A necessary data reference could not be resolved

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Level 1

70 points

A necessary data reference could not be resolved

I have some videos taken with my iPhone 4 (ATT model) which I downloaded into iPhoto. I KNOW I have successfully played them from iPhoto before - one I think as recently as the last week. But most of them, when I try to play them, give this message:

A necessary data reference could not be resolved.

One I made almost two weeks ago still works. But every one I've tried that was made prior to December 12th does not (I do have two from December 12 - one works and one doesn't. I think they are the same thing but at some point I made a copy with some adjustments I don't recall).

Another weird thing:

There was one in particular I wanted to get into iTunes. Trying different things, I tried loading it into Quicktime - and that worked. I then saved out a copy from QT which I then imported into iTunes.

But when I tried that again, almost none of the movies I tried to select would let me do it! Trying to import via iTunes has the same problem.

So, what the heck is going on and how can I get things working again?

Macbook, Mac OS X (10.6.2), http://picturehawaii.blogspot.com/2010_09_01_archive.html

Posted on Mar 2, 2011 11:08 PM

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Answer 1

dbk9999 Author

Level 1

70 points

Mar 4, 2011 7:11 PM in response to dbk9999

Anybody with experience with this?

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Answer 2

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,308 points

Mar 5, 2011 12:36 AM in response to dbk9999

Select one of the affected videos in the iPhoto Window and go File -> Reveal in Finder -> Original. A Finder Window should open with the file selected. Does it?

Regards

TD

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Answer 3

dbk9999 Author

Level 1

70 points

Mar 5, 2011 2:05 PM in response to Yer_Man

The file wasn't selected, but it was on the list and, at least with one I tried, I could open it in Quicktime.

I assume (I don't have time to test at the moment) I could then save it and have iPhoto import the new copy but that has two possible issues: Will the copy be exact or lose quality like jpeg photos do? And, of course, kind of a pain to have to do that with each movie! Especially since, for all I know, it could periodically happen again with the copies or just with new videos.

But this is progress! Thanks.

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Answer 4

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,308 points

Mar 5, 2011 2:47 PM in response to dbk9999

The file wasn't selected...

That's not good, it means that iPhoto has lost the file. Can you try a few others?

Regards

TD

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Answer 5

dbk9999 Author

Level 1

70 points

Mar 5, 2011 3:29 PM in response to Yer_Man

Okay, just tried some others and this is just weird.

First, the one I found before turned out to be one I had successfully been able to make a copy of before - the copy shows in the finder, with the original. Both play in QT. But only the original shows in iPhoto. I assume that is because while the copy is in the same folder, I never "imported" it into iPhoto. Also, while the original shows up, it isn't selected automatically.

Tried four others and while the finder shows up, these are not listed at all!

I then tried selecting some of these that don't show in finder and chose "export". The export dialogue shows that it would just be exporting a jpeg, not a movie!

So, I have movies from my iphone 4 that work, some that don't work, some of those that don't work which will it least show up in the finder (via iphoto) and run from there, and some that won't show up that way at all.

Also, I noted that at least one of those which does show up and play from the finder has a slightly different name. Not sure if that is actually a problem. I may have renamed it in iPhoto - seems to me I've seen cases before where the name iPhoto gives is not necessarily what the finder shows unless you rename it there or something.

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Answer 6

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,308 points

Mar 5, 2011 3:47 PM in response to dbk9999

Download iPhoto Library Manager and use its rebuild function. This will create a new library based on data in the albumdata.xml file. Not everything will be brought over - no slideshows, books or calendars, for instance - but it should get all your albums and keywords back.

Because this process creates an entirely new library and leaves your old one untouched, it is non-destructive, and if you're not happy with the results you can simply return to your old one.

Regards

TD

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Answer 7

dbk9999 Author

Level 1

70 points

Mar 6, 2011 4:22 PM in response to Yer_Man

I took it to the Genius bar today. One of the things they did was try to rebuild the library. But he also said, based on a couple other things we saw, that there could be another problem. Ended up leaving it for a more thorough check/repair.

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Answer 8

Nov 18, 2011 3:22 PM in response to dbk9999

Terence,

I'm having the same problem, I have backed my videos up (lucky me) but why does this happen?

Tont Dwyer

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