. To recap what I've done so far:

- from the old catalog, I exported all images as catalogs (in chunks)
- created a new catalog, and imported all of the catalogs


Should I export the entire new catalog, and then import it into a new catalog?


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## Victoria Bampton (May 3, 2010)

Just try doing an export of the entire catalog and open that. No need to import it into another catalog, as the export itself will be creating the catalog. The only reason I'm suggesting that is the export as catalog clears out some junk, which import from catalog doesn't.


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## jimtron (May 4, 2010)

Export as catalog without previews, I presume?


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## sizzlingbadger (May 4, 2010)

that will be fine, previews can be re-built.


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## Victoria Bampton (May 4, 2010)

[quote author=jimtron link=topic=8759.msg65941#msg65941 date=127293'946]
Export as catalog without previews, I presume?
[/quote]

With or without, doesn't matter.


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## jimtron (May 6, 2010)

OK, I'm making some progress here. I've been having trouble building previews from my external drives, via external USB and FW8''. This has been consistently resulting in slow preview builds, and then usually LR crashes. So I tried temporarily installing my drives inside my MacPro, and that's working like a charm. 

I was experiencing more LR crashes when building and uploading Web galleries, even with local source files, although I realized I did have an external drive connected (even though I wasn't getting files from it for the Web gallery). I tried disconnecting the ext drive and was able to successfully build and upload a couple galleries. So the culprit must be my FW/USB ports in the MacPro, and/or my external drive, which actually isn't really an external drive exactly--it's a Newertech drive dock that I use with a handful of internal SATA drives to access photo files and also video. An interesting thing is that I haven't noticed any trouble with the docked drives and video editing with FCP. Oh, and I tried swapping out the FW8'' cable in case that was the culprit. 

Another thing, I realize I have many recent logs of LR crashing via Console (also been letting my Mac send reports to Apple). I don't know how to decipher the crash logs, anyone know how I can get help with that? Fortunately my MacPro is currently covered under Applecare, which is great news, but OTOH I'd hate to bring it in and be without it for a few days or more if there isn't really a hardware problem. I've run Techtool Pro and nothing shows up.


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## sizzlingbadger (May 6, 2010)

try un-plugging one drive at a time and test. I had a bad FW8'' enclosure and it hung OSX and crashed LR several times before it finally died. The disk inside was fine so a new enclosure fixed it.


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## jimtron (May 6, 2010)

[quote author=sizzlingbadger link=topic=8759.msg66'85#msg66'85 date=12731277'4]
try un-plugging one drive at a time and test. I had a bad FW8'' enclosure and it hung OSX and crashed LR several times before it finally died. The disk inside was fine so a new enclosure fixed it.
[/quote]

I've had the problem with at least 3 different discs, using both the Newertech dock and a USB/Sata adapter. All the discs are working fine when I install them inside my computer.


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## jimtron (May 6, 2010)

update: I pulled the drive out to see if it wasn't seated properly, and noticed there was a jumper in place limiting the data transfer rate to 1.5gbps instead of 3...removed it and am trying again...don't know how much of a difference that will make...

update 2: ok, I keep getting spinning beach ball hangs after scanning once the "rendering standard previews" begins. 

Oh jeez, not out of the woods yet. OK, so I've made a new catalog which is working fine, and I've been building previews of offline images by temporarily installing the discs that house them inside my MacPro--thinking that something with my external disc connections was faulty. This worked great for 3 discs, but as I began rebuilding previews with another disc, LR crashed. I ran DiskWarrior on the disc, which showed no problems. Repaired startup disk permissions. Optimized the LR catalog, and tried again--sure enough, LR keeps hanging when I try to build the previews from this one particular disc. I tried opening a different LR catalog to see if I could build the previews from the disc, and LR hung up again. 

Now I can't launch my new catalog at all--even when I have the disc in question unmounted. The catalog launches but the LR splashscreen won't go away, and nothing is functional. So I'm confused...


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## jimtron (May 7, 2010)

I moved all the photos off the drive that kept crashing LR, onto a brand new drive, which is installed inside my MacPro. Still crashes LR when I try to rebuild previews. I just posted over here as well: http://forums.adobe.com/thread/633873


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## jimtron (May 17, 2010)

Update: I spent a great deal of time creating a new catalog and rebuilding previews. The "all photographs" problem had gone away, although I was still having problems with freezing. Now the "all photographs" problem is back. If I select "all photographs" and turn filters off, I have no previews. I do see previews if I apply a filter (such as flagged). 

I opened a case with Apple to make sure my hardware and OS are fine. So far no problems are showing up. 

