Apple Pictures Saved as .aae files???

Lawrence, Thanks again for a post to this string.

Regarding Adobe's Photoshop understanding the AAE files...I've not been able to find any successful way to get Photoshop to recognize the AAE file except as a Text file. When I try to open a photo file and it's corresponding AAE file, the photo file opens fine in Photoshop but the AAE file opens as a Text file. I've not found any option within Photoshop to "open" it as a layer file, for example, to layer onto the jpeg file, in any manner, as I would when using multiple layered jpeg files in photoshop when created a composited image.

All of this began after a recent iOS update that came out. I do realize that the iPhone does not save images as AAE files. And I realize the original images are always saved as jpg files. That I'm very clear about. While I can see the edited image as the final edited image in the iPhone/iPad Camera roll, just as it was saved after my edits in either of those iDevices, it's when I have imported those same edited images into my MacBook Pro in recent weeks, that the edited image gets stripped of it's edit all together with the creation of the AAE file associated with the Original image via Image Capture. This had never happened in Image Capture before either whenever I have used it.

In all my years of using Photoshop (13) and using it's photo import option via it's Bridge software, I've appended my personal/professional photography metadata template upon import. (information embedded in the jpeg file which can be "read" by any number of programs so as to determine camera settings EXIF info or copyright information appended by me, to name a few types of info embedded.) But Bridge no longer recognizes my iPhone when it's connected to the computer. Thus when I import via Image Capture - The stripping out of the edits from the photos leaves me with AAE files that I have not found a way to successfully reattach to it's jpeg partner resulting in what had been the in iPhone/in iPad edited version. The AAE file as TEXT does not reintroduce the textural filter or tone to the image in any combined form that I can find.

I'll reread the linked information you provided in your reply, but I'm thinking that the AAE form is a bit different from what I've known before as the XMP files. Maybe not. But I'll check it out again. I just can not find a way to get Photoshop to reattach or embed that partner AAE file with it's jpeg file to create the saved and edited image as I see it in the camera roll of my iDevice, as opposed to the original image.

Thanks for your searching for a link and info. I'll keep trying.

Those are what is known as a sidecar file. They have zero graphical value on their own. Go get the matching JPEG files.

See: What to expect when you import edited photos from your iPhone, iPad, or iPod to your Mac or PC - Apple Support

So, the AAE files have just started becoming an issue for me on my iDevices. I've always kept the iOS updates updated. And on my MACBook Pro as well. I used many, many photo editing apps and have for years on my iPhone. I don't use Photos on my MAC and don't have the iCloud Photo Library turned on any of my iDevices because I could always import and catalog my photos via Photoshop's Bridge. Until recently. I've had to start using Image Capture on my Mac which doesn't offer any subfolder organizational options as importing via Bridge did. So...I've beginning to see the "light" here. Apple is trying to steer us all into HAVING to use the Photos app on our Mac computers so that we have to use iCloud Photo Library turned on, on all our Apple products, so that we can access the edited versions, or download them, only via Apple. (Is Apple having a feud with Adobe again?) I've resisted that because of the earlier articles about the iCloud Photo Library not enabling as a default, the original size of the jpegs we want to edit, only iDevice friendly resized versions are editable. Maybe I got that info wrong. I don't want to work on a minimized size to create the art I do, because it's convenient for Apple to offer me a downsized image to edit, keeping my original in the cloud. I want to edit THE jpeg I've taken. It seems as if now everything HAS to go to the Cloud between all the devices in order for us to have the edited version to be able to download without those stupid AAE files coming with them and stripping out the edits when we're done. What a HASSLE!!! Sorry for the rant. I appreciate the link you provided above - it was the best one I've found through all my searching out a solution. But the last thing I want to do is enable Photos app on my Mac. It is just not helpful for the way I catalog and store my images. My next best option is that I'll just Air Drop everything into my Downloads folder and manually catalog it all on my computer. What a HASSLE! I've used Macs since 1985 and I'm just really frustrated by this AAE thing. ...again, thanks for your expertise, Lawrence. Greatly appreciated. I'll end the rant now and please know I'm not ranting at you...just really frustrated.

Could restate your questions or concerns?

I would like to offer some help, but I am not sure what you are concerned about. I'd take a guess but I don't want to misinterpret your words.

There is no requirement to enable Photos. You can continue to use Adobe Bridge. If so, AAE files will have no value to you until and iff Adobe is able to understand them and make use of them. FYI, Adobe Lightroom uses the same approach to image management. The difference is they can bury their "AAE" files in a database, and don't store them beside the image file, unless you choose to do so.

Why must everything Apple does be seen as a conspiracy?

LACAllen wrote:

Could restate your questions or concerns?

I would like to offer some help, but I am not sure what you are concerned about. I'd take a guess but I don't want to misinterpret your words.

There is no requirement to enable Photos. You can continue to use Adobe Bridge. If so, AAE files will have no value to you until and iff Adobe is able to understand them and make use of them.

That's strange. Adobe INVENTED .aae files. Any current Adobe program (Photoshop, Photoshop elements, etc) should understand them.

The other option is to sync the images with iCloud Photos, then export them to some other program. The Export function asks if you want to keep the edits in the .AAE file or revert to the original image.

