Skip to main content
_
_Thom_Pantazi_
Participant
December 10, 2008
Question

Newbie Question

  • December 10, 2008
  • 2 replies
  • 681 views
First I want to apologize for a long message. I thought it was necessary to be very detailed to explain the problem.

I am an absolute newbie to Photoshop Bridge and workflow in the Mac world. I have been doing workflow on a PC for many years. I try to use the tool on my Mac using Parallels but Parallels has a hard time with removable media. I love my Mac and want to find a way to do what I have been doing for years using my Mac and Adobe tools. Here is what I do in a nutshell using a tool that does all of these steps:

1. Insert the memory card
2. The card is detected and the tool fires up
3. The tool reads the card and list the image files found on the card.
4. I can either highlight some of them or all of them.
5. The tool allows me to specify a "job code". (this is basically the description of the group of images.)
6. I choose to download the images. Again either all or a selection.
7. The tool processes the images. I will describe what processes means below.
8. After the process is complete, I delete the selection I processed.
9. If I did a selection and not the whole set, I choose another selection and go back to step 5.

Before I describe the "Process", I want to explain a bit about the optional settings the tool allows me to set.

A. You can have the tool set the image files to read only if you choose to.
B. The tool can read metadata from the image files such as camera brand and model, in addition to the obvious date and time details. These values can get used as tokens to set both the folder and file names.

Process Description

I have established a storage methodology that has me storing the files in a folder hierarchy that looks like this:

/Photos/YYYY/MM-DD Description/

Within those folders I store the image files without changing their names. This is not necessarily a requirement, it is just how I have done it for years.

For example I might have the following:

/Photos/2005/12-24 Christmas Eve/IMG2048.JPG
/Photos/2005/12-24 Christmas Eve/IMG2048.CR2
/Photos/2005/12-24 Christmas Eve/IMG2049.JPG
/Photos/2005/12-24 Christmas Eve/IMG2049.CR2
/Photos/2005/12-24 Christmas Eve/IMG2050.JPG
/Photos/2005/12-24 Christmas Eve/IMG2050.CR2
/Photos/2005/12-25 Christmas Morning/IMG2051.JPG
/Photos/2005/12-25 Christmas Morning/IMG2051.CR2
/Photos/2005/12-25 Christmas Morning/IMG2052.JPG
/Photos/2005/12-25 Christmas Morning/IMG2052.CR2
/Photos/2005/12-25 Christmas Morning/IMG2053.JPG
/Photos/2005/12-25 Christmas Morning/IMG2053.CR2

In addition to that basic hierarchy, I also include a bit of metadata. Since I know who owns which camera models, I can add the name of the
photographer to the folder. See below:

/Photos/2005/12-25 Dad Christmas Morning/IMG2051.JPG
/Photos/2005/12-25 Dad Christmas Morning/IMG2051.CR2

or

/Photos/2005/12-25 Jessie Christmas Morning/DSC2051.JPG
/Photos/2005/12-25 Jessie Christmas Morning/DSC2051.CR2

This is done via a token replacement.

With this folder hierarchy described, I can finish the process description. The tool will determine the folders that is needs to store the images into. If they are not already created, the tool creates them then it copies the images to the folders.

I am pretty sure I can do what my older tool does using Adobe Bridge and Scripting.
This topic has been closed for replies.

2 replies

_
_xbytor_
Known Participant
December 14, 2008
Thom_Pantazi@adobeforums.com wrote:
> First I want to apologize for a long message. I thought it was necessary to be very detailed to explain the problem.
>
> I am an absolute newbie to Photoshop Bridge and workflow in the Mac world. I have been doing workflow on a PC for many years. I try to use the tool on my Mac using Parallels but Parallels has a hard time with removable media. I love my Mac and want to find a way to do what I have been doing for years using my Mac and Adobe tools. Here is what I do in a nutshell using a tool that does all of these steps:
>
> 1. Insert the memory card
> 2. The card is detected and the tool fires up
> 3. The tool reads the card and list the image files found on the card.
> 4. I can either highlight some of them or all of them.
> 5. The tool allows me to specify a "job code". (this is basically the description of the group of images.)
> 6. I choose to download the images. Again either all or a selection.

Workflow change for 1-6:
1 - Insert card
2 - Copy card contents to a working directory
3 - Browse to this directory and select the files you want to process.

_Never_ work on images while they are on a card or on the camera. Far too many
bad things can happen.

> 7. The tool processes the images. I will describe what processes means below.
> 8. After the process is complete, I delete the selection I processed.
> 9. If I did a selection and not the whole set, I choose another selection and go back to step 5.
>

> I have established a storage methodology that has me storing the files in a folder hierarchy that looks like this:
>
> /Photos/YYYY/MM-DD Description/

The builtin Bridge Batch Rename can change file names based on metadata. As far
as I can tell, it cannot do the same with folder names.

> I am pretty sure I can do what my older tool does using Adobe Bridge and Scripting.

I agree. As an example, here's a segment that I use for do the same kind of
process. 'Incoming' is the folder where I've copied the images from a card
reader, and 'Sorted' is where the files are sorted by capture date and stored.
This was written for PS, but similar logic would apply in plain Bridge. It also
uses a bunch of the xtools library routines which tends to simplify the code.

-X



var inFolder = new Folder(Folder.desktop + "/Incoming");
var outFolder = new Folder(Folder.desktop + "/Sorted");

var dateTag = 'CreateDate';

function main() {
// var files = Stdlib.getImageFiles(inFolder);
var files = Stdlib.getImageFiles(inFolder);

XBridgeTalk.startApplication(XBridgeTalk.getAppSpecifier("bridge"));

var dates = XBridgeTalk.getMetadataValue(files, dateTag);

for (var i = 0; i < dates.length; i++) {
var dateStr = dates;
var file = files;
var date = Stdlib.parseISODateString(dateStr);
var fname = date.strftime("%Y-%m-%d");
var folder = new Folder(outFolder + '/' + fname);
if (!folder.exists) {
folder.create();
}
var name = file.name.replace(/_DSC/, "DSC_");
var outf = File(folder + '/' + name);
file.copy(outf);
}

alert(i + " images imported");
};

main();
_
_xbytor_
Known Participant
December 14, 2008
6. I choose to download the images. Again either all or a selection.
>
> Workflow change for 1-6:
> 1 - Insert card
> 2 - Copy card contents to a working directory
> 3 - Browse to this directory and select the files you want to process.

Two other steps that would normally go here are:
4 - Delete any obviously flawed/unrecoverable images.
5 - Apply any metadata (keywords, descriptions) where appropriate.


If you convert raw images to DNG, now would probably be the time. I'll probably
be adding that step to my import script.

-X
_
_Thom_Pantazi_Author
Participant
December 13, 2008
I am surprised that no one responded to my post.
Terms & ConditionsAccessibility statement
Using the community Terms of use Privacy Cookie preferences Do not sell or share my personal information ad choicesAdChoices