iphoto imports upright photos as black

I have the same issue.

Upright (portrait) photos taken with iPhone 4S appear black once imported into in iPhoto even though "Original Files" are fine. If I edit/rotate them, this "rotation fix" works (as as far as I've tried) and the black thumbnails are replaced with the actual image.

Those taken with iPad and my Canon DSLR are OK, so - for me - this is just an iPhone 4S issue.

An added frustration is that when iPhoto pulls in my Photo Stream the same black thumbnail issue is there too and I can't use the rotation fix on those! When I view the Photo Stream on another device (iPad, iPhone) there is no issue (ie. I see the expected images rather than black thumbnails).

Canon Powershot SX130. Any that I held the camera sideways for come up as black. If I rotate the photo, then revert to original, the photo looks fine.

Occasionally, the photo will import as being corrupt (no image data at all, shows up as just a dotted outline). Had one this morning where the photo was fine on the camera, imported it, and the photo was corrupt in the iphoto library. Umount the camera, then look at the photo on the camera, and the camera then reported it as being corrupt (even though it was perfectly fine before touching it in iPhoto).

Had the same issue, point and shoot Panasonic had no issues but my Canon Rebel XS had black images for all upright images. Going into Edit mode displayed them correctly but it didn't change anything outside of the mode. I decided to select my entire event and went to "Photos > Reprocess Raw" as was previously mentioned, even though my images aren't Raw. Everything is displaying correctly now!

The "rotate Clockwise then revert to original' fix worked for me (iPhone 4S) I noticed an unusual behavior that might be a clue. If I rotate *counterclockwise* instead, the "revert to original" option is greyed out.

Surely that is a bug. Rotation in either direction should allow reversion to the original, not just clockwise.

Editing seems to be a fix - I just clicked on enhance photo and it went back to the original photo. A little easier than rotating because it's only one click, but it seems like any edit will do the trick. This is ridiculous that apple can't get the iphone to play nicely with a native program.

I have a Nikon D80. Same problem. Editing seems to fix things. Have just updated to the latest iPhoto following WWDC and no change. So frustrating! Please everyone leave feedback through iPhoto.

MacBook Air, Panasonic DMC-TZ10, SD cards, same problem as described above.

But I'd like to add a piece of information to the puzzle... Up until today everything used to be fine. I'm currently on holiday and import pics every evening. Until yesterday everything worked fine, the problem only started today.

This means it is not an incompatibility between certain camera models & iPhoto - otherwise it should never have worked.

My gut feel is that this is pointing towards corruption of some file(s) or databases. But which? This is a travel MB Air, so I had no problem to delete the complete iPhoto library and start all over again. To no avail - even worse: the pics that were displaying correctly before are now black too when I reimported them.

So this is a bug that starts to happen after a while - nothing has changed in my setup between yesterday and today...

I do hope Apple will pick this up.

Cheers --Mike

Does anyone know if this problem has been fixed in the recent iPhoto update?

It has not - at least, applying the latest iPhoto update did not fix previously imported vertical photos that were black. Too soon to tell if the latest update will prevent this issue from reoccuring in the future.

Like many other posters, this issue arose for me with no changes in my system - same camera, same SD card, same iPhoto version - one day vertical photos imported fine, the next they did not - and none of the fixes in this thread (beside the "rotate, then revert to original") have corrected the issue.

Alexander Richardson wrote:

Does anyone know if this problem has been fixed in the recent iPhoto update?

cmarcus007 wrote:

...

Like many other posters, this issue arose for me with no changes in my system - same camera, same SD card, same iPhoto version - one day vertical photos imported fine, the next they did not - and none of the fixes in this thread (beside the "rotate, then revert to original") have corrected the issue.

The same is true for me. I wonder if there was a specific time where everyone started to experience the issue. As far as I know the last time I imported photos was sometime in April.

I deleted the cache files and preference files and started with a new library and this solved the problem... for now.

Cheers --Mike

theNatster wrote:

I had the same problem. Nothing worked for me until I stumbled upon a seemingly unrelated article.

The trick is storing your photos outside of the iPhoto library.

So instead of importing directly to iPhoto, transfer your photos to your Mac's Photo folder (in Finder).

At this point, you should either delete the corrupted photo folders in iPhoto or create another library in iPhoto, so you dont create duplicates of all your pics. Once that's done,

Open iPhoto. Go to Preferences > Advanced > and uncheck the first check box "Copy items to the iPhoto library"

Unchecking this box lets iPhoto reference the photos on your computer, but not transfer them iPhoto, which is where the problem is.

You can now go to Import Library, and begin "importing" to iPhoto.

A further explanation, as well as other helpful tips can be found in the article at:

http://www.macworld.com/article/1143828/referenced_library.html

Good luck!

Excellent reference article natster, its how i work too.

I had the same problem, and the simple solution, to me, was:

1. click the "edit" option

2. 4 clicks on the rotate button.

3. repeat the 1 and 2 step for each foto.

Problem solved.

Sounds like this issue is effecting a lot of people, including myself.

CAN EVERYONE REPORT THE PROBLEM TO APPLE

Then hopefully they will sort it out quicker!!

I found the reason for this issue: it's iPhoto itself! Or at least an iPhoto update.

It has nothing to do with a corrupted image or library.

The issue starts the moment you update iPhoto form 9.1.3 to 9.2

The only solution that currently works is to delete iPhoto, reinstall (preferably from the iLife install DVD) and update up to 9.1.3.

You probably would have to create a new library, because the previous one can not be opened and requires a newer version of iPhoto.

I had the same issue when importing pictures from a Nikon D800 in my iPhoto library. Luckily I had a few other Mac around me so I could test this thoroughly.