Finder: certain image files only display generic thumbnail icon

I have another thought and wonder if someone can try it and report back.

The problem may be a corrupted launch services register. It is launch services that determines how to open documents and so forth.

I usually experience this issue by finding multiple instances of dictionary files in AppleScript Editor. The fix is to open terminal an issue the following command.

/System/library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Frameworks/LaunchServices.fram ework/Support/lsregister -kill -r -domain local -domain system -domain user

Then you need to reboot and the rebooting takes some time, because LaunchServices has to rebuild its databases.

Fred

I have this problem from time to time with jpg files showing only the standard Preview JPG icon instead of the picture thumbnail. Usuallly I find that closing down Finder or restarting my mac solves the issue but I've just had one that I had edited in Photoshop that would not respond to either. While playing around with it, I right clicked and clicked on Get Info, then while the Info panel was up I deselected the image in Finder and behold, the thumbnail appeared. Problem solved!

You can also, when you have the info pane open, just drag the image on to the thumbnail.

I have found that the way my jpeg was saved has made the difference. I was able to replace the folder icon with my jpeg after (in PS CS5) I selected "save as" > then unchecked "Embed Color Profile:" > selected "Low" for the Image Quality.

I my case the problem with the standard icon is shown and not the photo icon appears sometimes, for jpegs and for psd files.

I haven’t figured out why, but I get the photo icon back if I select the icon and click duplicate… Wow… the duplicate shows the photo icon. Then I delete the original and rename the duplicate. The renaming is of course not necessary, but that is a matter of taste.

This suggests that the .DS_Store file may be the culprit. Perhaps deleting it and restarting Finder would cure the issue.

Been experiencing the same problem with PSE 13 so I can only speak to that but I assume other versions of Photoshop would behave similiar. I got this from another in a post from elements forum I beleive. The reason for missing or strange looking thumbnails after saving in photoshop is that photoshop creates their own thumbnail which Finder will default to. The first thing is to stop photoshop from creating a new thumbnail when you save a file after editing. Again in PSE go to Preferences, Saving Files and for Image Previews select Never Save. Now what I did to get back my Finder thumbnails was select all the thumbnails in question and pull them into Photoshop. Then without making any changes, select File, Process Multiple Files, check rename and I just add a suffice of "x" and choose your file size. Duplicate files will be created with the new name, then I trash all the originals and now all the thumbnails are back. The only real time consumer is if you want to rename all the files back. I am not sure of a batch command for that but just having an "x" at the end of the file name doesn't bother me.

I had the same issue. The below steps fixed the issue for me after speaking to a Apple representative.

1. Backup your computer to time machine

2. Erase your harddrive and do a new clean install (support.apple.com/en-us/HT5943)

3 Restore backup which you created in step 1.

Hope this helps. It definitely works for me and I can now see all of my icons correctly now. I am on Yosemite.

I've had this problem for years and no "solution" on this forum appears to be more than a temporary fix at best.

I now routinely make a copy of the offending file, and the copy shows the thumbnail without fail. However if I delete the original and rename the copy as the original, the generic icon reappears. I've just found if you change the original file name of an offending icon, something as simple as adding one character to the name, the thumbnail appears.

The generic icon problem is related to the file name. I don't understand why, but then I'm not acquainted with the source code. The name change solution seems to be the simplest work-around.