How Can I Easily Rotate Images In Finder

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Level 3

673 points

How Can I Easily Rotate Images In Finder

I am scanning several thousand slide images, and to save time reframing every slide, I am orienting ALL slides in landscape, regardless of if the image is actually landscape or portrait.

I currently scan 8 images at a time in each batch on an Epson 4990 in full Professional Mode, and then review the scans in Bridge, rotating the images as needed, opening in PSE6 and saving the images in the new orientation. This works fine, but, as I understand it, PSE6 recompresses the images on save, introducing slight degredation to the image.

What I am hoping is that there may be a small utility that can simply change the landscape/portrait property built into the image properties.

I have tried Xee to rotate the image, but it messes up the image, as well as I think it recompresses the image as well.

I don't want to bring the images into iPhoto as they are for a customer, not personal images.

Any help or suggestions on how to rotate an image, without recompressing the image, would be greatly appreciated.

TIA

Quad G5 2.5 GHz, 4 GB RAM, 1.5 TB HDD, Mac OS X (10.5.8), iLife '09, iWork '09, Final Cut Studio2, DROBO 6TB

Posted on Nov 30, 2011 7:36 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

Tomo 2

Level 3

560 points

Nov 30, 2011 7:59 PM in response to Gary Sumlak

Why don't you just rotate them in Apples default preview app? Doesn't that have lossless rotation?

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Answer 2

LarryHN

Level 10

106,110 points

Nov 30, 2011 8:02 PM in response to Gary Sumlak

The finder is a file manager and can not rotate photos

this is a user to user iPhoto support forum - iPhoto can rotate photos

Preview can rotate photos

Many applications can rotate photos - <a href="http://web.me.com/larryhn/iPhoto_08_(version_7.x.x)_FAQ/Graphic_programs.html"> click here for links to some to consider.</a>

I would think your Epson software could rotate them

Obviously PSE can rotate photos

Google is your friend

LN

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Answer 3

Gary Sumlak Author

Level 3

673 points

Dec 1, 2011 4:04 AM in response to Tomo 2

I tried Preview (OSX 10.5), but PSE 6 said the two images I rotated were not a format PS understands when I tried to make a contact sheet of the folder. However, when I opened the images in PSE 6 by double clicking in Bridge, the images DID open in PSE 6 for editing. After saving the images from within PSE 6, I was able to make a contact sheet with the problem images.

So, that tells me that Preview did something to the images when I rotated and saved them, that PSE 6 did not like.

Thanks, appreciated the reply.

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Answer 4

Gary Sumlak Author

Level 3

673 points

Dec 1, 2011 4:45 AM in response to LarryHN

The finder is a file manager and can not rotate photos

Yes, I am fully aware that finder does not rotate images. I was simply referring to Finder as means of managing images, where I can select the image I want to rotate, and launch a simple app that I could use to rotate the image.

this is a user to user iPhoto support forum - iPhoto can rotate photos

Since this is the only forum that deals specifically with images, I thought this would be the best place to find people with image manipulation experience.

I have been using iPhoto and Aperture for many years, and am all too familiar with their shortcomings.

Yes, it is true that iPhoto can rotate images, but then I would have to import thousands of images into iPhoto that I do not want to manage with iPhoto. Then I would have to export the rotated images to a folder so that I can deliver them to the customer. This is the same for Aperture and Lightroom. Not a very efficient method.

Many applications can rotate photos - click here for links to some to consider.

Thanks for the link. Seashore looks interesting.

I would think your Epson software could rotate them

The Epson scanning software will rotate the image, but only in Thumbnail mode, which, unfortunately, forces the scanning area to shrink, cropping about 10% of the image. There is nothing that can be done about this if you use Thumbnail mode. Also, in Thumbnail mode, the scanner is easily confused into cropping darker areas of an image.

So, ultimately, Thumbnail mode is not usable, nor disirable when scanning for a customer.

Ultimately, I am looking for a utility that will simply update/change the image property for orientation that will not recompress the image - pay for free.

