PSE5 Nikon D80 raw OK in editor, not organizer

[billferreira]

I've been running PSE4 for years and it works fine with my Nikon D80 files with ACR 3.7. A copy of PSE5 came with a Canon scanner we just purchased and it installed fine but could not handle my D80 raw (NEF) files in either the editor or organizer.

Updated to ACR 4.5 and the editor can edit the files but the Organizer still can't display them. Tried ACR 3.7 which handles them fine in PE4 and that didn't work either. When ACR opens in the Editor, it does show that it is running ACR 4.5.

It doesn't matter whether PE5 is started from the Organizer or the Editor, the same result occurs. PE4 & 5 are both on the machine at the same time. PE4 still works just fine. Of course I don't try to open them both at the same time.

And oh yes, I've tried rebooting and checking for updates. PE5 is at 5.0.2 which is the latest level according to Adobe.

Windows XPP is the OS.

Thanks Bill

[johnrellis]

What is the precise error message when you try to import one of the raw files into the Organizer using File > Get Photos And Videos > From Files And Folders?

[billferreira]

What is the precise error message when you try to import one of the raw files into the Organizer using File > Get Photos And Videos > From Files And Folders?

I'm not importing any photos, just opening the PE4 catalog in PE5. I did recover the catalog to no effect. More details:

there is a folder with a set of D80 raw files which have not been edited yet
these images were imported into PE4 last year
some of the files show the small images in the organizer
some of the files show a greyed out image with the broken link symbol - a picture torn in half with the lower right corner folded over
I can click on any of these images and choose Edit
whether the image showed correctly or with the broken link image, ACR edited the image correctly
I just noticed, none of the D80 images have any Metadata in PE5
the metadata displays correctly in PE4


Thanks for taking the time to address my problem,
Bill

[billferreira]

What is the precise error message when you try to import one of the raw files into the Organizer using File > Get Photos And Videos > From Files And Folders?

I'm not importing any photos, just opening the PE4 catalog in PE5. I did recover the catalog to no effect. More details:

there is a folder with a set of D80 raw files which have not been edited yet
these images were imported into PE4 last year
some of the files show the small images in the organizer
some of the files show a greyed out image with the broken link symbol - a picture torn in half with the lower right corner folded over
I can click on any of these images and choose Edit
whether the image showed correctly or with the broken link image, ACR edited the image correctly
I just noticed, none of the D80 images have any Metadata in PE5
the metadata displays correctly in PE4


Things are getting stranger. I just reopened the catalog in the PE4 organizer (PE5 closed of course). At first all the images were displaying correctly with the metadata. As I watched, the raw file images were replace with the broken file image and the metadata was erased.

Perhaps I should have migrated the catalog to PE5 but could not find any convert or import command. Hence I recovered the catalog thinking that would do the conversion.

This is probably a huge "user error" and fortunately I can return to a PE4 backup and just forget about PE5. But I was doing this as a trial as I'm planning to buy PE8 whenever it makes its appearance. BTW, I started on PE1 and migrated through 2 and 3 to 4 with nary a problem.

Thanks for taking the time to address my problem,
Bill

[johnrellis]

It's been several years since I moved up to 5 from 4. But searching the documentation indicates that there was no conversion required (as there is moving to 6 or from 6 to 7). Here's what the Read Me for 5 says:
1. Adobe does not recommend switching between older and newer versions of the Photoshop Elements Organizer.
...
4. If you are upgrading from Photoshop Elements 3 or earlier, Photoshop Album, or Photoshop Album Starter Edition, after installing Photoshop Elements 5.0, you should select all the files in your Organizer catalog, and use the Edit > Update Thumbnail for Selected Items command (Control+Shift+U) to rebuild all the thumbnails for your files. This will optimize scroll speed in the Organizer.
5. Updating previous catalogs (more than 30,000 photos) can take over an hour. Even longer if upgrading from older versions. Please be patient!

Even though step 4 says it applies to upgrading from PSE 3 or Album, I would still do it, since you're having thumbnail problems. It could be that was your problem.

Also, doing File > Catalog > Recover can't hurt.

[billferreira]

- reverted to the PE4 catalog
- opened PE5 in the Organizer
- PE5 converted the catalog
- same problem with D80 images
- broken picture images
- no metadata
- edit/update thumbnail for a couple selected images
- no change
- recover the catalog
- no change
- edit/update thumbnail
- no change

Guess it is time to dump PE5 and go back to PE4 which doesn't bode well for my formerly planned migration to PE8. I definitely won't buy it unless they have at least a free 14 day trial.

Thanks for all the time you've put into this,
Bill

[johnrellis]

Adobe has provided 30-day free trials for past versions of PSE, so I'd expect there will be one for PSE 8. You could download the free trial for PSE 7 to see how well the conversion will likely go. Between 5 and 6 Adobe completely changed the catalog database format, and there was almost no change between 6 and 7.

[JonE]

Read this:

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/326/326616.html

and this:

http://support.nikontech.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/12591

The 2nd article may be more on point. Windows has some trouble displaying thumbnails for Nikon raw (NEF) files. This is true in Windows Explorer and carries over into Organizer. (It's my theory but I can't prove it htat Organizer basically uses Windows Explorer.) You may need the NEF file viewere to allow PSE to display its thumbnails correctly. THe one referenced is a Windows XP fix. I couldn't quickly find one for Vista - not sure one is needed. I don't think I have one on my Vista system but can't recall for sure. I definitely had to install the NEF viewer fix on my prior XP system.

This will give you a chuckle:

http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop/nikonraw.html

[billferreira]

Actually there is no connection between the Windows RAW viewer and the organizer, the organizer displayed RAW images for years before they were supported by Windows. The only requirement is that there be a version of ACR which both supports the desired format and works with a given level of Elements. So it is not possible to view Nikon D300 images in Elements 4 because the version of ACR which supports the D300 does not work with Elements 4.

