resetting the {seqn} back to 0001 every time the image date changes

[PhilBurton]

I'm using the demo version of PM and so far it does everything I want it to, including sorting photos by date into different folder.  I have set up PM to create folders based on YYYY/MM/DD and it does that exactly the way I want it to.
 
However, I can't seem to get the following to work:
 
If I am ingesting photos with multiple creation dates, I want {seqn} to reset back to 0001 each time the image date changes.   So far, I have found that {seqn} increments over the entire range of photos being imported, with the result that for dates after the creation date of the first photo, the lowest number seqn in the filename is more than 0001.

Thanks

[Kirk Baker]

Phil,

I'm using the demo version of PM and so far it does everything I want it to, including sorting photos by date into different folder.  I have set up PM to create folders based on YYYY/MM/DD and it does that exactly the way I want it to.
 
However, I can't seem to get the following to work:
 
If I am ingesting photos with multiple creation dates, I want {seqn} to reset back to 0001 each time the image date changes.   So far, I have found that {seqn} increments over the entire range of photos being imported, with the result that for dates after the creation date of the first photo, the lowest number seqn in the filename is more than 0001.

There is currently no way to do that.

-Kirk

[theim]

I would like to see that capability in a future release as well !

Thanks...

[PhilBurton]

Phil,

I'm using the demo version of PM and so far it does everything I want it to, including sorting photos by date into different folder.  I have set up PM to create folders based on YYYY/MM/DD and it does that exactly the way I want it to.
 
However, I can't seem to get the following to work:
 
If I am ingesting photos with multiple creation dates, I want {seqn} to reset back to 0001 each time the image date changes.   So far, I have found that {seqn} increments over the entire range of photos being imported, with the result that for dates after the creation date of the first photo, the lowest number seqn in the filename is more than 0001.

There is currently no way to do that.

-Kirk

I have over a year of digital photos to import.  Can you suggest a workaround until such time as this feature is implemented.

In a way, I'm surprised that this feature doesn't exist.  Before doing the demo download, I read a whole bunch of reviews of PM, and they were universally positive.  Many were very enthusiastic.  I wonder why no one raised this issue in any of the reviews.  Like the previous poster, I would also like to see this feature implemented.  Please pass this along to the product manager.

[RichWagner]

I would like to see that capability in a future release as well !

Thanks...

Add me to the list.  This is also fundamental to the way I name/number images.

Thanks,

--Rich Wagner

[Kirk Baker]

Phil,

I'm using the demo version of PM and so far it does everything I want it to, including sorting photos by date into different folder.  I have set up PM to create folders based on YYYY/MM/DD and it does that exactly the way I want it to.
 
However, I can't seem to get the following to work:
 
If I am ingesting photos with multiple creation dates, I want {seqn} to reset back to 0001 each time the image date changes.   So far, I have found that {seqn} increments over the entire range of photos being imported, with the result that for dates after the creation date of the first photo, the lowest number seqn in the filename is more than 0001.

There is currently no way to do that.

I have over a year of digital photos to import.  Can you suggest a workaround until such time as this feature is implemented.

In a way, I'm surprised that this feature doesn't exist.  Before doing the demo download, I read a whole bunch of reviews of PM, and they were universally positive.  Many were very enthusiastic.  I wonder why no one raised this issue in any of the reviews.  Like the previous poster, I would also like to see this feature implemented.  Please pass this along to the product manager.

You need to understand that a feature like this would have problems.  If you have a folder full of images whose dates are all different, then the sequence number would be resetting all of the time, which is not likely what you want.

Most people who use PM use the Ingest feature to pull their images off of their card shortly after shooting.  They don't point PM at a set of folders on their hard drive and Ingest them again.  A non-resetting sequence number works fine for this.

There is no need to Ingest your images again if the images are already on your system.  PM will browse them directly without needing to copy them somewhere else.

Maybe if you explain what it is that you are ultimately trying to accomplish, I may be of assistance.

-Kirk

[gregoire]

I have over a year of digital photos to import.  Can you suggest a workaround until such time as this feature is implemented.

