Problems importing from CF card to LR5

[Mary Ann]

I have a new MacPro and upgraded to Lightroom 5 and CC Photoshop. I am having a lot of problems importing from CF cards. I have tried different card readers and different ports. I have some movies on the CF cards (SandDisk 32GB Extreme). In the past, with LR 4 and my old Mac, I had no problem importing movies or images.

Now, when I put a card in and pull up the Import dialogue, it takes forever for the previews to load and sometimes it just loads some of them and the rest are blank. I can import a few sometimes, or all sometimes, but LR usually ends up crashing. My only real option is to copy to my computer and then import to a catalog.

This is very cumbersome and not a practical solution as I take multiple sittings on a card and only want to import certain images to LR catalogs (I use a different catalog for each client).

Any thoughts on what could be causing this would be much appreciated. The transition to a new Mac Pro and Lightroom 5 has been difficult.

Thank you!
Mary Ann

 

[clee01l]

I have a DataTale firewire800 drive (and a 36mp Nikon and not generally any movies) No thunderbolt on this iMac but plenty of USB2 EHDs. I can import from SDHC, and CF with *.MOV files recorded on the cards. I also copied the contents from the card to the Datatale and was just as successful.

While I can't duplicate your problem, I also can't duplicate your your hardware. So, this is far from a valid test. Jim has your camera but runs Windows So that can't duplicate your problem precisely either.

Are you running OSX 10.9.2, the latest OSX update? At this point I'd say to open a ticket at Adobe commenting on all of the things that you have tried and iterated here. The Link is at the top of this page.

I can't see how it would help any, but I am going to De Queen AR on Friday and could detour through Shreveport Friday afternoon.

 

[Mary Ann]

Thanks, Cletus. I did fill out a bug report with Adobe, but not sure if I will hear anything. Not sure how to get direct support or if it is possible. Thanks for the offer to stop and help Friday. Unfortunately, I will be flying home late Friday night from Minnesota from a business trip this week. I am leaving early Monday morning so I will not be able to troubleshoot LR the rest of this week.:hm: Hopefully, next week-end I will have time to get to the bottom of this.

 

[Jim Wilde]

Trying to summarise, then....you can import OK (including movies) if the files being imported are on your boot drive. But you cannot import files from either CF card OR existing Thunderbolt drive if they contain movies? Is that correct?

If so, one more question....with your normal catalog, i.e. not the test catalog that you created on the boot drive, are you able to import files (including movies) that are on the boot drive? If you are, does that gives you a temporary workaround, i.e. copy the CF card contents to the boot drive first, then use the "Copy" or "Move" import option to import and transfer them to your preferred destination on your Thunderbolt drive? Sure, that's an extra (unwelcome) step, but may get you working again until Adobe can get a handle on the problem.

 

[Victoria Bampton]

Hang on, when you say LR4 works is that on THIS computer or on your old computer?

 

[Mary Ann]

Victoria & Jim,

So sorry to be so delayed in responding. I was out of pocket on a business trip (for another business we own) in northern Minnesota for the last week. I am just now back to my computer to deal with this.

To answer both of your questions- Jim, I am not able to import movies into Lightroom in any form. It doesn't work even if the LR catalog is on my main hard drive (internal flash drive on the Mac) and the images are on the main drive, also. I have tried it. As long as there is a movie in a folder whether i am importing from a CF card or hard drive, LR hangs.

Victoria- LR4 works perfectly on my new computer (MacPro 2013). I can use a catalog with movies in it, as well as import new movies. The import issue is only in LR5.

I am at a loss on how to proceed other than dropping LR5 altogether. It is truly unusable as many of my LR catalogs have movies already downloaded to them.

Obviously, there is no workaround to this. Please direct me on how to get this issue resolved with LR Support. There is another guy on a forum that is apparently having the same issue so it has been replicated.
(http://forums.adobe.com/thread/1453575?tstart=0)

Thank you,
Mary Ann

 

[Jim Wilde]

Mary Ann, there was also a very similar issue posted on this site: see here.

As I mentioned in one of my earlier posts, there are many in-camera settings for movie shooting.....in order to eliminate that, it would help if you can find one that you are prepared to share here as I suggested in that linked post. As things stand, I have no idea why you cannot import when movies are included, yet I can.

 

[Mary Ann]

I will be glad to share a movie. Can you tell me the best way to do that and what the maximum size is? I will be in meetings for the next 4 hours but will take care of it after that.

The puzzling thing to me is that LR4 imports and plays movies just fine. So it is definitely a LR5 problem.

Thank you!
Mary Ann

 

[Jim Wilde]

Yes it does look like an LR5 problem, but then why don't I have the same problem? At the moment I don't, so is there anything different about your movies versus mine, even though shot with the same camera models?

To share, suggest Dropbox as I mentioned in the other thread. Find a small movie, put it in your local Dropbox Public folder, then right-click and select "Copy Public link" which pastes the link to your clipboard, then paste that link here.

 

[Mary Ann]

Jim,

I sent the .MOV file to you by PM. Let me know if you don't get it.

Thanks,
Mary Ann

 

[Jim Wilde]

Yes I did, thanks. Couldn't reply earlier as my internet connection has been down all day, and has just been restored.

But the bad news is that the movie imports just fine. That would tend to eliminate camera settings from the equation, but leaves us no nearer resolving the issue. One question I'm not sure you answered is whether your Quicktime app is up-to-date?

