New ImageIngesterPro Mac Beta 15 and Windows Beta 7

[Marc Rochkind]

In Windows Beta 7 and Mac Beta 15:

• Sidecars (XMP files) present on the card folder (or descendent folders of it) are now carried along in the ingestion and are renamed to match the renamed associated image file. This fixes a problem with the Multi-Camera Shoot feature when the input images have sidecars, and also helps generally when re-ingesting. If an image already has a sidecar, no new sidecar is generated and no additional macro replacement occurs, regardless of settings of the Metadata Template and Camera Raw Settings drop-downs.
  
• Adjusting the same folder multiple times without syncing on the Multi-Camera Shoot panel resulted in incorrect adjustment amounts. Now fixed.
  
• The Worksheet/Checklist feature has been removed. (It wasn't implemented on the Windows Beta, but there was a placeholder menu item and a Preferences tab.)
  
• A bug in memory allocation when using the include/exclude-extensions feature on the Preferences-Ingestion tab could theoretically result in a crash, although none was reported by users.
  

In Windows Beta 7

• See combined list, above.
  
• Check-for-Update on the Help menu is now implemented, although the results for a beta aren't valid. Check the website or the ImageIngester Blog for update information.
  

In Mac Beta 15

• See combined list, above.
  
• The include/exclude feature on the Preferences-Ingestion panel now works properly with extensions of any length. In earlier betas only 3-character extensions were handled.
  
• A notice has been added to the Preferences-Ingestion panel reminding you to press Return after editing text.
  
• Spaces between extensions on the Preferences-Ingestion panel are now reduced to a single space.
  
• A memory leak when the Multi-Camera Shoot feature was used has been plugged.
  

I have a few issues to track down (such as the problem with JPEGs and sidecars on Windows), but I plan to release final versions on both platforms this week.

--Marc

[danaltick]

Marc,

I gave the Windows version a try today.  Worked great with Bridge CS3 and John's iView panel.

Once again, thanks a million!

Dan

[Dawnne Gee]

Marc: I am in meetings most of today, and running print orders before I head out for the meetings. Since I'm a single parent this week, my evenings are entirely full as well. As I noted in an earlier thread, I will try to get some shoots run through this, especially multi-camera stuff late tonight or tomorrow morning.

Relatedly, some questions for you:

1. In a previous thread or email (yeah, first the mind goes, forgive me!) you suggested that making a Preference Set for each photographer might be a good idea. I've been using Preference Sets more for shoot type, as the type of shoot (at least for me) plays a fundamental role in determining expression of copyright, rights-release, etc ~ but that is largely also because for my original company, multi-photographer shoots were by far the exception to the rule. The one thing I'm not really clear on from your documentation (which is not necessarily a commentary on the quality of your documentation, but on my ability to digest it while we're setting up this new company) is what is the actual purpose of a Preference Set, and how is it best applied?

2. In a previous email, you'd mentioned you were considering a licensing model. Our first major gig with the new company at the end of February is going to be a multi-camera shoot with at least two computers running on-site ingestion all the way through to iView cataloging and website generation for kiosk preview and ordering. Will we need to buy separate licenses or what? I just want to make sure we do the right thing for you and that you get what you're worth. And....er....I'll need to start training people shortly after the first of the month, and for obvious reasons, I won't be carrying over ShadowMoon's license to the new company.

3. Relatedly, this just occurred to me: I will want and need each ingestion computer to have the same Preference Sets, especially if Preference Sets should be defined per photographer. How will I be able to transfer this type of setup information between ImageIngesterPro installations? Do I presume correctly that we will need to run largely out of the Dynamic Templates, and copying the SQLlite.dll and ImageIngester.xmp will suffice? Will copying the SQLlite.dll violate any licensing?

We'll be happy to be a test-bed of that type of implementation for you, if more needs to be done to accommodate that type of usage. We should have the computers in roughly ten business days.

The work you've done (especially with existing XMP's) sounds fabulous! Thank you! I'll work that into tonight/tomorrow's retest as well, just to verify it.

~Dawnne

[Marc Rochkind]

Dawnne--

1. I'm not sure about the best advice for Preference sets, as I expect to learn a lot from how working photographers use them. Certainly shoot type, or camera type, or photographer make sense, or even combinations of these. At some point (e.g., Version 3) I might look into hierarchical Preference sets and how to share them across machines. (See #3, below.)

2. I haven't figured out all of the details of the licensing model yet, but I do know that the basic fee of $40 is supposed to be per photographer, not per machine, as I plan to allow the same licensed copy to be used on up to 3 machines, as long a  single photographer is using it on those machines. There will also be a quanltity discount for shops with more than one photographer (or schools, etc.), but I haven't worked out how to do that yet. I expect to have it worked out in the next couple of weeks.

