Apple Event: May 7th at 7 am PT

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

Level 1

50 points

iPhoto '11 (9.3) deleting modified photos...Again!

Aarg! Once again an iPhoto 11 upgrade has deleted ALL my modified photos and left only the thumbnails! Even photos that have been in my library for years suffered, just like last time.

This happened a little over a year ago when I upgraded from iPhoto 9 to 11. Thousands of modifieds (which are the ones I want to keep!) were simply zapped into non-existence. The actual files deleted, not the thumbnail. A few escaped then, but now they too have been simple erased off my hard drive!

Once again Apple has struck. I ran the innocent sounding iPhoto update that came yesterday, 650.39, and today, again any photo I modified with Photoshop only bring up a black screen when double clicked. When I try to "edit" in iPhoto is says "Image Cannot Be Edited: This photo was previously editted with another application (Yep, Photoshop CS 5.1....and saved as standard jpeg's....not exactly esoteric Apple!) or with an early version of iPhoto (gee, since you own iPhoto and I've 'updated' this library at least 4 or 5 times over the last 7 years you'd think that would be a non-issue Apple). Duplicate this photo to edit it.

Are you kidding? My modified photos are no in the finder. A "reveal modified" brings up the top level directory. You zapped them! I can't duplicate them because there is nothing there!

I can choose "edit in external editor' and the original pops up in Photoshop. But that pesky modified, Apple knew I really didn't need that photo I took two hours to tweak....any more than I needed them a year ago.

Yes, I tired rebuilding the thumbnails. No help. Took about 3 hours.

Beware the iPhoto upgrade!

Posted on Jun 25, 2012 5:26 PM

27 replies

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,380 points

Jan 16, 2013 10:59 PM in response to Eric Jerome

This is a different issue from the one on the thread, where the Use was deleting masters.

No one from Apple is here. You need to contact them directly. In the meantime, restore from the back up you made prior to upgrading.

Joseph Corl Author

Level 1

50 points

Jan 17, 2013 5:43 AM in response to Eric Jerome

Eric,

Sorry to hear about this! Likely the data is still on your hard drive but the directory references are wiped out. You might try a 3rd party utility to recover or "undelete" files. But if so, don't do anything else on that drive until you do of course, as it might overwrite the photos. At least you could get your photos though they will be all stuffed in a recovery folder.

Old Toad

Level 10

207,631 points

Jan 17, 2013 12:21 PM in response to Joseph Corl

What system version are you running?

With the latest update I can't actuallly test what i did before:

import

choose edit in external and iPhoto creates a duplicate to edit in PS

save changes

delete original (everything was still fine at this point btw)

then edit in iPhoto (crop or other)

rebuild library (which happened on the updates both a year ago and now)

You must not be running the latest version of iPhoto or the system as that duplication issue when using an external editor has been fixed for some time now. At least with 10.8.2 and 9.4.2. At the time the two duplicates were linked and moving or deleting one did the same to the other most times. What version of iPhoto are you running

Joseph Corl Author

Level 1

50 points

Jan 17, 2013 7:19 PM in response to Old Toad

OT,

That was a post from last July. I was using the latest versions of both iPhoto and the OS at that time. But the duplication issue vanished in one of the later updates. What was strange was that the photo edited Photoshop was a bona fide separate file, but apparently upon a later "rebuild" of the library (due to another iPhoto upgrade problem) it somehow found and deleted a bunch of these.

My approach now is strictly to do all editing elsewhere and only import to iPhoto when all is done, so that it sees it as an "original." If I do subsequent editing, I drag it to the desktop, edit in Photoshop, delete the original from iPhoto, then import the newly edited version, so once again iPhoto sees this as a master.

But there is still some goofiness in my library (photos being replace by large thumbnails at times if I flip through a lot of photos while viewing while enlarged) that probably means there is some corruption.

My task now has been to go through every photo, one at a time, and replace the unedited "originals" with a copy of the modifieds I had made back before all this began. Then when all is as it should be, I plan to manually export the entire library as individual photos to a HD, delete my current library entirely, then carefully reimport the photos (after lots of back ups!) in small batches and hopefully cure what must have been lots of issues introduced way back in 2011 when the first iPhoto upgrade crashed in mid-install, as it did for many.

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,380 points

Jan 17, 2013 10:56 PM in response to Joseph Corl

If I do subsequent editing, I drag it to the desktop, edit in Photoshop, delete the original from iPhoto, then import the newly edited version, so once again iPhoto sees this as a master.

