Verifying images

[Linwood Ferguson]

This isn't necessarily a lightroom question (unless there's a tool specific to lightroom which would be nice)...

How can I verify the images in my catalog (or just a directory tree). I.e. that structurally they are intact. Better yet, whether or not they have changed, e.g. with a run amok program, disk failure, LR doing metadata updates (badly, or just doing them when I didn't expect).

I found a took called ImageVerifier (http://imageingester.com/), but it reported all my TIF's as invalid so I didn't find it to have a lot of credibility (I just created these in Lightroom with an edit-in-CS3, I validated by opening in CS3 and also in Irfanview without error).

But it does fundamentally what I want (if it worked). It's $4' (actually its free but you have to buy a $4' tool I don't need to get it free, but $4' is not a terrible fee).

Anyone have other choices?

I guess I could just export all pictures in the catalog and see if I get errors. Was hoping for something a bit faster. And noticing change would be nice (e.g. a lot of errors could just be a change not a structural problem).

 

[PatrickC]

If an image pixel file is absent or damaged, you'll see a ? (missing) or ! (unreadable) in the Lightroom grid. LR checks all the images whenever you access a folder. It can take a few seconds/minutes (depending on how many images and the speed of your system) before all the pictures are checked.

If the metadata in the image doesn't match the metadata in the LR database, you can set an icon to warn you of this too; right-click in the grid>View Options>Grid View tab>Cell Icons>check 'Unsaved Metadata'. This will tell you if the LR metadata is newer or older than the file metadata too.

I'm not sure how technically robust the checking is though.

Patrick Cunningham

 

[johnbeardy]

IV does something very different from LR checking whether a file exists and if it can read it. I know a lot of very detailed work has gone into it, so maybe ask Marc Rochkind directly or post at the DAM Book Forum where he hangs out. On the IV page, he does say "many TIFFs deviate from the standard and therefore can't be checked by ImageVerifier. Don't use this option unless you know the images to be good."

John

 

[Linwood Ferguson]

On the IV page, he does say "many TIFFs deviate from the standard and therefore can't be checked by ImageVerifier. Don't use this option unless you know the images to be good."

John

Interesting. These TIFF's came fresh out of Lightroom.

Thanks for the pointer to the author. I did no real research on the tool, when I saw it rejected valid TIFF's (or ones I had some reason to think valid) I just assumed it was not a useful tool. It does appear to have a lot of depth of development and participation out there.

its interesting it is only sold with the "ingester". I'm quite happy with loading in Lightroom as-is without introducing something else to touch the images. But it's not a LOT of money.

 

[Replytoken]

I use ImageIngester as my front end for LR. I like it because it can rename my files, back them up and convert them to DNG format with just one command.

--Ken

 

[Linwood Ferguson]

I use ImageIngester as my front end for LR. I like it because it can rename my files, back them up and convert them to DNG format with just one command.
--Ken

Can't lightroom do all that for you as well? it would appear to, though I don't use either the backup or DNG feature.

How does ImageIngester differ in that regard?

It seems even better because it will also apply a develop preset, a metadata template, optionally keyword, and build previews, all while I go get food and drink or clean the mud off or whatever.

 

[Linwood Ferguson]

It's compression (at least).

I just tried something with Image Verifier.

I am running 2.3 release with CS3, and in a recent directory had 3 TIFF's that were produced by doing an edit-in CS3. I did not save the files in CS3, so they are what came out of Lightroom going to CS3.

Today I exported a bunch of TIFF's including these three to a directory and ran the Image Verifier on them -- all passed.

So just to be sure, I restricted the list to just these three TIFF's, one set from the edit-in-CS3, and one set from the export.

The export passed, the edit-in did not.

The export was done as TIFF's, 16 bits, sRGB, no sharpening or resize, no compression, i.e. pretty vanilla. So I tried again, changing only the compression setting in lightroom for the export.

Failed verification.

So apparently IV can't handle TIFF's that have compression (at leats a Lightroom variant of compression).

And apparently the handoff to CS3 from LR 2.3 is a compressed TIFF (I say that not just because it failed but I checked the file size of the handoff file and it matches the compressed version size).

 

[Linwood Ferguson]

And apparently the handoff to CS3 from LR 2.3 is a compressed TIFF (I say that not just because it failed but I checked the file size of the handoff file and it matches the compressed version size).

Which... I see there is a preference to control (before someone tells me I did it!).

 

[Replytoken]

Can't lightroom do all that for you as well? it would appear to, though I don't use either the backup or DNG feature.

How does ImageIngester differ in that regard?

It seems even better because it will also apply a develop preset, a metadata template, optionally keyword, and build previews, all while I go get food and drink or clean the mud off or whatever.

While ImageIngester (II) can do a lot to files as you have mentioned, I prefer how it handles renaming, backing up and DNG conversion to LR. With II, I can first have it rename my NEF files using my naming convention. These files are then copied to my backup hard drive. Then, II will convert my files to DNG (using Adobe's free DNG Converter program) with the exact same naming structure, except for the file extension which is now DNG instead of NEF, and also copy those to my backup hard drive in addition to my working hard drive. It may be possible to do this in LR, but I like the folder structure and ease of convenience of II. Its all done with the push of one button.

Best of all, II is a very small program, so it can be loaded on to a netbook and used in the field with ease. Putting LR on a netbook seems a bit taxing.

--Ken

 

[Linwood Ferguson]

To the extent it is helpful to anyone...

I bought the Image Verifier (well, I bought Image Ingester, but I installed Image Verifier).

I scanned all shots (about 7''', maybe half JPG's from long ago, the rest NEF's with a few TIFF and PSD's thrown in).

I had a few dozen TIFF's that it wouldn't verify, that were compressed, and if I opened in CS3 and re-saved as not compressed it verified.

I had about a dozen PSD's that gave errors about "(Wrong expanded width (columns = 2848; expanded = 5696))". No idea what that was, if opened and re-saved in CS3 they went away. Interestingly the metadata showed they were originalled saved in CS3 (though maybe a different update -- they were over a year old).

I have about a half dozen TIFF's that don't get fixed with CS3 but work fine, i.e. there's something in them that IV doesn't like, but apparently that's a "feature".

MOST interesting is I found two really, actually corrupt images, one an old JPG that was given to us from a fishing trip, and one an NEF.

Most interesting because Lightroom had imported them and read them fine at the time, and the NEF at least had not been changed since (the JPG had some metadata updated so it was rewritten).

The NEF was actually corrupt. DNG, Lightroom, all the adobe products refuse to load it (unexpected EOF). NX would load it but about a 1'th of the left side was messed up with bad colors in vertical bands.

Significant to me is that the modication date showed no change, and I went back through backups to last August and they were all also corrupt (I think I have older ones on DVD need to look).

Sometime, some how on a Raid-1 volume, without updating the modification date, the file became corrupt. Fortunately not a file I cared much about, but it could have been.

I think I'm sold on the need for something like Image Verifier. I have a really good set of online and off-line backups, but they do no good if you do not notice a corruption in a long enough period so as to rotate through all of them.

And yes (with a nod to Ken above) if I had been making a separate backup before going into Lightroom, I would have been all set. I need to consider that, been assuming I was covered by daily backups of everything changed.

I guess with Windows "changed" is a state of mind.

The one thing I cannot find to do with Image Verifier is to notice a file's absence -- if it was there, and is now gone.

I guess I can do a full synchronize on a tree from Lightroom -- is that the only way to check (yes, I know if I look at a thumbnail that is missing it tells me, but I don't want to look at every shot).