3. You can copy Preference set files from computer to computer, but I don't know if this will be convenient, as much of the data there is very specific to the last time the program was used. Copying SQLite is OK.

--Marc

[Dawnne Gee]

One buggy-boo, in my humble opinion:

If I have the Card set to "user choice", you now default me to "C:\" when i start a new ingestion, instead of the last-used location, even when the last-used location still exists (which for an ingestion session, it basically always will when reading from a digital wallet). All your other browse dialogs work fine, but this one slows things down, at least when working with an Epson P-500, as the photo folders are always three levels down from the root, which means four clicks the way you currently have it. Just sayin'.....it's not a show-stopper.

Regarding your item #2: Per-photographer sounds cool, but doesn't directly accommodate a company which may be using contracted photographers?

FWIW, I have had successful test runs of your multi-camera workflow, including date/time synchronization and the whole works. This will be a wonderful time-saver for assisted weddings and the like. Thanks!

~d~

[Marc Rochkind]

Dawnne--

I'll take another look at the remembered folder.

By "per-photographer," I didn't mean a specific individual; I meant a user. One license means one simultaneous user. If 3 photographers ingest at the same time, that's 3 licenses. If one photographer ingests on one of three computers, that's only one license.

Thanks for the feedback on the MCS feature... that's the first feedback I've ever gotten!

--Marc

[Dawnne Gee]

the MCS is cool. for me, it only applies to assisted shoots, where we're shooting the same basic subject(s) from different angles ~ that having been said though, when i have to shoot unassisted, i quite frequently have 2 or more cameras at hand. i pretty much always sync up the clocks before i shoot, but it's nice to know there's an easy way to fix that after the fact. in fact, i'm diligent about the clocks now because of a couple of shoots from a while back where i wasn't, and the time spent syncing everything by hand.

i understand better about your licensing considerations. that sounds entirely reasonable, and very generous. i guess i need to ask Peter about the DAMUseful software in this regard as well!

[Marc Rochkind]

Dawnne--

There are a couple of reasons why MCS might help even when the cameras were perfectly synced:

1. The different ingestions are in different folders, and they need to be intermixed, or
2. The file names don't reflect the order of shoot, and therefore the images aren't sorted correctly when ordered by file name.

--Marc

[Jake]

Marc,
Since upgrading to Beta7, I haven't been able to ingest any of my photos due to the following error. I shoot RAW format with a Nikon D70 . I've never had a problem with any of the other Beta versions. This is the screen generated from IIP.


Backup Image Folder (Post-Conversion): G:\My Backups\IIP Backup [not used]
Run Adobe DNG Converter: No
Metadata Template: Copyright Rights Reserved
Camera Raw Settings: [none]
Primary Folder Arrangement: {@datetime,1,4}/{@datetime,1,4}-{@datetime,5,2}-{@datetime,7,2}
Starting Number: 41

Creating folders
Copying files

ERROR:
Generated sidecar (XMP file) contains invalid character.

Finished


Thanks,
Jake

[Marc Rochkind]

Jake--

This is a new error message. It means that the metadata template contains an invalid character that would make Bridge or Photoshop ignore the sidecar. It's usually an unescaped copyright character, but it could be anything.

Did you enter any special characters with an ALT+nnnn sequence? If so, you need to preceded them with Alt+0194.

Let me know if the above isn't helpful and I will supply more detailed instructions.

--Marc

[Jake]

Marc,
As far as I know I haven't entered any special characters. Where would/could this have been entered?

[Marc Rochkind]

Jake--

Special characters can be in the metadata template itself or in data, probably in the database, that gets inserted into the generated sidecar as a result of macro replacement. The first question is what the template is. Is it the supplied template, ImageIngester? One you created? If so, how was it created? Do you have any data, in the IPTC tables perhaps, that contains special characters?

A test you can run is to use the template without any data from the database. That is, create new rows for each of the 4 IPTC tables, don't enter any data into those rows (except for the key field, which is automatically entered), and choose those empty records on the metadata panel. See if you get the error message. If you do, it's the template--send it to me and I'll take a look at it. If you don't get the error message, it's the data in one of the IPTC records. Choose one of your own records, see if the get the error. If you do, it's a field in that record. If you don't, choose the next record. This step-by-step approach will isolate the error.

If nothing seems to indicate the error, let me know what results you did come up with, and I'll work with you from there.

--Marc

[Jake]

Marc,
Thanks for the direction. The problem was in the Template; don't know exactly what, but It's working now.

Jake

[Marc Rochkind]

OK, good Jake. In the final version, I've added some more info to that error message that give the context around the invalid character. Glad you were able to find the problem without this.

--Marc