In a way, I'm surprised that this feature doesn't exist.  Before doing the demo download, I read a whole bunch of reviews of PM, and they were universally positive.  Many were very enthusiastic.  I wonder why no one raised this issue in any of the reviews.  Like the previous poster, I would also like to see this feature implemented.  Please pass this along to the product manager.

Like Kirk said: the answer to your wonder is simple. After a shoot I ingest, select, rename and caption with PM. Re-ingesting a whole harddrive is not a regular job. For multiple day "shoots" (travel photography comes to mind) I have adopted a naming scheme wherein the date changes but the sequence number continues instead of manually resetting it per day. Had this feature existed, I would probably have used it, but since it doesn't: as long as the name is unique and chronologically sortable on a filename basis it's OK for me.

[JWS]

Check your camera, in the folders section, mine makes a new folder every day, and I have a choice of continuous or start over numbering.

JWS

[mbbphoto]

In a way, I'm surprised that this feature doesn't exist.  Before doing the demo download, I read a whole bunch of reviews of PM, and they were universally positive.  Many were very enthusiastic.  I wonder why no one raised this issue in any of the reviews.  Like the previous poster, I would also like to see this feature implemented.  Please pass this along to the product manager.

Kirk says:

You need to understand that a feature like this would have problems.  If you have a folder full of images whose dates are all different, then the sequence number would be resetting all of the time, which is not likely what you want.

Most people who use PM use the Ingest feature to pull their images off of their card shortly after shooting.  They don't point PM at a set of folders on their hard drive and Ingest them again.  A non-resetting sequence number works fine for this.

As someone who often shoots at night this would be a dangerous feature for me.
All of a sudden my images would start renumbering in the middle of a gig.
Marc

[schwarznavy]

Hello Kirk and everyone.

I too am trying out the demo due to reading many positive reviews and blogs. Also, I'm in the Navy and many Navy photogs swear by this software. In fact, what led me to seek out a piece of software like this is that I'm looking for a new solution for my office -- the U.S. 7th Fleet Public Affairs Office.

So far, I like everything I see, except for this issue.

I recognize this thread is a little old, but I do have a perspective that I think directly fits with this post.

When I think of the need to add a sequencial number to a filename, the need obviously exists to avoid having multiple files with the same name.

Since it seems that many people are renaming their images with some variation of the date, then the need to add a sequence of numbers to filenames only exists if all the images come from the same date.

Case in point, if I'm ingesting two images taken on different dates, then renaming one to JANUARY-01-2008-0001.jpg and the other JANUARY-05-2008-0002.jpg is wholly unnecessary. The date would suffice.

However, four images from two different dates would need a sequencial number. What photo mechanic offers is JANUARY-01-2008-0001.jpg, JANUARY-01-2008-0002.jpg, JANUARY-05-2008-0003.jpg, and JANUARY-05-2008-0004.jpg.

But that could lead to confusion. If my January-05 photos were in their own folder, then someone might think I'm missing JANUARY-05-2008-0001.jpg and JANUARY-05-2008-0002.jpg.

So if I happen to have two days worth of photos on my card, then I can't benefit at all from the sequencing feature offered by Photo Mechanic. In fact, I can't meet Navy regulations on renaming imagery without doing some manual work. We're supposed to use the date and then a sequential number, starting with 001.

Don't get me wrong -- I do love what I have seen so far from Photo Mechanic. I just wanted to convey how important this feature can be.

Thank you for providing this great software.

Matthew

Phil,

I'm using the demo version of PM and so far it does everything I want it to, including sorting photos by date into different folder.  I have set up PM to create folders based on YYYY/MM/DD and it does that exactly the way I want it to.
 
However, I can't seem to get the following to work:
 
If I am ingesting photos with multiple creation dates, I want {seqn} to reset back to 0001 each time the image date changes.   So far, I have found that {seqn} increments over the entire range of photos being imported, with the result that for dates after the creation date of the first photo, the lowest number seqn in the filename is more than 0001.

There is currently no way to do that.

I have over a year of digital photos to import.  Can you suggest a workaround until such time as this feature is implemented.