Thanks LACAllen, for your note above. And your concern. Sorry that with my rant at the time I wrote that reply, that I lacked the clarity of stating my issues clearly.

While I realize there is no "requirement" to enable Photos, it seems to me that that is the direction that I find is one of a very few options.

Regarding the suggestion to continue to use Adobe Bridge - I wish I could! I find that is NO LONGER an option at all. Not on my 1 year old MacBook Pro with the latest version of the OS. I've used that method for years. I have a monthly subscription to multiple Adobe CC products. But Bridge no longer recognizes my iDevices. No iPhone (6 iOS updated to latest version). No iPad. It doesn't even recognize one of my Olympus cameras anymore. I've uninstalled Bridge CC and reinstalled it. The version of Bridge 6.2.0.179 offers two options by which I can download images to my MacBook Pro "Get photos from camera" or "Import from device". The first option is how I use to do this for years with no glitches. The second option opens "Image Capture" - which is very basic and offers no options as Bridge's import function did with subfolder creations and renaming the batch import, and appending my preferred metadata template.

The main problem with the Image Capture option is now any edits I've made to my photos taken with my iPhone and edited in apps in the iPhone or taken with the iPhone's Hipstamatic app and it's filters - all get imported as original photos with many edits stripped from the photos and imported as AAE files. AAE files are useless by themselves, best I can tell. What the issue is for me - is two fold - Bridge no longer recognizes any of my iDevices. And secondly, any imported pictures (via Image Capture) come across as original photos stripped of their edits.

The option to use Air Drop and send them to my computer is looking like my only sure fire way of getting the photo with its edit intact. After that import I can manually create subfolders in keeping with my system and append the metadata after the fact.

I've avoided Lightroom like the plague for years because for me Bridge was the easiest and most logical solution to how I wanted to catalogue and keep my photos. And Camera Raw has provided virtually the same post processing editing options that Lightroom came to develop. So, my preference would be to continue to avoid Lightroom if at all possible. But thank you, LACAllen, for suggesting that as a possibility. I would have to see if it, unlike Bridge, would even recognize my iPhone.

And regarding the conspiracy issue - in my 30 years of using Apple computers/devices this is my first time to make such a suggestion! And again, I'd rather not have to use Apple's Photos software on my computer as the default way of importing photos. I've been very spoiled by Photoshop's Bridge for years, I'm afraid.

Thank you again for your reply. Always helpful to glimpse any bit of info from others that might work.

Just to be clear, the iPhone does not save images as .aae files. The original images are still there as .jpg files. The changes made by edits are saved in the .aae file. But only the edits, not full images. To see an edited image you need both the .jpg and the .aae with the same name, as well as a program that understands the XMP "sidecar" format. For example, if the image name is image1.jpg, the matching edits will be in image1.aae.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extensible_Metadata_Platform

My bad Lawrence. I have newer used After Effects and my experience with Lightroom and Photoshop is that I see .XMP sidecar files. I stand educated.

Ok... but IMO there is a huge difference between a direction and a requirement... one can become unfair.

So, are Bridge's issues not an Adobe problem to solve?

I would suggest you use Photos/Instagram et al, on your device to save your edited images elsewhere before importing to your Mac. Then you can go back to edit mode on your device, and if you want, revert to the original file. That's one upside to the AAE file. It's how Photos can take you back to an unedited file. After your import(s), you would end up with each version of your file and no sidecar files. And no Airdrop process to invent.

IMO, the import process of Lightroom is a carbon copy, save for look and feel, of Bridge. I believe every function and feature is there.

I say conspiracy because it is a very common explanation here. Your suggestion of a rift between Adobe and Apple triggered it for me. They need each other.

All good info, LACAllen. I appreciate your fair assessment of the use of words and their distinctive implications. And I also especially agree with the Adobe and Apple needing each other, but in the past they have stood apart on issues creating some difficulties with some software compatibility. Like Flash Player, I think?

And the last thing I want to have are all the sidecar files as I do with the AAEs. I had read up at one point when this first started to happen in the Adobe forums and discovered that - if memory serves me - Adobe cited that this was a change that Apple had made via the Yosemite update that led to this incompatibility. I'd have to go re-do that research, but for now, I'm just trying to find the easiest way to keep the edited jpegs as the edited version that are saved in iPhone/iPad.

Going to Lightroom may be my last hope. I just don't like the "library" system as Lightroom wants the user to create. I've attempted to use Lightroom multiple times in the past and it and I did not play well together with how it wanted to create Libraries. Then I would ditch all it's libraries and uninstall Lightroom. It just was not how I wanted to categorically save my work. I've got my work over multiple external drives, in a system I set up for my use years ago, and if I can just get Lightroom to move beyond creating it's version of Libraries that I have to then use, maybe it will work. But using either Lightroom or Apple's Photos will create a whole different set of workflow issues that I'll have to adapt to when all I want to do is just do it as I always have.

I have a feeling I'm not going to like developing a whole new schema. But such is life with technology and it's advancing software remakes, I guess.

Thanks for your encouragement.

Guys,

An alternative that´s easy and fast is just to iMessage the picture edited to yourself.

There´s no much loss in quality and is quite less dangerous than e-mail yourself (in terms of privacy, in my opninion).

Then, save it on your phone and it will be there on your camera roll edited and JPG.

Chers.