This is really frustrating, as I make my living as a photographer and I LR is a major part of my workflow. I would greatly appreciate hearing any suggestions. 

Over at the Adobe LR forum I started a thread as well. It seems that folks over there are having trouble with 2.7 that goes away when they downgrade to 2.6. I tried that to no avail. 

Help please!

eta: I've got crash logs if that helps...

Here are 2 threads at Adobe I started: http://forums.adobe.com/thread/64''19?tstart=' http://forums.adobe.com/thread/633873?tstart='


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## Victoria Bampton (May 17, 2010)

Jim, I'm getting lost and I'm really short on time at the moment. Would you mind just summarizing exactly what happens, and what you've tried so far?


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## jimtron (May 17, 2010)

[quote author=Victoria Bampton link=topic=8759.msg66623#msg66623 date=1274'86898]
Jim, I'm getting lost and I'm really short on time at the moment. Would you mind just summarizing exactly what happens, and what you've tried so far?
[/quote]

When I click on "all photographs" without a filter I see no previews. I can see previews/thumbnails when I apply a filter (say, flagged) or click on folders. I tried removing the .lrdata file and optimizing the catalog. Then I created a new catalog, and imported my images from the old catalog (I had exported the images to catalogs). Now I'm having the same problem with the new catalog.


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## Victoria Bampton (May 18, 2010)

Very good summary, thanks Jim. Do I guess the question is, is it specific to your computer, or specific to that problem catalog.

If you import a few photos into a clean brand new catalog, do you see the same thing?

And if you go back through opening your backup catalogs, do you see a time when it started happening?


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## jimtron (May 18, 2010)

[quote author=Victoria Bampton link=topic=8759.msg66654#msg66654 date=1274162395]
Very good summary, thanks Jim. Do I guess the question is, is it specific to your computer, or specific to that problem catalog.

If you import a few photos into a clean brand new catalog, do you see the same thing?

And if you go back through opening your backup catalogs, do you see a time when it started happening?
[/quote]

I created a new catalog. My main catalog is huge, so I had exported the photos in several chunks (export as catalog). As I imported the chunks, everything was working fine (I could see thumbs when clicking on "all photographs"). But once I got all photos re-imported, the problem came back. I tried opening the catalog on my brand new MB Pro and the problem is happening there as well. 

Regarding backup catalogs, I don't think I have more than one, which also has the problem. Should I have more than one backup cat?


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## Brad Snyder (May 19, 2010)

[quote author=jimtron link=topic=8759.msg6667'#msg6667' date=12742'3693]

Regarding backup catalogs, I don't think I have more than one, which also has the problem. Should I have more than one backup cat? 
[/quote]

It's worth considering a tier of backup catalogs, for exactly the reason you've encountered. Undetected corruption/errors being progagated out of sight.


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## jimtron (May 19, 2010)

[quote author=Brad Snyder link=topic=8759.msg66688#msg66688 date=1274231138]
[quote author=jimtron link=topic=8759.msg6667'#msg6667' date=12742'3693]

Regarding backup catalogs, I don't think I have more than one, which also has the problem. Should I have more than one backup cat? 
[/quote]

It's worth considering a tier of backup catalogs, for exactly the reason you've encountered. Undetected corruption/errors being progagated out of sight.
[/quote]

Thanks for the suggestion. Is there a preference for that, or if not, how do you suggest setting it up?


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## Brad Snyder (May 19, 2010)

If using Lr to backup the catalog, it will automatically save every backup you make in dated subfolders. You have to expressly delete them, using the OS, to make them go away. I generally keep the last 5 or so. 

It's also worthwhile to navigate to a backup catalog *.lrcat file, with Finder/Explorer and double-click it. Lr will open the backup catalog, and you can randomly navigate a sample of your photos to look for problems. Not scientific, but a bit of extra quality control. *Note that if you have Lr set to open the 'Most Recently Used' catalog, to be careful that you don't accidentally re-open the backup catalog when restarting Lr for real work.* That particular mistake leads to endless confusion, and very long threads here on the forum.


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## Victoria Bampton (May 19, 2010)

[quote author=jimtron link=topic=8759.msg6667'#msg6667' date=12742'3693]As I imported the chunks, everything was working fine (I could see thumbs when clicking on "all photographs"). But once I got all photos re-imported, the problem came back. I tried opening the catalog on my brand new MB Pro and the problem is happening there as well. 
[/quote]

Ok, that would suggest a glitch in that specific catalog. There's some bit of corruption or misplaced data somewhere there. Remind me, when you built that new catalog, it was without previews, which you've since rebuilt, or were the current previews previously with the old catalog?

