Participant

Answered

Prevent Bridge from importing duplicates?

Forum|Forum|4 years ago
December 7, 2021
3 replies
3641 views

I'm using Bridge on Max OSX Monterey (up to date version as of Dec 7 2021) and the import dialog works nicely EXCEPT it imports everything on my SD card on my camera, including TONS of duplicates from imports that have already taken place.

I don't delete my files from my SD card until the card is nearly full. Its a simple effective backup in case something happens to the imports before they are stored in the cloud.

But the impact of this is that everything I import from today's shoot is fine but the software also re-imports everything I shot yesterday and already imported.

I'd like to keep my workflow simple and effective, and toggle the ability to not import files that have alraedy been imported. But I cannot find this option in Bridge and the import dialog box.

This topic has been closed for replies.

Correct answer gary_sc

Hi Nathan,

First off, congrats on recognizing you do not want to delete files from the card until you have backups. This is a GREAT practice to follow.

Unfortunately there is no mechanism currently in PhotoDownloader that can automatically select only the recent shoot. In Lightroom Classic, you cannot import the same image you already have imported, but you're not working with Lightroom Classic.

I can think of two options for you.

1) If you go into Advance mode in the PhotoDownloader, you can see two buttons on the bottom: one that "Checks all," the other "Unchecks all." First, click on the Uncheck All. Now, scroll to the bottom which is where the latest files are found. Click on the last file, the last image in the list. Now scroll upward until you see that first image that you took that day (the dates should be visible) and Shift-click that file. At this point, all of the images you took that day are selected. Now tap the "Check all" button and only THOSE files will be checked. You can now download only those images and past images will not be downloaded.

Process #2) (FWIW, this is what I do when I'm on holiday and I'm using my wife's laptop)

I download all of the images from that day's shoot and spend the evening working on the images until I'm done for the day. I then take an external hard drive I travel with and download all of the images and the work I did onto the hard drive. I now have two copies of the images: one on the computer and one on the hard drive. Once I've done that I know it's safe to format the card in my camera and I can go out the next day and take more photos.

Let me know if either of these work for you.

ا

ايهاب27019517hyvl

Participant

نعم صحيح

gary_sc

Correct answer

Community Expert

Hi Nathan,

First off, congrats on recognizing you do not want to delete files from the card until you have backups. This is a GREAT practice to follow.

Unfortunately there is no mechanism currently in PhotoDownloader that can automatically select only the recent shoot. In Lightroom Classic, you cannot import the same image you already have imported, but you're not working with Lightroom Classic.

I can think of two options for you.

1) If you go into Advance mode in the PhotoDownloader, you can see two buttons on the bottom: one that "Checks all," the other "Unchecks all." First, click on the Uncheck All. Now, scroll to the bottom which is where the latest files are found. Click on the last file, the last image in the list. Now scroll upward until you see that first image that you took that day (the dates should be visible) and Shift-click that file. At this point, all of the images you took that day are selected. Now tap the "Check all" button and only THOSE files will be checked. You can now download only those images and past images will not be downloaded.

Process #2) (FWIW, this is what I do when I'm on holiday and I'm using my wife's laptop)

I download all of the images from that day's shoot and spend the evening working on the images until I'm done for the day. I then take an external hard drive I travel with and download all of the images and the work I did onto the hard drive. I now have two copies of the images: one on the computer and one on the hard drive. Once I've done that I know it's safe to format the card in my camera and I can go out the next day and take more photos.

Let me know if either of these work for you.

nathan_hAuthor

Participant

Thank you very much for sharing these workarounds.

While this doesn't fix Bridge/Photodownloader per se, these two workarounds provide a solution until Adobe fixes it within the software.

So I'll mark this as a solution, since these ideas work, even though the best solution would be a fix from Adobe.

gary_sc

Community Expert

Hi Nathan,

Thank you for appreciating my approaches to resolving your issue, but I do understand, there's nothing broken here. This is working as expected.

Let me explain: if you were working in Lightroom Classic, the files are entered into the database that LRC functions around (in a nutshell, LRC is ACR with a Database. It's more than that, of course, but in the grand scheme of things, that's what it is). So when you've Imported the file AG_05493.CR2 into LRC, it can go, "Oh, I've seen that file before, I will not let the user import it a 2nd time."

But Bridge has no database structure whatsoever. If anything, controlling Bridge is pretty much Fleshware (if you're familiar with the term). Simply, there is no way for Bridge to know that yesterday's files have already been downloaded. To make that step would require a LOT of engineering time that could probably be better used in other areas. (Sadly, Bridge has way too many bugs as it is.)

About the only thing I can think of to help you on this is to make a Feature Request for Bridge to only allow "Today's images." Alternatively (maybe better), have a list of dates that images were taken, and you select which ones you want to download. (I realized that the problem with "Today's images" is what do you do if you took a few images AFTER you downloaded yesterday's images. There's no way for ANYONE to know which images were yesterday's images.

Let me finish this with the fact that I do have to deal with what you're dealing with, albeit in a very different structure: I am the Editor of the newsletter for a woodworking club I belong to, and to help even out workloads, one of the other members takes the photos*. He, like you, formats the card when he wants to, not in any formal way. I didn't know this when he started taking photos for the newsletter, and I went ahead and downloaded all the images while I was doing some other tasks and found not only the photos from the last meeting but photos of the previous meeting as well as family photos and his general photos.

That's when I got into the habit of looking for specific dates of our meeting before downloading images.

*needless to say, since Covid and our meetings are now on Zoom, this is not an issue.

Sahil.Chawla

Adobe Employee

Hi there,

Sorry to hear about this. Could you please try resetting the preferences of Bridge and let us know if it helps? https://helpx.adobe.com/bridge/kb/troubleshoot-errors-freezes-bridge.html

Regards,
Sahi

nathan_hAuthor

Participant

Thank you for the recommendation.

It does not appear that this prevents Bridge from re-importing the same photos a second (and third etc) time each time.

Sign up

To post, reply, or follow discussions, please sign in with your Adobe ID.

Sign in to Adobe Community

To post, reply, or follow discussions, please sign in with your Adobe ID.

Scanning file for viruses.

This file cannot be downloaded