Now to the resolution of the problem. I had restored my system back to Elements 4 both the software and the Elements catalog. Scanning through the images in the Organizer, I found random errors of two types: 1) no meta-data or 2) no meta-data and a corrupt thumbnail. Using Edit / Update Thumbnail would not fix the problem with the corrupt image.

So as a test, I deleted one of the error type 2 images and re-imported it with "From Files and Folders", just the one image mind you. All of a sudden, hundreds of the broken images were no longer broken. Furthermore, updating the thumbnails is now working.

So overnight I recovered the thumbnails of about 3,000 of the almost 12,000 images in my catalog and the recover of the catalog just completed before I saw your response. So it looks like my system is back in sound condition.

The next steps are to complete the updating of the thumbnails, probably another dozen hours or so, recover the catalog again, back everything up and then re-try Elements 5.

I appreciate everyone's help on this matter and I don't pretend to understand what happened or why "my fix" worked, but there is again peace on the home front.

Bill

[billferreira]

If you didn't read my prior response, please read that one first otherwise this one is not likely to make a lot of sense.

So I followed the final steps that were outlined above and PE5 still had the same errors as before. Next I replaced ACR 4.5 (the one recommended by Adobe for PE5) with ACR 3.7 (the one for PE4).

The result was many broken thumbnails for D80 raw images but all the meta-data is present. Using the tip outlined by someone much earlier in this thread to use Edit / Update Thumbnails, everything is now working correctly.

More testing to come of course but at least success is in sight. Though someone locally is offering a copy of Lightroom 2 for $100 and I'd be sorely tempted to switch if Adobe didn't do such a poor job implementing sidecars. Maybe they'll finally get it right with Lightroom 3 but that's a topic for another thread.

Bill

[billferreira]

People have asked this question on this and other forums from all over the world but no one has ever come up with a solution. Any new news?

Choose Edit
then Preferences
then Files

and then...

Microsoft Visual C++ Runtime Library
Buffer overrun detected!
Program: ...op Elements5.0\PhotoshopElementsOrganizer.exe
A buffer overrun has been detected which has corrupted the program's internal state. The program cannot safely continue execution and must now be terminated.

[Barb O]

"no one has ever come up with a solution"


I would suspect that deleting the Preferences file for the Organizer would be a start.

I am looking for the Adobe technical document for v5 which describes how to do that action to give you a specific reference..

HERE IS THE REFERENCE

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/333/333200.html

Step 4 shows how to find and rename the psa.prf Organizer preferences file while PSE in not running

Note: you do NOT need to do the Registry changes discussed in that point 4

FYI- If that does not work, then either post back for more discussion OR close down PSE again and try renaming the entire folder in which the psa.prf file is contained.

[billferreira]

I doubt they apply to my situation since PE5 was a fresh install. To be sure, I uninstalled and reinstalled it and the problem still exists. I have never modified the preference file either, my attempt to do so crashes PE with the C++ error.

I have downloaded the PE7 trial and it seems to be working fine. However it expires in 30 days and PE8 might not be out by then so I may be PE-less for a few months as I'm not going to pay for PE7 and then have to do it again a couple months later.

Thanks for your suggestion,
Bill

[treezza1953]

I am not trying to change from one PSE version to another. I have downloaded the Camera Raw update 4.4.1 so I can get raw files from my D80. I cannot get them into the Organizer, but I can open them in the Editor. I can still bring in raw D70 files, though. There is a problem related to the D80 raw files. I suspect this is a software problem. I have teh same problem when using the earlier update version 3.6 which should accommodate D80 raw files. This too does not bring files into the Organizer.

[billferreira]

That is the only one that worked for me in PE4 & PE5. The newer one up to and including 4.6 would not handle my D80 images.

[johnrellis]

I cannot get them into the Organizer, but I can open them in the Editor.
What is the precise error message when you do File > Get Photos And Videos > From Files And Folders of one of the problem photos?

[billferreira]

Treeza1953

I forgot to add to my previous reply to your question that I had exactly the same problem. My D80 raw images were not viewable in the organizer, just the broken link icon. However I could click on the image, opened it in the editor and ACR would handle the image just fine.

The problem existed with both ACR 4.5 and 4.6, it goes away with 3.7.

Bill

[johnrellis]

Let's verify that Treeza1953 does indeed have the same symptoms by finding out what happens as the result of File > Get Photos And Videos.

[johnrellis]

My D80 raw images were not viewable in the organizer, just the broken link icon. However I could click on the image, opened it in the editor and ACR would handle the image just fine.

The problem existed with both ACR 4.5 and 4.6, it goes away with 3.7.

Bill,

One thing we forgot to check was your installation of the new ACR 4.6 plug in. You need to ensure that there is exactly one copy of the Camera Raw.8bi in your Plug-Ins\File Formats folder. If you rename the old version in place, e.g. to Camera Raw.8bi.old, or if you create a subfolder of File Formats and place the old version there, the Oganizer will still load it. The Editor uses different rules for loading plug-ins and in these cases could load the new version while the Organizer is loading the old one.

You can double-check where the Organizer is loading ACR from by looking at its Log.txt file:

http://www.johnrellis.com/psedbtool/photoshopelements-6-7-faq.htm#Examine_the_Organizers_log_file

[billferreira]

That fixed it. What do you think they were smoking when they came up with that idea, renaming old versions (or creating a previous version folder) is just about a standard? Funny that it worked through V4 and they broke it with V5.

Thanks for your help. I now have licensed V4 & V5 as well as a V7 trial all working "sort of" at the same time but will be sticking with V5 until V8 appears.

Bill

[johnrellis]

Great, glad it's working.