Organizer displays in hourglass instead of thumbnail pics

[tmhaist]

I am getting really frustrated. I have been using Photoshop Elements 5 for about 6 months and everything was going fine until about 1 month ago. The last few times I transferred pictures from my camera to photoshop in the organizer they show up as an hourglass over each picture. I take alot of high school sports pictures and I like to see the pictures in the organizer so I can pick and choose pictures easier. I found another thread on here about the same thing and I tried updating the thumbnail but nothing happens. Please is there anybody who can help me - this is driving me nuts.:confused:
Thanks/Tracy

[Ward Grant]

Hello Tracy and welcome to the forum,
Whenever Organizer starts acting up, a good first step is File>Catalog>Recover, which helps straighten out the underlying Ms Access database.

Another usual cause for missing thumbnails would be if the images were moved/renamed/moved outside of Elements, usually with Windows Explorer. Have you made any such moves lately?

Also, have you checked/defragged your hard disk lately? Just curious how full it is? Not having enough free space can cause some hiccups.

If these hints do not help, post back and we'll see what we can do.

[tmhaist]

I tried the File>Catalog>Recover and nothing happened and then I defragged my hard disk and that didn't work. I don't think I have moved anything outside of elements. It shows that I have 30.5 GB of free space on my hard drive. Also if I edit a picture that didn't have an hourglass over when I get done editing it there is an hourglass over it. Thanks for you help. :) Tracy

[Ward Grant]

Tracy
This is odd behavior, especially the part about a newly edited picture becoming an hourglass. It sounds like you have plenty of free space.

How much RAM do you have? There has been some similar problems in the past, but mostly with extremely large files. Are you doing any extreme editing (multiple layers with special effects on each layer) on all the pictures? I'm thinking no by your post, but just trying to see what is happening

I'm thinking the thumbnail cache needs to be rebuilt for some reason. Here is a "might help, can't hurt" idea.
Open Organizer at a time when you don't need the computer for awhile.
Do a Cntl+A to select all the images and then Right Click one of the pictures. Update Selected Thumbnails.
If you get a popup asking to reconnect any missing files, either reconnect them or delete from catalog (but not hard disk).
Walk away from the unit for an hour-it may not take too long, but sitting there watching it does nothing and it may takes this long, depending upon how many pictures you have.
Hopefully, when you get back, your thumbnails will have returned.

[tmhaist]

Well I did the Update Selected Thumbnails and now all of my thumbnails have an hourglass over them. So that didn't do the trick.:) I believe I have 512 MB of RAM. And no I haven't done any extreme editing just some editing on some pictures. I'm getting tired of looking at the hourglasses. Thanks again for your help.

[Ward Grant]

Hello Tracy
I hope you come back to this thread
Okay this is really strange behavior.
Would you be willing to try a couple of more things-
File>Catalog>New and call it Test. File>Get Photos and select four or five photos. Do you still get the thumbnails? You can then do File>Catalog>Open and point back to your regular organizer. (We'll leave Test for now; we can delete it later).

I know this sounds basic, but these photos are on your hard drive, correct? Not an external drive or CD/DVDs? When you open Organizer, go to bottom left and change to Folder View (if you don't use that already). Make a note of where Organizer says your photo is (the folder name will be across the top of each folder). Look in Windows Explorer and confirm the photos are actually in the same folder. Also, do you have a rough estimate of number of pictures (500 or 5,000 type of guess).

If you post back with these answers, we can try a few things. Your 512 of RAM should be plenty

[tmhaist]

OK I made a test catalog and put about 36 photos in it. They all show in the thumbnail as pictures.

Yes the photos are on my hard drive. In the bottom left of my organizer the choices are Date (newest first), Date (oldest first), Import Batch and Folder Location. I switched to Folder Location and almost all of my folders are by date. Then I went to Windows Explorer and yes the same pictures are in the same dated folder. I have a little more than 4100 pictures. I really appreciate you taking the time to help me with this. I know just enough about computers to be dangerous.:) Tracy

[Ward Grant]

Thanks for hanging in there-the fact a new catalog shows images is good.
Here is my suggestion (with a tip of the hat to Barb O for some hints she sent me)
Close Organizer.
Open Windows Explorer and click Tools>Folder Options>View and then be sure Show Hidden Files and Folder is clicked on and then Apply to All Folders (this is just to be sure we can see some things Adobe hides by default).
I am assuming you are using the default Organizer location so go to
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Adobe\Catalog Folders and find the My Catalog folder. I am talking the folder, not the My Catalog.PSA file.
Move this folder to your Recycle Bin, but do not erase it yet.
Open Organizer and see if you notice any difference. There are some "support" files in this folder, including your thumbnails, that will get rebuilt so it may take a few minutes. If you start to see your thumbnails reappear, do the "Nanny-Nanny-hoo-hoo" dance while the machine builds all the thumbnails
Hopefully this will correct the problem.

If this does not fix the problem, I would then try this:
Close Organizer and repeat the steps above.
Look in C:\Documents and Settings\UserName\Application Data\Adobe\Photoshop Elements\x.0\Organizer and find a status.dat file
Move this file to your recycle bin and open Organizer.
UserName will be your user name
x.0 will be the version of PSE you have 3.0, 4.0 or 5.0

[tmhaist]

Thank you so much. I don't know if I did the right "Nanny-Nanny-hoo-hoo" dance but it was close. Although in Nebraska I think every dance has to have something to do with "GO BIG RED".

I moved the folder My Catalog to the recycle bin and when I opened my organizer all of my pictures began appearing. I am so happy.:) :D

A couple of more questions - when I went into the Catalog Folders and found the My Catalog Folder I also have a Catalog1 folder and a Catalog2 Folder. Do I do anything with those?? And do you know why this happened and did I do something to dumb to begin with? Also can I now delete my recycle bin with the My Catalog Folder in it? Thanks again for all of your help. I never would have figured it out on my own. Tracy

[Ward Grant]

Tracy-In the words of Col. John "Hannibal" Smith of the A-Team, "I love it when a plan comes together."

As for the "extra" catalogs, these would normally be created if you upgraded versions. The existing catalog is renamed My Catalog-1.PSA. Each catalog has its own support folders. If you don't have the dash (My Catalog1), then I am not sure.

Once your are comfortable with your system, you can delete all the extra catalogs, the associated folders and the files you moved to the Recycle Bin. They do no harm so you can leave them for a few days, if you need to.