How to fix error "Photos cannot load adjustments for this image"

Thanks. This topic has been discussed quite a few times before.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250932769

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/251185547?page=1

No definitive solution has been identified, but one common cause seems to be that the original file has been lost within the library and so when you view the image in the library you are only seeing the thumbnail which is separately created. To see if this could be one of the problems you are experiencing, you could follow Leonie's advice in the thread above which involves downloading PowerPhotos. Once you have loaded your library you can right click on some of the problem photos and see if the original file can be located. If it can be located, you can try opening it in Finder to see if it opens OK; if Power Photos can't locate the file then you have found the cause.

A further suggestion, which is tedious, but worth a try - you could select all of your photos in the Photos.app and try exporting them all. Photos.app will then give you a list of all of the photos that can't be exported. You mentioned that you have a Time Machine backup, if you restore an old version of the library you can then search for the photos which couldn't be exported and then re-import them into your current library

Old Toad, Terence and Leonie are the technical experts on this forum and may be able to offer greater insight.

Just on Tony's point, restoring Time Machine from different dates may be your only way to recover lost photos. I had to do this recently due to losing thousands of edits.

However, it may not take as long as you think. By using Power Photos it will allow you to merge libraries based on rules that you select, so for example you could merge libraries from different dates and tell it that 'where duplicates are identified you want to keep the larger file' - this is quite easy to do in PowerPhotos - and so if an old version of the library has the full file and the newer library only has the thumbnail, it will keep the full file.

Repair Photos can cause more problems than it solves, so should certainly be used with caution.

60k photos is quite a sizeable library. There is no reason that the export function should cause any problems. I would suggest selecting 'Export unmodified photo' as under the new APFS file system, when it exports the photo it just creates a link to the original file rather than creating a new file and so it will be much quicker. However, rather than export all 60k in one go, you might want to create a few smart albums based on a date range of a year or so each. Maybe look to create 5 or 6 albums with 10k photos in each. This might also help you to identity whether the problem arose with photos from a specific date range?

Hi

Is the library on your system drive, or on an external drive?

Has anything been changed on your system that might have triggered the problems (eg MacOS upgrade), or moving the library.

Have you ever tried to edit the contents of the photo library using finder (or any other system/app other than the photos app itself - eg duplicate file finders are known to damage photos libraries)

One thing that might be worth trying, is to "revert edits to original" on one or more of the images to see if that solves the problem. (Select image - then image>revert to original)

Regarding time machine - it will take some time, but it might be worth restoring you library from different dates to see if you can pin point when it got damaged.

Ah yes, for some strange reason the error window will not allow you to copy its contents - I have just taken a screenshot in the past as well. I don't know if a log file is created and if so, where its stored - maybe one of the tech guys here would know?

Hi,

I also get this message occasionally, but often only when I try to move between photos too quickly. Are you getting the message on certain photos all of the time or does it randomly come up on a photo and the next time you view the photo its OK?

Are you using iCloud Photos? Can you view the edited photo OK on other devices?

"This is not with iCloud Photos but the desktop version of Photos"

The reason for asking this question was to see whether you had iCloud Photos enabled on Photos.app and, if so, whether you were able to view the affected photos on other devices and be able to zoom in on them.

Have the photos that are giving this error adjustments applied? Are the photos RAW files? Are the photos files that have been edited on an iPhone or iPad?

Whenever I am getting the "Cannot load adjustments" error, it usually helps to discard the adjustments and to use the common "Revert to original". It is generally not possible to add adjustment to previously edited photos enthuse cases:

• If the photos have been migrated from aperture or iPhoto with adjustments applied.
• If the photos are RAW photos, developed with an older version of the RAW support for the camera.
• If the photos have been edited on an iPhone or iPad with editing tools or effects, that are not (or no longer) available in MacOS

In all these cases it will help to revert the photo to the original version. (Image > Revert to Original)

You may also see the error message if the Photos Library has been damaged by a third party program for removing duplicates. Some "cleaning" applications, that manipulate the Photos Library directly, without using the programming interface of Photos, can damage a Photos Library beyond repair. Then you can only discard the library and restore an older version, that has not been damaged, from your backup.