Another source of dataloss.

If you do this all you're getting is your iPhoto preview, a lower quality version of your image.

Regards

Joseph Corl Author

Level 1

50 points

Jan 18, 2013 8:00 AM in response to Yer_Man

TD,

Actually in iPhoto (9.4.2) it does not copy the preview but the underlying high res file. I just did this again with a high resolution photo and confirmed it, and opened it in Photoshop to double check. Aperature may do things differently.

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,380 points

Jan 18, 2013 8:13 AM in response to Joseph Corl

You sure about that? I just did two tests: one with an 8.5mb Nef and it yielded a 2mb jpeg, and another 2.2 MB Jpeg yielded a 2.1 MB Jpeg.

But it brings a more real issue into focus: as you're obviously not interested in lossless processing or version control, why are you using iPhoto?

Joseph Corl Author

Level 1

50 points

Jan 18, 2013 8:42 AM in response to Yer_Man

Just did it again with two recent photos from my Nikon D300 neither of which has been edited in any way. The "get info" size matches the original and pixel count exactly (5,654,712 bytes in both cases). The Nikon was set to jpg.

NEF's might behave differently??

"Lossless versioning, etc." -- i was fine with it until iPhoto began throwing away all my mods, even those made in Photoshop, some of which had taken hours in the case of restoration work of old photos including detailed retouching.

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,380 points

Jan 18, 2013 8:50 AM in response to Joseph Corl

I think I figured that out:

If the file is edited or Raw then there's a version in Previews, and that's what dragging gets - as Raw automatically generates a preview on import.

If there has been no editing done then there is no Preview and so you get the Master.

I repeated the test on a file that hadn't been edited and got the same result as you.

LarryHN

Level 10

106,110 points

Jan 18, 2013 8:55 AM in response to Yer_Man

And I see the same results as TD

Either dragging or exporting current give those results for me

Old Toad

Level 10

207,631 points

Jan 18, 2013 9:08 AM in response to Joseph Corl

You're Photosshop workflow is why you're having problems as Terence has already pointed out. The following is the correct way to use Photoshop with and within iPhoto:

Using Photoshop or Photoshop Elements as Your Editor of Choice in iPhoto.

1 - select Photoshop or Photoshop Elememts as your editor of choice in iPhoto's General Preference Section's under the "Edit photo:" menu.

2 - double click on the thumbnail in iPhoto to open it in Photoshop. When you're finished editing click on the Save button. If you immediately get the JPEG Options window make your selection (Baseline standard seems to be the most compatible jpeg format) and click on the OK button. Your done.

3 - however, if you get the navigation window

that indicates that PS wants to save it as a PS formatted file. You'll need to either select JPEG from the menu and save (top image) or click on the desktop in the Navigation window (bottom image) and save it to the desktop for importing as a new photo.

This method will let iPhoto know that the photo has been editied and will update the thumbnail file to reflect the edit..

NOTE: With Photoshop Elements the Saving File preferences should be configured as shown:

I also suggest the Maximize PSD File Compatabilty be set to Always. In PSE’s General preference pane set the Color Picker to Apple as shown:

Note: to switch between iPhoto and PS or PSE as the editor of choice Control (right)-click on the thumbnail and select either Edit in iPhoto or Edit in External Editor from the contextual menu. If you use iPhoto to edit more than PSE re-select iPhoto in the iPhoto General preference pane. Then iPhoto will be the default editor and you can use the contextual menu to select PSE for your editor when desired.

Joseph Corl Author

Level 1

50 points

Jan 18, 2013 1:36 PM in response to Old Toad

OT,

That's exactly how I was doing the workflow for several years, and why having all those Photoshop edited files deleted by iPhoto (upon two different upgrades several months apart) has made me leary of ever trusting it again. It just didn't seem right that it would delete photos edited by the external editor, in my case Photoshop.

To recap, it did it after the initial upgrade to 11, which crashed halfway, as many experienced. Then I was foced to rebuild the library to recover anything (I had not choice, it came up as the only option).

Then, after restoring all my edited photos (hours of work) some months I later did the minor point upgrade and it did the same thing again! Once again forced to rebuild the library after which any file edited in Photoshop via the method you describe above, was removed entirely from the computer. Thankfully I had nearly everything backed up, but now I have to manually search, find the back up, and manually restore each.

iPhoto '11 (9.3) deleting modified photos...Again!