image corruption

[Keith_W]

A problem seems to have reared it's head.

When I change CF cards there seems to be corruption occurring somewhere - a consequence of which is the at the minimum the preview images are useless and at worse some of the actual image files actually become corrupt.

Even rescanning the disk doesn't clear the problem of the corrupt thumbs - the only solution seems to be closing down PM, but strangely the files are clearly visible in Foto Station.

My suspicion tghat it is something to do with the cache, but I can't think of how to solve it. It seems to occur when I change the card before all the preview images have finished processing - could that be the cause and if so is there a safe way of changing quickly?

Also I have set windows up to open PM when a card is inserted - could that be a problem?

Finally one more variable - this has only started since I installed CS2!

Tech details;

Win XP Pro, PM 4.4.3.3., PS-CS2, San Disk cards, San Disk Image Mate reader

Appreciate any help with this.

Many thanks


Keith

[Kirk Baker]

Keith,

A problem seems to have reared it's head.

When I change CF cards there seems to be corruption occurring somewhere - a consequence of which is the at the minimum the preview images are useless and at worse some of the actual image files actually become corrupt.

Even rescanning the disk doesn't clear the problem of the corrupt thumbs - the only solution seems to be closing down PM, but strangely the files are clearly visible in Foto Station.

My suspicion tghat it is something to do with the cache, but I can't think of how to solve it. It seems to occur when I change the card before all the preview images have finished processing - could that be the cause and if so is there a safe way of changing quickly?

Also I have set windows up to open PM when a card is inserted - could that be a problem?

Finally one more variable - this has only started since I installed CS2!

Tech details;

Win XP Pro, PM 4.4.3.3., PS-CS2, San Disk cards, San Disk Image Mate reader

Appreciate any help with this.

Are you ingesting the images or are you browsing them directly on the card?

-Kirk

[Keith_W]

Hi Kirk

This happens when I'm browsing the images directly on the card

Thanks

[Kirk Baker]

Keith,

This happens when I'm browsing the images directly on the card

While I don't know what may be causing your problem, we do definitely recommend that the first thing that you do with your images is Ingest them rather than browse them.  And we recommend that you Ingest them to both a primary destination, and a secondary destination.  This way you have an immediate backup, as well as the original images (still on the card) as a secondary backup.

Why do we recommend Ingesting instead of browsing/editing on the card?  Because of several things:

First, this is the only copy of your images.  If they are lost, they can be lost forever.  Image recovery software can sometimes do a really good job of rescuing your images, but they don't always work.
Second, most people stop shooting when the card is full.  If the card is full, then captioning (which of course can make each file larger than it was before) can fail because there is not enough disk space available.
Third, while cards seem durable, they are actually fairly fragile, and have a limited life span.  They have a limited read/write cycle.  Sectors/blocks on the cards can and do go bad.
Fourth, cards and readers are slow compared to the hard drive on your computer.  Once the files are available locally on your computer, the rest of your workflow will be much faster.

Why this issue only started for you once Photoshop CS2 was installed, is unknown to me.  Were you editing the images off the card with Photoshop CS2?

HTH,

-Kirk

[Keith_W]

Hi Kirk

I understand what you say about ingesting, but it's not a practical solution at that point in the edit process.

I shoot soccer in the UK and my workflow is as follows;

Tag images to use in the camera, open PM and view tagged images, copy suitable ones onto laptop hard drive, open folder in PM and select to edit all in PS, save after edit then caption and rename in PM prior to FTP'ing out of PM.

That all works fine during a match when time is tight.

After the match I will often scan through the entire card on a 'second edit' picking out any I might have missed earlier. They are then copied to the hard drive and the above flow used. At this point I switch from card to card on many occasions and it's at that point that the problem arises. Although time pressure is decreased there is insufficient time to ingest maybe 4Gb or more across several cards.

Normally after that second edit I would then do the ingest.

I've used the same work flow as above since I bought PM and have never experienced any issues. The two significant changes in the last 2 weeks have been upgrade from PS7 to CS and a change to a SanDisk Image Mate card reader.

Thanks again


Keith

[Kirk Baker]

Keith,

Hi Kirk

I understand what you say about ingesting, but it's not a practical solution at that point in the edit process.

I shoot soccer in the UK and my workflow is as follows;

Tag images to use in the camera, open PM and view tagged images, copy suitable ones onto laptop hard drive, open folder in PM and select to edit all in PS, save after edit then caption and rename in PM prior to FTP'ing out of PM.

That all works fine during a match when time is tight.

After the match I will often scan through the entire card on a 'second edit' picking out any I might have missed earlier. They are then copied to the hard drive and the above flow used. At this point I switch from card to card on many occasions and it's at that point that the problem arises. Although time pressure is decreased there is insufficient time to ingest maybe 4Gb or more across several cards.

Normally after that second edit I would then do the ingest.

I've used the same work flow as above since I bought PM and have never experienced any issues. The two significant changes in the last 2 weeks have been upgrade from PS7 to CS and a change to a SanDisk Image Mate card reader.

OK, then here is what I suggest you do: use Ingest, but set it to Ingest locked photos only (they will be the ones you tagged inside the camera.)

This way you will immediately be working on a copy locally on your hard drive.  If you don't have time for a secondary destination, that's fine since you still have a backup on the card.

HTH,

-Kirk