Assuming it is, I'm stumped. The only obvious difference between your system and mine is that I'm on Windows, you're on OSX....are you happy if I share that movie link with a couple of our Mac-user Gurus for them to test?

 

[Victoria Bampton]

are you happy if I share that movie link with a couple of our Mac-user Gurus for them to test?

Excellent plan Jim, if that's ok with your Mary Ann. I can borrow a Mac Pro 2013 to rule out a model-specific issue too.

 

[clee01l]

If Mary Ann would like to share the *.MOV file with me too, I can look at it on my iMac. In the last few days I imported mixed files to my MBP and just yesterday imported those same images into my iMac. My *.MOV files came off of SD & CF cards out of a Nikon.

 

[Mary Ann]

Jim,

I would be happy for you to share it with anyone that can help. I tried to update Quicktime but it appears that it is a system app and updates with my Apple software update and that is the latest version.

The most puzzling part of the entire equation is LR4 works perfectly with movies. It seems like if it were a computer problem, it would not work with either version. There is obviously some conflict with LR5 only. I don't know if there would be a conflict on any other systems as I only have a Mac Pro 2013 with Mavericks to run LR5. My other computer is a MacBook Pro and has Snow Leopard.

Thanks,
Mary Ann

 

[Jim Wilde]

I agree it's a puzzle.

Both Victoria and Cletus have offered to take a look at the movie (they were the two people I was thinking of as well), so I'll drop them the link and await their test results.

Just to be clear though, if you try to import just that movie (nothing else) will that work? Or is it only when you include a movie along with other files that the problem occurs?

 

[Victoria Bampton]

Excellent question Jim. So far it's importing correctly every time on my machine.

 

[Mary Ann]

I opened LR5 and tried to import movie from my HD. As soon as I opened the Import Dialog, it immediately hangs. Doesn't even give me a chance to to import the movie. As soon as it seems the files on my hard drive in the Import window, it hangs and then crashes.

WHAT NEXT??? I don't know what to do. There is some huge conflict going on somewhere that is rendering LR unusable.

Would anyone like to screen share with me and watch this happen???

Thanks for your help!!!

 

[Victoria Bampton]

Mary Ann, remind me, have we tried trashing preferences anywhere along the line? That would certainly be worth a try. Here are the instructions: http://www.lightroomqueen.com/commu...(or-Trashing-)-the-Lightroom-Preferences-file and you'd need to trash preferences for earlier versions as well as LR5, just in case it's grabbing data from the older preference files.

 

[Mary Ann]

Yes, I did trash the Preferences first for LR5 and then after that didn't change anything, I trashed Preferences for all of Lightroom. After trashing all LR preferences, when i opened Lightroom, my settings were all still there. So I questioned whether the preferences really got trashed. But someone (can't remember who said) that was normal that my settings would remain.

 

[Jim Wilde]

What settings are you referring to? If you mean presets, then they're not affected....but a simple way to be sure that the preferences reset has worked is to see what happens when you first start up again. All of your previous catalogs will have been "forgotten", meaning you'll have to tell Lightroom where they are, and you'll receive the "tell me your geographic location" prompt as soon as you startup for the first time after the reset.

 

[Mary Ann]

Jim,

That is why I didn't think the preferences were reset. When I restarted Lightroom, all of my previous catalogs were still there. I threw all the preferences away for every Lightroom that I could find. I don't know what else to do. It did create a new set of Preferences with a new date, but somehow it still remembered all the previous catalogs when I reopened LR. Any thoughts?

 

[clee01l]

Mary Ann,
Your preferences is a file named "com.adobe.Lightroom5.plist" located in the folder "/Users/[your user name]/Library/Preferences/" The Library folder is hidden by default. In Finder, hold down the Alt (Option) key when using the Go menu. The user library folder is listed below the current user's home directory. I don't think you have yet deleted this file as prior instructions were not specific.

You do not need to delete this file. just rename it. LR will create a new one on restart. If you have lots of preference settings that you don't want to lose and creating a new Preferences file does not solve the problem, you can rename the old plist file back and LR will use it the next time you start up.

 

[Jim Wilde]

I don't think you have yet deleted this file as prior instructions were not specific.

Cletus, have just updated my instructions as per your additional details. Thanks.

 

[Mary Ann]

Cletus,

Thanks so much for this info. I had deleted the preferences the first time the way you told me to (from the Go menu), but this time I renamed it and renamed another file called "com.adobe.Lightroom4.LSSharedFileList.plist" also. It appears to delete the preferences this time, as it asked me the country, etc. and all previous catalogs were not showing up when I started Lightroom 5.

So I brought up a new catalog and imported and existing folder with only CR2 files in it. Everything showed up perfectly. Then I clicked on import and went to a folder containing videos. It hung for a few minutes and then released and went to another folder. I think brought up Import dialog and navigated to another existing folder containing both videos and photos. It is hanging and I get the Application not responding (Force Quit).

So without a doubt, this issue is definitely a .Mov issue and only for LR5. Any other thoughts of a next step?

 

[Victoria Bampton]

There's another new post on the bug report forum - someone else with the same problem. I'll merge them when I'm back in the office (I'm just answering a couple of threads from my iPad), and forward them to a LR QE to see if they have any clues. I saw Chris Cox posted on yours too.

 

[Mary Ann]

Been out of town for a several days and thought I would check back in to see if anybody has gotten any information on this LR issue? I am to the point of going back to LR4 if I can't get this resolved in the near future.

Thanks!
Mary Ann