Adjustments lost after renaming raw files

[Erik Brammer]

Hi Nik,

I have edited a range of raw images using Raw Power 2 for Mac OS, and once done, I renamed them using Mac OS Finder. I then exported them as jpgs and found that all adjustments were not considered. Checking the raw files again in RP revealed that here, too, the adjustments were no longer available / considered.

So it seems like my renaming action caused all adjustments to be “forgotten”. But even with all hidden files displayed in Finder I couldn’t find any sidecar file that would still reference the original file names.

Is there a way to batch rename the raw files using Finder or elsewhere without losing the adjustments?

Thanks,
Erik

P.S.: Fortunately I had created a backup of tge adjusted raws with the original file names so i could recover all my work – no harm done so far.

[Nik Bhatt]

Hi Erik,

Sorry you ran into a problem there. RAW Power stores adjustments in sidecar files located in its “sandbox” directory. Because the sidecars are not in the same directory as the originals, RAW Power uses the file name + some metadata to associate the sidecar with the original.

So, if you edit, then rename the original, the association is lost.

One solution to this situation is to (carefully) rename the sidecar file. This is how to do it:

1) Finder: Go > Go to Folder

2) Paste the following (no quotes) and hit return:
~/Library/Containers/com.gentlemencoders.RAWPower/Data/Documents

3) you will find a bunch of files; some are jpgs, others are the sidecars.
The jpg is the “full size” jpeg preview made by the app after editing.

4) The first part of the name is what you want to change:
(e.g., “ _DSF3894” in the below name)
“_DSF3894-(DNG)-09AB0010364E7A110FE92FB019E45BE9”

I suggest duplicating the sidecar file before renaming it, so you can easily restore it if the rename goes awry.
I suggest also renaming the full size jpeg the same way.

I hope this helps.

—Nik

[Erik Brammer]

Hi Nik,

thanks a lot for your advice. While technically feasible, I will hold back from following these instructions on 180 images. It is not a major issue to live with the original file names, and on exporting the jpgs, I can still assign a custom file name.

Generally speaking, wouldn’t it be useful to have Raw Power store the sidecar files in the same directory where the raw files resides, with a file name identical to the raw’s file name, just with a different extension (i.e. without all the hex suffix)? That way one can move stuff around and has everything consolidated.

Cheers,
Erik

[Nik Bhatt]

Storing the sidecar next to the file would help in many cases, but it doesn’t always work – the app may not be able to write to the directory, for example. So, at the very least, there needs to be a fallback that uses the sandbox. But in the fallback case, because two original files can have the same name (from different folders), the app would need to give each sandbox file some kind of unique specifier. As a simplification, I ended up storing all the sidecars in the sandbox. The “hex data” is the unique specifier – because of how it’s constructed, the app can connect the sidecar to the original even if the files move.

BTW: even if the sidecars were next to the originals, you would still have a problem. The connection between sidecar and original would be broken once you renamed the originals [unless, of course, you renamed the original and sidecar together].

[Erik Brammer]

… and another thing: When I export using a custom name and sequence, Raw Power doesn’t use a fixed number of digits for the sequence, filling up with zeros as needed.

Also, the sequence by which the images are being exported seems to be rather random. As the file creation date in Finder is no longer the original image capture date, it is virtually impossible to restore the chronological sequence of the images. Of course, in a photo app like Apple Photos, the images will appear in the correct chronological sequence again, but now I need to re-export them with a custom name and counter from Apple Photos to create a jpg image sequence that I can share e.g. with my wife.

My suggestions for improvement:
– Use a fixed number of digits for exporting with custom name and sequence, potentially as a parameter with a default value of 3 digits that the user can modify.
– When exporting files, set the file creation date to the original image capture date.
– Export in the (chronological) order in which the images are being displayed in Raw Power.

[Valdo]

DxO has the sidecar files along with images and it’s a total mess!