I am hoping to glean some advice from a forum that deals with image manipulation, hopefully saving possibly hours of figuring out how to search for what I need - Google can be quite clueless if you don't give it the correct key words.. :-(

Thanks for the response though. It is greatly appreciated.

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Answer 5

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,350 points

Dec 1, 2011 5:18 AM in response to Gary Sumlak

Create a new empty library,

Import the images

Rotate them

Export them

Trash the Library.

Assuming the images require the same rotation then you can simply do them all at one go. If they don't then two will do it.

Regards

TD

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Answer 6

Oct 20, 2012 8:55 AM in response to Gary Sumlak

I know this is a bit of an old post but automator can do this:
http://www.macosxautomation.com/training/services/tut02/index.html

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Answer 7

LarryHN

Level 10

106,110 points

Oct 20, 2012 9:33 AM in response to Gary Sumlak

Yes, I am fully aware that finder does not rotate images. I was simply referring to Finder as means of managing images,

Then not sure whay you ask the question if you knew it was impossible

How Can I Easily Rotate Images In Finder

And note that the finder does not manage images - it only manages files - which is why it can not rotate images

I am hoping to glean some advice from a forum that deals with image manipulation, hopefully saving possibly hours of figuring out how to search for what I need

Thought that was what I posted - sorry if these five suggestions were not to your liking

The finder is a file manager and can not rotate photos

this is a user to user iPhoto support forum - 1 - iPhoto can rotate photos

2 - Preview can rotate photos

3 - Many applications can rotate photos - <a href="http://web.me.com/larryhn/iPhoto_08_(version_7.x.x)_FAQ/Graphic_programs.html"> click here for links to some to consider.</a>

4 - I would think your Epson software could rotate them

5 - Obviously PSE can rotate photos

Google is your friend

Like Google, asking the question you want the answer to is helpful here too.

LN

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Answer 8

Apr 27, 2013 1:38 AM in response to LarryHN

google on how to rotate images, you will find many useful an helpful image app. all can do well on image rotate to any angles you like.

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Answer 9

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,350 points

Apr 27, 2013 1:43 AM in response to waybetter

Why does your post have a link to a .NET sdk? Why not come right out and suggest this as a solution rather than sneaking it in there? Something to gain by it?

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Answer 10

Old Toad

Level 10

207,607 points

Apr 27, 2013 9:36 AM in response to Gary Sumlak

Download and use Xee to losslessly rotate, flip images. It's free.

OT

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Answer 11

Apr 27, 2013 9:42 AM in response to Gary Sumlak

Just use Automator it has a rotate image action.

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Answer 12

May 3, 2013 4:38 PM in response to Gary Sumlak

I use Picasa as my photo editor/viewer. It's free and user friendly. I wanted a lot of my pictures rotated in finder so they'd appear correct on my screensaver. You can easily go through Picasa and rotate them but you have to SAVE the changes by going to FILE and selecting SAVE or hitting COMMAND and "S". It's the easiest way I know to rotate mulitple pictures. I went throught and rotated the ones I wanted. Then went back and selected all (even the ones I did not rotate) and hit SAVE.

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Answer 13

Old Toad

Level 10

207,607 points

May 3, 2013 4:59 PM in response to Dromero101

Check the file size of one of the unrotated and rotated photos before and after doing your save. Curious to know if it gets any jpeg compression in the process.

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Answer 14

Sep 25, 2013 3:54 AM in response to Gary Sumlak

You can do this almost instantly for any number of images using Terminal.

1) Open terminal

2) Navigate to folder with images in

3) type this: sips -r 90 *.jpg (change *.jpg to fit your list)

There's lots more you can do with sips, including changing properties, resizing etc. See my blog post Mac Image Batch Processing using Terminal for some more detail.

Importantly, you can make this an option in your Finder context menu so right-clicking on file(s) brings up an option called rotate 90. Do this using automater to create a new Service that runs the shell command in step 3 in a 'for' loop taking files selected as an input.

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Answer 15

srdtf

Level 1

8 points

Jul 28, 2014 7:57 AM in response to Matt Mapleston

Thanks to Matt--your's is the sanest suggestion here, along with the other's comments saying the Mac's file explorer doesn't do this.

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