In a way, I'm surprised that this feature doesn't exist.  Before doing the demo download, I read a whole bunch of reviews of PM, and they were universally positive.  Many were very enthusiastic.  I wonder why no one raised this issue in any of the reviews.  Like the previous poster, I would also like to see this feature implemented.  Please pass this along to the product manager.

You need to understand that a feature like this would have problems.  If you have a folder full of images whose dates are all different, then the sequence number would be resetting all of the time, which is not likely what you want.

Most people who use PM use the Ingest feature to pull their images off of their card shortly after shooting.  They don't point PM at a set of folders on their hard drive and Ingest them again.  A non-resetting sequence number works fine for this.

There is no need to Ingest your images again if the images are already on your system.  PM will browse them directly without needing to copy them somewhere else.

Maybe if you explain what it is that you are ultimately trying to accomplish, I may be of assistance.

-Kirk

[Kirk Baker]

Matthew,

When I think of the need to add a sequencial number to a filename, the need obviously exists to avoid having multiple files with the same name.

Since it seems that many people are renaming their images with some variation of the date, then the need to add a sequence of numbers to filenames only exists if all the images come from the same date.

Case in point, if I'm ingesting two images taken on different dates, then renaming one to JANUARY-01-2008-0001.jpg and the other JANUARY-05-2008-0002.jpg is wholly unnecessary. The date would suffice.

However, four images from two different dates would need a sequencial number. What photo mechanic offers is JANUARY-01-2008-0001.jpg, JANUARY-01-2008-0002.jpg, JANUARY-05-2008-0003.jpg, and JANUARY-05-2008-0004.jpg.

But that could lead to confusion. If my January-05 photos were in their own folder, then someone might think I'm missing JANUARY-05-2008-0001.jpg and JANUARY-05-2008-0002.jpg.

So if I happen to have two days worth of photos on my card, then I can't benefit at all from the sequencing feature offered by Photo Mechanic. In fact, I can't meet Navy regulations on renaming imagery without doing some manual work. We're supposed to use the date and then a sequential number, starting with 001.

As I explained earlier to Phil Burton, adding such a feature can be problematic.  Moreover I am not convinced that it can be written in such a way that it always works consistently.  Photos are renamed using your rename string in the order that they appear in the contact sheet.  So it is quite easy depending on your sort order to fool a 'reset the sequence number when the date changes feature'.  Here is an example, using photos shot from the camera over a couple of days, but arranged by interest with the date shown in brackets, and the resulting sequence number shown in parenthesis:

DSC_0007.JPG    [2009-01-02]  (Seq: 001)
DSC_0001.JPG    [2009-01-01]  (Seq: 001)
DSC_0002.JPG    [2009-01-01]  (Seq: 002)
DSC_0003.JPG    [2009-01-02]  (Seq: 001)
DSC_0004.JPG    [2009-01-02]  (Seq: 002)
DSC_0005.JPG    [2009-01-02]  (Seq: 003)
DSC_0006.JPG    [2009-01-02]  (Seq: 004)

It's a contrived example I know, but it illustrates my point.  If the photos were sorted by Capture Time then the sequences would have worked fine.  But any other sort (including filename sort) has the potential for causing inconsistencies in the automatic reset feature.  I suppose if users didn't mind that the feature can be fooled, we could add a new variable called {autoseqn} that has the new behavior and leave the current {seqn} alone.

-Kirk

[schwarznavy]

Kirk,

I know nothing about programming --

But is speed one of the concerns? I mean, programming this {autoseqn} to first sort by Capture Time (even if they weren't) and then run the sequencer, and then check to see if the date changed, and then reset the sequencer accordingly...that would probably be a little slower, right? And Photo Mechanic is known for its speed....

Maybe you could put in parantheses (*Note: this feature may take longer depending on your machine.). Maybe it could be a toggle....

[Kirk Baker]

Kirk,

I know nothing about programming --

But is speed one of the concerns? I mean, programming this {autoseqn} to first sort by Capture Time (even if they weren't) and then run the sequencer, and then check to see if the date changed, and then reset the sequencer accordingly...that would probably be a little slower, right? And Photo Mechanic is known for its speed....