If I were fixing it, I'd import into a new catalog in smaller chunks and at the stage when it started going wrong, I'd take a backwards step and exclude that chunk, as it sounds like the problem is limited to a small chunk of the catalog, and probably a very recent bit. Dan Tull might be up for having a look, but I'd guess he'll probably be rushed off his feet until LR3's out the door.


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## jimtron (May 19, 2010)

Yes, I exported and imported without previews, and then built the previews. I'll try again and slow down as I'm importing so I can pin down the problem. Do you have an inkling of what kind of corruption this could be? Corrupt image file? Something else?


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## Brad Snyder (May 19, 2010)

The bulk of the 'miscellaneous weirdness' problems that I've encountered derive from either corrupt image(s) or malformed/corrupt Develop Preset(s). With the corrupt image file being more likely. Seems like Lr should be able to trap those, but apparently some stuff is still slipping thru.


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## jimtron (May 19, 2010)

[quote author=Brad Snyder link=topic=8759.msg66732#msg66732 date=1274294542]
The bulk of the 'miscellaneous weirdness' problems that I've encountered derive from either corrupt image(s) or malformed/corrupt Develop Preset(s). With the corrupt image file being more likely. Seems like Lr should be able to trap those, but apparently some stuff is still slipping thru. 
[/quote]

Is there any tool that will scan image files and find corrupt ones?


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## Victoria Bampton (May 19, 2010)

Ok, it's got to be some misplaced bit of data in the catalog, rather than a preview problem specifically then. You said it was ok at some stages of imports and then went weird again once you imported a certain part?

If you want to make it really methodical, to find which bit contains the problem, without having to start again from scratch when you do find it, set it to backup each time LR starts, and close and reopen LR between imports to trigger the backup. That way, when you do find it starts behaving weirdly, you can just go back to the previous backup and carry on from there, skipping the folders that made it go 'weird'.


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## jimtron (May 20, 2010)

[quote author=Victoria Bampton link=topic=8759.msg66742#msg66742 date=12743'5'39]
Ok, it's got to be some misplaced bit of data in the catalog, rather than a preview problem specifically then. You said it was ok at some stages of imports and then went weird again once you imported a certain part?

If you want to make it really methodical, to find which bit contains the problem, without having to start again from scratch when you do find it, set it to backup each time LR starts, and close and reopen LR between imports to trigger the backup. That way, when you do find it starts behaving weirdly, you can just go back to the previous backup and carry on from there, skipping the folders that made it go 'weird'.
[/quote]

I'll give that a try, thanks.


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## Harmany (Dec 29, 2009)

Hi all
here is a wierd problem. At least to me. I upgraded to 2.6, do not know if i had this problem befroe, but do not think so. Did some reorganizing, then went to the All photographs to correct some keyword metadata that did not import right the firt time (old problem, jsut addressing it now). 

All looks great when i go to each hard drive where the photos are stored, i can see all the thumbnails, can access the photos for developing, etc. But in the all photograph section at the top or the library, for most of last eyar's photos i see every other or every third thuimbnail. Sometimes a conisistant pattern, see 2, miss 2, other folders have an inconsistant pattern.

if i click on the ? at the top right (in All Photogrpahs), it will ask if i want to find the photo, gives me its previous location. i go to that hard drive (bottom portion of the library) and click on that folder and that photo, i see all photos from that day and see that one, and it is normal. The one that was "found" by clicking on the ? will not be seen or allowed to reimport. If i drag it to that disc, it is already in the folder. But i still canot see it in the ALL Photographs section.

is my file corrupt? I have optimized it, backed it up, verified it, etc. Turned computer on, off multiple times. OS Snow Leopard, very new Macbook pro, lots RAM, HD space etc. 

Any help would be appreciated, applogize for the spelling, this site does not have spell check and i think i am dyslexic, cannot type.

Joyce


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## Brad Snyder (May 20, 2010)

[quote author=jimtron link=topic=8759.msg66733#msg66733 date=1274294711]
[quote author=Brad Snyder link=topic=8759.msg66732#msg66732 date=1274294542]
The bulk of the 'miscellaneous weirdness' problems that I've encountered derive from either corrupt image(s) or malformed/corrupt Develop Preset(s). With the corrupt image file being more likely. Seems like Lr should be able to trap those, but apparently some stuff is still slipping thru. 
[/quote]

Is there any tool that will scan image files and find corrupt ones?
[/quote]

Not that I know of, I was thinking along the same lines as Victoria. Import in chunks, 'till the problem shows, then backup a step. That's worked a couple of times for me.


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