Help.....I deleted images by mistake

[BradSmith]

I've just discovered that 4 months ago, I mistakenly deleted a 100 Gb folder of images from LR AND my SSD where I keep all my RAW files.   But I have the RAWS in a time machine backup from just before I deleted them, so I've recovered the RAW files to my SSD.   Got em, but not the edits.     In the same time machine backup from 4 months ago just before the deletion, I also have my LR Catalog from before the deletion, so I guess my edits to the 100 Gb images would be recoverable from that LR catalog in time machine.   But......in the past 4 months, I've shot and added a couple thousand new images to LR and spent a lot of time editing them in LR.
 
I want to get the 100 Gb of images back into LR with all edits intact.  I want to NOT lose all the edits I've done to the new images since my screw up.   

How can I go about doing this?
thanks,
Brad

[digitaldog]

Open the OLD catalog and relink, if necessary, the raws that went missing. Do you see the edits now?
Select them only, use the Export as Catalog command.
Go to the new catalog (where they were missing), use the Import as Catalog.
If all goes well, you'll be back in business but no guarantees.

Consider that if these were DNGs, all the edits (and more) would be embedded into the DNG container.

[David Eckels]

Consider that if these were DNGs, all the edits (and more) would be embedded into the DNG container.

A MAJOR reason to use DNGs

[fdisilvestro]

If you just deleted / restored the raw files and nothing changed in the catalogue, then you don't need to do anything else after restoring the raw, unless you restored in a different location, which you can solve from inside LR.

[fdisilvestro]

One more thing, you shouldn't even need to re-import the images, just open LR and your images should be fine with the edits. If you restore to a different location then the images will appear as "missing" and you can solve it by searching the new locations within Lightroom

[digitaldog]

If you just deleted / restored the raw files and nothing changed in the catalogue, then you don't need to do anything else after restoring the raw, unless you restored in a different location, which you can solve from inside LR.

He says he deleted them in LR. At least that's how I read it. If so, no more edits or any trace of those raws:

I mistakenly deleted a 100 Gb folder of images from LR AND my SSD

So Brad, exactly how did you delete the images?

[fdisilvestro]

He says he deleted them in LR. At least that's how I read it. If so, no more edits or any trace of those raws:So Brad, exactly how did you delete the images?

Yes, if he deleted the images from inside LR, he needs to follow your procedure.

[BradSmith]

Andrew,
I deleted them from LR, so they were gone from my current catalog and the RAWS were gone from my Photo storage location.  I'll follow your suggestions below and report back....it makes sense to me.
Brad

from Andrew:  "Open the OLD catalog and relink, if necessary, the raws that went missing. Do you see the edits now?
Select them only, use the Export as Catalog command.
Go to the new catalog (where they were missing), use the Import as Catalog.
If all goes well, you'll be back in business but no guarantees.

[BradSmith]

I've never had to deal with Catalog manipulations before, so I have a further question about the recovery from my time machine backup.....I see three separate Catalog items from LR Catalog folder from the date of the time machine backup I'm using........
.lrcat
.lrcat-data
Previews.lrdata

Should I recover all of them or just the  .lrcat   file?

thanks, Brad

[digitaldog]

I've never had to deal with Catalog manipulations before, so I have a further question about the recovery from my time machine backup.....I see three separate Catalog items from LR Catalog folder from the date of the time machine backup I'm using........
.lrcat
.lrcat-data
Previews.lrdata

Should I recover all of them or just the  .lrcat   file?

thanks, Brad

The key is both of the lrcat files. You can rebuild the previews if necessary. Try recovering all three sure, but the .lrcat files are the critical documents:

https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom-classic/kb/catalog-faq-lightroom.html

[BradSmith]

Andrew
I recovered all 3 and your suggested procedure worked.
Thanks so much for saving me hours and hours of re-editing.
Brad