Maybe you could put in parantheses (*Note: this feature may take longer depending on your machine.). Maybe it could be a toggle....

No, I don't think speed is a concern in this instance.  But I don't think the user would ever expect that their sort order would be changed.  What if they wanted to use the original sequence variable along with the auto-sequence variable?  The results would be very different than they expected.  Also, the little preview of what your photos are going to be renamed would be inconsistent if the photos sort order would be dynamically changed when the real renaming operation were to take place.

-Kirk

[Tekrat]

Kirk,

I know nothing about programming --

But is speed one of the concerns? I mean, programming this {autoseqn} to first sort by Capture Time (even if they weren't) and then run the sequencer, and then check to see if the date changed, and then reset the sequencer accordingly...that would probably be a little slower, right? And Photo Mechanic is known for its speed....

Maybe you could put in parantheses (*Note: this feature may take longer depending on your machine.). Maybe it could be a toggle....

No, I don't think speed is a concern in this instance.  But I don't think the user would ever expect that their sort order would be changed.  What if they wanted to use the original sequence variable along with the auto-sequence variable?  The results would be very different than they expected.  Also, the little preview of what your photos are going to be renamed would be inconsistent if the photos sort order would be dynamically changed when the real renaming operation were to take place.

-Kirk

I recently downloaded and began using beta 4.6.  Subsequently, I submitted payment for a license, as I really liked (and still do) what PM has to offer.

Now, I'm new to PM, and I've much to learn, so I've been working a large, indoor sport shoot I did to get the feel of the program.  In particular, the current ability to manage XMP and IPTC data was a huge motivator to invest.  In addition, I believe the team will have a catalog program to complement PM some time in the not too distance future.

Anyway, I want to use PM for all my workflow from ingest to sorting, renaming, resizing for web, watermarking, etc.  So yesterday I experiment using PM it to ingest from CF card I find this same issue with sequence renaming.  I also take images over a course of days some times, where a card will include images spanning two dates or more.

Over the last two years, prior to owning PM, I've had discovered and used FastStone Image Viewer, a freeware program, to ingest photos and for initial review and grading.  A great little software but it pales next to PM.  However,  one thing this program did was allow me to ingest creating multiple folders based on YYYY/0M/YYYY-0M-0D, along with file renaming to include YY-MM-DD_{seqn} , and most importantly the seqn begins newly for each days folder and allows as many unique names as necessary for that days shoot.  The seqn is based on date/time shot, so all files in each folder are numbered exactly in the order shot, down to the fraction of a second.

This is an important feature to me and necessary to support a large, existing database of images.  Is there any way to address this?  Please? 

Thank you Kirk, and everyone at PM, for listening.

[bazography]

...one thing this program did was allow me to ingest creating multiple folders based on YYYY/0M/YYYY-0M-0D, along with file renaming to include YY-MM-DD_{seqn} , and most importantly the seqn begins newly for each days folder and allows as many unique names as necessary for that days shoot.  The seqn is based on date/time shot, so all files in each folder are numbered exactly in the order shot, down to the fraction of a second.

If I am understanding you correctly, this may help at least partly accomplish your goal.

In the ingest dialog, under "Copy Photos", if you have selected "into dated folder", images shot over multiple days will go into one folder, with the folder name being today's date.
However, PM will allow you to ingest several days worth of photos and separate them into folders by date. In the ingest dialog, under "Copy Photos", select "into folder with name". Then use Variables to insert the date as your folder name. Now when you ingest photos, PM will create a new folder for each batch of images shot on a particular date.

The sequence variable will not reset to 0001 for each new date, but with the images separated into folders by date it would take seconds to select all the images from day 2 and rename them after the initial ingest is complete. Your example of YYYY-MM-DD_0001 would be {year4}-{month0}-{day0}_{seqn}. In the rename dialog, the snapshot feature allows you to store your favourite renaming string, so it would only be a few clicks of the mouse to rename a folder full of photos.

Hope this helps.