corrupt files

[rosey]

We have recently been seeing corrupt images once our raw files are open in bridge and camera raw. Normally, we would drag the images from the card straight to our G5 hard-drive, and so recently we have been downloading using iview media pro 3 to our three hard-drives. However, we are still finding corrupt images on all three locations. We have tried purging the cache folder and running disk utilities. These corruptions seem quite random, in that whats corrupt in raw (bridge)  may not be corrupt in jpeg form, or visa versa. Sometimes only the thumbnails in bridge are corrupt but once opened in camera raw, the 'corruption' seems to have corrected itself.  Does anyone have any idea what we are doing wrong or is there a block on our computer thats preventing the computer from reading the files after downloading from the original cards? WE have also downloaded images from a Nikon and so far have not seen any corruptions. Corruptions seem to be prevalent from our canon cameras. Any connection there? Any help would be much appreciated.....we are going insane....

rosey

[peterkrogh]

Rosey,
To get help, you need to outline step by step what you are doing, (each step and *every* action and setting that you can) and you need to explain what you mean by corrupted and corrected.

Please also outline what software you are using, including exact version numbers (system, iView, Bridge, Camera Raw).
Peter

[Joe Reifer]

Hi Rosey -

I had some seemingly random Canon RAW files corruption issues that were solved by:

1. Disabling anti-virus software when copying files from the CF reader to the computer, or from the computer to external FW drives.
2. Running Disk Warrior

Cheers,

Joe

[rosey]

Mac os 10.4.6
iview media pro 3
Bridge - comes with photoshop CS2
Camera Raw - 3.4

Corrupted images defined as truncated or incomplete images. Some with thin lines across the images and others with blocks of white/color, almost as if the computer could not translate the entire image.
Firstly, we would upload via iview directly from the card (in card reader) into a catalogue. Then go to file - import from camera-select destination - choose and download. WE would do this consequitively with all three hard-drives. Once uploaded, we would consolidate all the files from the different folders within that job into one folder for edit in bridge, by just copying them to the desktop. Corruptions start to occur at this point. After editing, we color correct in camera raw (more corruptions may be noted, some new, others the same, some seem to have corrected themselves, others stayed the same). Then we batch process files and save as jpegs - and surprise, ore corruptions as mentioned above, the jpeg folder is where we batch process again for our local lab into a new folder and create a folder for pictage, which we then ftp. Since we are new with iview, (just purchased it,....we have not introduced cataloguing or adding metadata as of yet. We are currently only using iview to download incase the computer is having a hard time reading or translating the files. Strangely enough, the nikon camrea our 3rd photographer uses has not had a corrupt image to date. Also, some images that were uploaded to pictage recently hads some corruptions on their end that we could not see in our upload folder to them? I am sure I need to create a better system of cataloguing and using dng converters etc, but we are still learning. But these corruptions are driving us crazy, they seem so unpredictable. What am I doing wrong or am I just battling against a computer that cannot translate these files? Help...

p.s. Could you tell us what brand of external additonal backup drives you would recommend for storing images and where we could get them? We currently have 3 drives (G5 HD, G5 INTERNAL AND G5 G RAID EXTERNAL) that we are saving to , one of which (G5 INTERNAL) is reaching its full capacity.

p.p.s. We ran disk warrior a couple of weeks ago and that has not helped, infact since then it seemed to have made the problem worse.

Thanks,
Rosey

[rosey]

Another clue....sometimes bridge will crash unexpectedly even with no other applications running. This has happened to us also with Photoshop and Safari. Prior to using iview, we would drag files direclty from the card onto the desktop,and then copy those files to all our HD'S. Seems the corruptions would appear on all three HDS whether we downloaded via iview or dragged straight from the card. WE also recenlty had to take in our G5 because the cd/dvd drive stopped working (wouldnt burn cds or dvds) and once last year, we had to return the machine because our only hd at the time had to be replaced. Maybe this will be helpful.

thanks again,

cheers,
rosey

[peterkrogh]

Rosey,
This sounds like bad RAM.  (Especially because the corruption seems to happen after download, and because multiple applications are affected).

Try this:

Restart computer.

Open a file into Photoshop and resize it to something huge, like a 1 gig file.  Make a chang to the file several times (at least one change for each gig of RAM in the machine).  See if you can force a crash (Bad RAM will crash the program or machine when it gets used, generally). 

If you can force a crash, then repeat with each RAM chip removed in sequence (in most cases, the Apple-supplied RAM will not be the culprit).  See if one particular chip's removal can stop the crashing.

It could also be a bad hard drive, but I'd bet on the RAM.
Peter

[rosey]

Hey Peter,

Nice to know,....we will try and get that repaired asap. Someone else also confirmed that it may be an issue with either bad hardware or bad ram. He performed some diagnostics and ran diskwarrior, which seemed to have corrected the problem momentarily,...however we are still seeing some of those weird corruptions. It seemed that the computer itself was glitchy,..ie icons were truncated etc.  I am hopeful your diagnosis will be helpful.

Thanks, I will let you know what happens.

Rosey