lsupremo Loc: Palm Desert, CA

I confess I screwed up in the beginning when I mostly imported from downloaded images from an SD card and then to my Catalog system and now I have lots of duplicates everywhere. Is there any way to identify what Lightroom image data goes back to which original image ? I know I can identify the duplicates but I don’t know which one to delete.

CHG_CANON Loc: the Windy City

Hey lsupremo, your question, to me, exposed one of the weaker points in LR. Having somewhat encountered your issue, try some of these ideas and see if they are useful:

1) Work in the All Photographs catalog view, sort the images by shooting date (aka Capture time). This will show all the duplicates based on the capture timestamp of the image. The potential benefit / next step is:

1a) Stack all your images / duplicates. You may still need to assess individual images to determine who / which is the "master" or otherwise the current edit. But, stacking all the duplicates will be a first step forward finding the duplicates.

Caveats, the images need to reside in the same folder on disk. The file types can differ (a JPEG can stack to a TIFF). But, as mentioned, both that JPEG and TIFF need to be in the same folder.

1b) To perform the auto-stack, use the auto-stack by capture time and set the time between stacks to 0:00:00.

1 continued - duplicates are not the end of the world, particularly if you manage them in a stack. You only 'see' the image at the top of the stack when the stack is collapsed. This might be all the maintenance needed.

2) If stacking isn't an option or otherwise doesn't accomplish enough, consider looking at the images based on their folder on disk. Say you have IMAGE01.jpg both in folder-A and folder-B, can you determine which is the "master" version of IMAGE01.jpg from the folder location? Either from the folder name or the status of the image in the LR catalog? If yes, set to 'reject' the image that is not the keeper version. Use your 'x' key to set the Reject flag.

Why Reject? Leave yourself an opportunity to review issues later. You could have hundreds / thousands of duplicates, just set them to reject. You can filter later by reject status and delete them all at once, after may one last double-check if desired.

2 continued - you might find the 'same' images as different file types and in different folder locations. If you merge them into the same folder, you can stack with the idea of idea 1, above.

3) Missing images, say imported from your camera card and later from disk, would be candidates to reject & delete. From the Library Menu command, you can run a process that specifically Finds all Missing Files. This process compares the catalog entry to the files on disk, reporting at the end all the images that are not where they belong according to LR. You can update their locations to resolve the missing status. Or, you can use them as a first pass of images to reject-delete.

Once you know an image is missing, just ask to show in folder. Hopefully, the folder reference will let you know where the image might now exist. Or, let you know the missing image is a candidate for reject-delete.

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

When you find yourself with a pile of rejected images, don't delete them right away. Select them all and export them as a catalog. Then reject them (from the first catalog). That will remove them from your main catalog and save them all in another catalog for safety. You then have all the time in the world to go through them in detail.

If you find some that you don't really want rejected, select them all and export them to a third (temporary) catalog. You can then merge the temporary catalog with the main catalog. That will restore them (with all their edits) to your main catalog. You can then just delete the temporary catalog. That can be done outside of LR.

via the lens Loc: Northern California, near Yosemite NP

One thing you can do is look at the history, no history no data. Also, LR simply reads the file name. Try deleting one and seeing if LR simply picks up the next one if the file names are the same.

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

Rather than delete a file that you might want to restore, just change the name. Maybe add "a" to the end of the file name. That way it's a simple re-renaming to restore the file if that turns out not to be the file you want to delete.

via the lens Loc: Northern California, near Yosemite NP

And you can always pick up the delete file from the trash, if needed. Or, you can simply unlink the file from LR without deleting it. Lots of different options to try out.

jaymatt Loc: Alexandria, Indiana

Don’t feel all alone. I did that once, and it took me forever to get it corrected.

maryo Loc: Santa fe

I have lightroom classic cc and can't find the All Photographs catalog view. How do you get there? thanks

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

In the library view (press "g" for the grid view) look on the left side of the window. There should be a menu that includes "navigator", "catalog", "folders", "collections".....
Click on the arrow next to "catalog". That should show you "all photographs", "all synced photographs", "quick collection", "previous import".....
Click on "all photographs". That should show you all the photographs in the middle panel.

Also, at the top of the middle panel is a menu for filtering the library view. You can select "text" to find a particular text string in a file name or keyword or other metadata, or you can select "attribute" to select on flags, star ratings or color labels, or you can select "metadata" to select on dates, ISO, shutter speed, aperture, lots of other parameters. You can select combinations of texts, attributes, or metadata to narrow down a search.

maryo Loc: Santa fe

I can't believe i missed it! I did not have catalog checked. I hate learning something new. Thank you so much.

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

Hey, learning is fun.

Just wait until you get to my age. You can learn something new every day, even if you knew it yesterday.

GregoryF Loc: Bella Vista, AR

LOL I am right there with you!

JD750 Loc: SoCal

I resemble that remark.

Good thing I like learning!

lsupremo Loc: Palm Desert, CA

NOW, after a whole bunch of trying this and that, I seem to have got there, THANKS your great response it really helped a lot