[Nik Bhatt]

And, yes, it can make quite a mess, especially if the sidecars are also used for metadata like ratings or flags (because many more images have such things applied to them).

[Nik Bhatt]

Hi Erik,

Inline:

Use a fixed number of digits for exporting with custom name and sequence, potentially as a parameter with a default value of 3 digits that the user can modify.

I’ll put that on the list for a future release.

Export in the (chronological) order in which the images are being displayed in Raw Power.

This is a bug – it should respect the sort order. I’ll put that on the bug list.

When exporting files, set the file creation date to the original image capture date.

I checked Aperture, Photos, and Lightroom. None of them set the file creation date to the original image capture date (all preserve the EXIF capture date, as does RAW Power). In general, I’m hesitant to mess with file creation dates. If the other two issues are resolved, I believe your situation would be okay, since the images would come in the right order.

[Erik Brammer]

Hi Nik,

thanks a lot for your swift feedback as usual. Indeed, if items 1 and 2 above are resolved, file creation dates don’t necessarily need to be messed around with, and it will greatly enhance the usability of Raw Power for processing larger series of images. In my most recent case, it was about 270 images to start with, ending up with 180 images I kept, and I could do the necessary adjustments on those very fast.

Back to my original post, in the future, I will first only do a quick screening of a series of images I want to keep, then rename, and only then start to do adjustments in Raw Power. Even if later I want to delete another few images, I prefer to live with the “holes” in the sequential numbering of my custom renaming rather than sticking with the original file names that came from cameras and phones.

Best regards,
Erik

[Erik Brammer]

Hi Nik,

I would like to catch up on the topic discussed above. Today I have come across an issue where I was checking some images which I was sure I had edited with Raw Power, this time SOOC JPGs from my Fuji X-Pro2. No adjustment icon visible in the thumbnails (see below), no adjustments visible when editing the files. I then checked for the .dat files in the sandbox directory that you have mentioned above, and such .dat files exist for the JPGs. It seemed like Raw Power ignored them. I then tried to “open with” –> Raw Power, and Raw Power says “The file you have selected could not be opened. There may be a permissions issue, or it may be damaged in some way.

Now I wonder what could have caused this. After we had the discussion above, I now always rename first and then start editing in Raw Power. Could one of the following actions cause damage to the .dat file or unlinking of it:
– Using ExifTool to add a GPS location
– Using ExifTool to change the file creation date to the image capture date
– Renaming the directory in which the image files are located
– Moving the image files to a different directory

Would you recommend to run a repair of permissions using

diskutil resetUserPermissions / id -u

Or would you mind if I sent you one of these JPGs plus the corresponding .dat file from the sandbox directory?

Best regards,
Erik

[Erik Brammer]

Fixing permissions did not do the trick, I just verified.

[Nik Bhatt]

Hi Erik,

Using ExifTool to add a GPS location: no effect
Renaming the directory in which the image files are located: no effect
Moving the image files to a different directory: no effect
Using ExifTool to change the file creation date to the image capture date: yes, can affect it

RAW Power uses the following information to create its “signature” that it uses to connect a photo with the sidecar. These are the components of the signature (this all changes in 3.0):

Filename (but not directory)
EXIF data: “PixelWidth”, “PixelHeight”, “Depth”, “DateTimeDigitized”, @”DateTimeOriginal”, “Make”, “Model”, “Orientation”

So if you change any of these properties in EXIF, it will alter the signature and the app will not be able to match the files.

In 3.0, the signature is based on the file name, the ‘inode’ which is the unique ID on the disk, and file system creation time (not EXIF). 3.0 will track a file as it moves on the disk, but not across disks (2.0 tracks across disks, but I have decided this is not as desirable as I first thought).

[Erik Brammer]

Hi Nik,

Thank you, this helps to understand what is going on. So from now on all renaming and EXIF should be done before I start editing in Raw Power.

For Raw Power 3.0, it will be useful to have instructions in the manual of what NOT to do in order not to break the link.

Best regards,
Erik

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