Renaming.

[ucs308]

I would like to rename my files using the frame number + serial for uniqueness. I use a lot of Leica camera's and have some scanned negatives. These do not have frame numbers, so how would I handle the lack of a frame number. Is it possible to substitute a sequence number? Should I just use a sequence number anyway? There about 400K to rename.

Thanks in advance.

[Kirk Baker]

I would like to rename my files using the frame number + serial for uniqueness. I use a lot of Leica camera's and have some scanned negatives. These do not have frame numbers, so how would I handle the lack of a frame number. Is it possible to substitute a sequence number? Should I just use a sequence number anyway? There about 400K to rename.

Thanks in advance.

What do the filenames look like now?  Do they have a four-digit number at the end of the filename (not counting the filename extension)?

-Kirk

[Hayo Baan]

For your scanned images at least, sequence numbers are probably a very good solution. Unless there are other things that make your files unique, make sure you allow for enough digits in the number though as otherwise you might end up with duplicates. That also goes for the frame number; that is only 4 digits so after only 10.000 images you're back to the first. So perhaps to be on the safe side and allow for 5 or, better yet, 6 digits.

Does this answer your question?

[ucs308]

Some of the Leica files have a sequence number starting with L. But it will not always be in the same position. The files have been renamed several times by various applications and I am just now trying to normalise everything using PhotoMechanic. I am not sure if the PhaseOne backs use a frame number. Maybe the best plan would be to use a sequence number? I am just not sure how I would synchronize that sequence number across my main machine and laptop, nor when sequence number will max out.

Then end goal is to get rid of duplicates and end up with a cleaner library.

I would like to rename my files using the frame number + serial for uniqueness. I use a lot of Leica camera's and have some scanned negatives. These do not have frame numbers, so how would I handle the lack of a frame number. Is it possible to substitute a sequence number? Should I just use a sequence number anyway? There about 400K to rename.

Thanks in advance.

What do the filenames look like now?  Do they have a four-digit number at the end of the filename (not counting the filename extension)?

-Kirk

[Kirk Baker]

Some of the Leica files have a sequence number starting with L. But it will not always be in the same position. The files have been renamed several times by various applications and I am just now trying to normalise everything using PhotoMechanic. I am not sure if the PhaseOne backs use a frame number. Maybe the best plan would be to use a sequence number? I am just not sure how I would synchronize that sequence number across my main machine and laptop, nor when sequence number will max out.

Then end goal is to get rid of duplicates and end up with a cleaner library.

Without examples it's hard for me to give you a renaming string that will work for you, but all variables in PM support substring extraction.  So if the base filename always ends in four digits, this can be extracted by doing:

{filenamebase:-4}

See: http://wiki.camerabits.com/en/index.php?title=User_Manual_Flat_View#Variable_Substring_Extraction

HTH,

-Kirk

[ucs308]

Here is a quick sampling. It is a mess. Many tools have been used over time. I had read through the page in the manual you linked to. But when I did I felt I would need a conditional processing to achieve what I needed. I'll re-read and see what I can do. But if you have additional ideas I would appreciate hearing them. 

GJT_2015-01-263_(CF000377) 1.IIQ

GJT-__-(IMG_5636).JPG

GJT-2015-08-15(IMG_6510).RAF

GJT-2015_12_29-Tue(L1005333).DNG

GJT-2016_03_06-Sun(_JKK2816).JPG

GJT-2002-02-28(GJT_1969-12-31_030468).TIF

GJT-2009-01-07(GJT_2009-01-07_027524).DNG

GJT-2009-01-24(GJT_2009-01-24_026572).NEF

[judophotos]

My collection of negatives, slides and digital images go back to 1972 so I always use the date in reverse followed by the camera, A, B or C and a sequence of 4 digits for digital images. So all follow this sample prefixed by my name:

FINCH20160905A0001

This naming sequence is carried out by PM during ingesting and each of my cameras are setup as A B and C

In the case of images from the analogue era, I exclude my surname and the images based on the contact sheet number as follows:

19800812A0136 for contact sheet number 1 and frame 36 taken on the 12 August 1980.

I hope this helps.
David

[Kirk Baker]

Here is a quick sampling. It is a mess. Many tools have been used over time. I had read through the page in the manual you linked to. But when I did I felt I would need a conditional processing to achieve what I needed. I'll re-read and see what I can do. But if you have additional ideas I would appreciate hearing them. 

GJT_2015-01-263_(CF000377) 1.IIQ

GJT-__-(IMG_5636).JPG

GJT-2015-08-15(IMG_6510).RAF

GJT-2015_12_29-Tue(L1005333).DNG

GJT-2016_03_06-Sun(_JKK2816).JPG

GJT-2002-02-28(GJT_1969-12-31_030468).TIF

GJT-2009-01-07(GJT_2009-01-07_027524).DNG

GJT-2009-01-24(GJT_2009-01-24_026572).NEF

There is no one renaming string that will take all of those various naming formats and preserve the ending digits.  You're going to have to select them in groups and use substring extraction on {filenamebase} to process them.

-Kirk

[ucs308]

OK. Thanks. But...Let me come at from a different direction.

If I were going to rename all the files in my library with main goal of getting rid of duplicates would renaming them using the capture time down to the sub-second be a reasonable approach?

[Kirk Baker]

OK. Thanks. But...Let me come at from a different direction.

If I were going to rename all the files in my library with main goal of getting rid of duplicates would renaming them using the capture time down to the sub-second be a reasonable approach?

Yes, but if multiple images have the exact same time and exist in the same folder, then Rename will add a letter or digits (configurable in Preferences->Files) to the duplicates.  This does not mean that the photos are guaranteed to be duplicates (you could have a very high frame rate camera that could shoot more than one image in the span of one sub-second time unit.)

-Kirk

[ucs308]

Is their anything unique to each frame? A checksum of the image data? Some other quirky piece of data that is accessible?

[Kirk Baker]

Is their anything unique to each frame? A checksum of the image data? Some other quirky piece of data that is accessible?

Not that I know of.  PM doesn't keep a checksum of the image data (and therefore there is no variable to use for it.)

-Kirk