Traveled on a photo shoot, and did some editing of the images on my laptop. Returned, and forgot about what I'd done so I imported the photos into my desktop LR and edited there. Now I have two catalogs in which I've worked on the same photos.
Is there some known function or method to "merging" these photo edits? I'm aware of how to import images from one catalog to another, but I've only done it before when the images did not exist on the other catalog. I've never had this particular problem before.
i don't think Lightroom can do it. if you have XMP files everywhere, i suspect there are programs that merge but what if you make conflicting changes? i think if you exported the catalog from your laptop and imported into the desktop in the first place, it would have brought everything in with edits in the first place. that's partly why i have my laptop with a subset of the same directory structure as my desktop.
Thanks, Herb. I don't use XMP files, LR keeps things only in its internal database. I also sync my computers (three desktops and two laptops) and they all have identical directory structures. What I normally would have done, and of course what I should have done, was to come back from the trip and import the traveling catalog into the main one. I've done that lots of times, and I can vouch for its proper functioning. All would have been well.
The problem is precisely that I didn't do that, and now I'm pretty sure that I did do work on both catalogs. I'm hoping to find a "merge" procedure that will save me from having to redo all those edits. If I can't find it, it's not the end of the world; but it's worth a shot to look for it.
if you worked only on RAW files, you can probably export all the XMP files from each catalog and then use some merge program. at least you will be able to detect which files were changed in each and what the changes are. i assume that they are not DNG files. if they are DNG then i don't think you can force XMP.
Ran a similar thread on Lightroom Forums and got a quick response. Simply import one catalog into the other, or both catalogs into a third, and LR will keep all your edits. If an image has been edited differently in both catalogs, LR will make two virtual copies of that image.
that part i didn't know. i seldom import catalogs and i always create XMP files just so i can continue editing on other machines when i move image files around.
Herb...
Rodolfo Paiz wrote:
If an image has been edited differently in both catalogs, LR will make two virtual copies of that image.
