Lost metadata in bridge

[blaineharr]

Hi Peter,

You'll recall I'd asked you back in August about what happened when I lost crop and straighten settings on a large group of photos back in August. I never really got to the bottom  of that. I redid all of the crops, they held, and went on.

Now I have another problem. Have about 2,500 raw files that I've just returned from Chile with. Have done keywords and captions for them and then my assistant and I worked on color and other corrections in Camera Raw and added bulk metadata. He had used Color Labels on some of the images to differentiate which were shots with which cameras, with and without polarizers, etc. to ease the workflow. When I went to get rid of the color labels on some I noticed later that those images had lost all of their metadata. As you'd mentioned before I opened the xmp files of those that the info. isn't appearing for with Text Edit and the info. is there. But is does not show up in File Info. in Photoshop. I presume this metadata will come back if I use "purge cache from this folder" but I am afraid of losing two days worth of Camera Raw correction settings, if it takes it back to an earlier state.

I do have a backup of the files with all of the keywords and captions, but before the bulk metadata and Camera Raw corrections were done. What would you suggest? My work has come to a halt in the meantime, as I don't want to lose anything, so I'd appreciate a reply as soon as possible. Thank you.

[blaineharr]

Hello again,

Something else, and this is probably part of it, all of the photos in bridge had the little symbol next to them in the slideshow window (the circle with the two black symbols inside it..in the Dam book that symbol is next to your metadata in figure 5-20 on page 131. They are next to every one of the photos that still have their metadata. That symbol ususally only appears when that is the photo that you're currently working on, isn't that correct? How do you get them to go away? Of the 2,486 pictures, 291 still have a blue label. How do I safely get rid of those blue labels, in bulk, as I obviously don't want the label to carry over once I may dng's and all the variations? Thanks.

[peterkrogh]

Blaine,
First thing I would say is to duplicate the folder and work on the duplicated files.  See if purging the cache will get them to show properly.

I think the symbol you are talking about is the "has camera raw settings" badge. It would stand to reason that Bridge is having trouble reading the metadata and does not see ACR settings nor the other metadata.

Has anything other than Bridge touched these files?
Peter

[Dawnne Gee]

i got an error similar to this when i imported a folder into Lightroom Beta 3, made changes, then stepped out of Lightroom -- the resulting XMP files had problems in Bridge. i think LRb3 (as opposed to LRb4) didn't store its metadata in XMP (or it was otherwise incompatible with Bridge at the time), and there may have been something gidgy with it corrupting existing XMP files? i'm reaching here, but since Blaine and i have had similar problems, and i know i touched that folder with LRb3, i wonder if that might not be the root of the evil, so to speak. a text-based comparison of the files showed doubled-up tagsets in the XMP, and missing closing tags. this is, in fact, the reason why i began experimenting with XMP data from a text basis. cleaning up the buggies in a text editor restored my original Bridge settings for me. and the problem doesn't occur with Bridge-created XMP files touched by LRb4.

[blaineharr]

Hi Peter,

I did as you suggested and copied the folder onto another external  hard drive (the first set was also on an external hard drive).  I opened that folder  in Bridge on another computer. All of the metadata came up and I checked some of the files (that had showed no metadata) in Camera Raw and all of the settings (the newest ones) are still there, so the work has not been lost. However all of the files have the camera raw settings badge next to them. How do I get rid of these?

My assistant worked earlier, before the files were comingled and work was performed on them in Camera Raw, in Photo Mechanic to number them. I'm not sure if he did anything else with them in PhotoMechanic.

Mostly this is good news, but can't move forward to create DNG's with that icon there, correct? Again this may have had  something to do with when he was grabbing various folders with blue color label. Many of those labels that I'd tried to eliminate are back, but the Camera Raw settings badge is on all of the files, regardless of whether they have a blue label or not.

[blaineharr]

Now I feel stupid. That icon should be there, to any images that have been corrected in camera raw. I was able to get rid of the blue labels (all this still on the second copy), so it looks like I can continue on the work flow now. I happy that I had seen that the metadata was still there, with the Text Edit, and it was. As to why the problem happened, I don't  know. Thanks for your help. Blaine

[Tom]

I am not certain this is the correct place for this but after one does all the renaming/keywords/itpc core in bridge and saves the file does one use bridge again? Since I am not a professional and browse my photos frequently I am getting a little confused on workflow. I guess I am describing the difference between a professional that uses his photos vs someone that looks at his photos.
As some of the people in the small camera club I belong to say it took a couple of years before they had things the way they liked them.
Peter you use a Mac I presume so where do you locate your working folder?
I must thank this forum for being so patient.
Tom

[peterkrogh]

Tom,
After I apply bulk metadata in Bridge, rate and do ACR adjustments, virtually none of my images ever see Bridge again: all organizing work is done in iView MediaPro.

Do you have the book?
Peter

[Tom]

Hi Peter,
Yes, I read your book once cover to cover and have been back through parts a lot. I tried import from camera but the name never changed so I just went to bridge and accomplished the same thing by adding text for the 1 underline. That works. I then go through and label the pictures, primarily at this point green for trash so I at least delete what I don't want. At this point I already have to many photographs and am learning so if I delete a couple extra I am not concerned.
Since I think I might be interested in LR even for a basic DAM I import them into LR to do the Camera Raw changes. I then export and save as DNG. So I think I have progressed a ways. I also save them again as jepg to load into iPhoto for all my email and browsing but not certain this is were I want to be but until I understand more of the management I am here.
I think I will wear the pages out of your book before lightroom even gets to v1.
Thanks again,
Tom