P: Labeling Problem when assigning Color Labels under a Filter on currently assigned Color Labels

[b_gossweiler]

LR 3.4.1 or 3.5RC, Win7 64-Bit:

When changing the color label (while a filter only showing images with an already existing color label is active), the change sometimes affects more than one image at a time.

Steps to reproduce:

1. Create new catalog, set AutoAdvance off

1. Import 6 images into the catalog

1. Go to AllPhotographs view

1. Select all 6 images using Ctrl-A

1. Click on label Red in the toolbar

1. Select Attribute Filter, only showing images labeled Red

1. Select first image only

1. Click on label Purple in the toolbar
   -> Image1 disappears, because Purple was assigned which does not match filter Red
   -> Selection is set to 2nd image automatically

1. Repeat for each of the 6 images
   -> sometimes (often), 2 images disappear because Red is removed from the first image worked on, and Purple is assigned to the next image automatically.

This behaviour is sporadic, but often enouth it can be called reproducible. It can can occur on any given image in the set or not, sometimes it happens on the 1st image already, sometimes on the 2nd, 3rd or 4th and so on, sometimes not at all. I am able to reproduce it about every second time I try though.

I've recorded a little screen capture with showing the behaviour here. In the example, when assigning purple to Image3, Image3 and Image4 disappear from the filter, because Image3 looses its label and Image4 gets purple assingned to it.

Beat

[Geoff the kiwi]

I can repeat this on a Mac as well. Check the number count in a smart collection set with a colour label and when changing the colour to another the count will often go down by two or more.

[ssprengel]

To fix the issue, in pseudocode:

GetCurrentImage().RemoveColorLabel(Red);
GetCurrentImage().AddColorLabel(Purple);

should be replaced with:

tempContext = GetCurrentImage();
tempContext.RemoveColorLabel(Red);
tempContext.AddColorLabel(Purple);

This ensures the image context of the RemoveColorLabel and AddColorLabel are the same image, even if the current image context has changed due to filter doing its job.

[Geoff the kiwi]

Where would you place that Steve?
I'm not sure that customers ought to be asked to do this though.

[ssprengel]

The Adobe Lightroom Developers should be asked to do this, in the Lightroom program anywhere more than one operation is supposed to be happening to the same image, but where the current-image-context is being determined more than once and so is prone to being changed based on other things happening in other threads.

Hopefully someone with a clue at Adobe will see this thread since Support didn't seem to understand or the communication between Support and Task-generation is too opaque. Seeing as Support is in India and the Developers could be in California, I'd suspect both understanding and communication are an issue.

[Cletus]

I've had (and reported) this problem or one very similar to it since v2.7. As I see it there is a disconnect as changing an images color label seems t be a two step operation. In step one the color is removed from the image
At that point the image in focus loses focus and the next image gets Focus (auto Advance)
In step 2 the image with focus gets assigned the new color label.

A partial workaround is to turn off Auto Advance

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

Cletus, I just tried out the auto advance "on" vs "off" and the problem persists in both scenarios on my computer.

[ssprengel]

Changing a color with Auto Advance On would have the same problem as changing the color when a color-filter is enabled, because both Auto Advance and Filter-By-Color change the image context while the color is changing.

[Cletus]

As I said this is a partial workaround. The label color changing issue is also apparent when the Color filter is off.

With Auto Advance ON select several images from the grid
Assign the color Red to these selected images
Deselect these images and select the first red labeled image.
Change its color to purple
The result: The selected image now has no label, the next image has a Purple label.

With Auto Advance OFF select several images from the grid
Assign the color Red to these selected images
Deselect these images and select the first red labeled image.
Change its color to purple
The result: The selected image now has a Purple Label, the next image is not selected

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

So let me say 2 things, one subjective and one objective:

1) It is really refreshing to see some actual people addressing this issue after over a month of dealing with Adobe technical support and feeling like I was on an island or at least had the worst malfunctioning computer / keyboard or mouse in the world

2) This problem did not seem to exist in earlier versions of Lightroom and it seems to be affecting a rudimentary function of the program that should not have changed through the versions, so it would make sense to me if someone in programming or QA would just take a look at the selection/flagging/labeling code and simply change it back to the way it used to be! Or am I simplifying the problem/solution?

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

One more thing to add -- I just downloaded the Lightroom 3.5 RC to see if by chance the problem had corrected itself -- the problem still exists both with the non-filtered auto advance scenario described by Cletus above as well as with the filters-on, non-auto advance scenario I have been experiencing from the start.

Is it possible to get this problem addressed/noticed by the 3.5 RC Adobe people to give it some visibility?

[Geoff the kiwi]

I have notified the Lightroom team.

[b_gossweiler]

How can it be that so many people are discussing possible workarounds and pseudocode on how to fix the issue, but the vote count is only 2 at this point of time ?? :(

Beat

[Geoff the kiwi]

I voted Beat, have you 😞

[b_gossweiler]

I know that yours and mine are the only 2 votes on the thread right now .... 😞

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

I hadn't voted, Beat, because I was initially unable to replicate as I was using the numerical keys 6-9 to change the colour labels. However, as soon as I switched to using the colour boxes in the toolbar I saw the problem. So it would seem the problem is confined to changing colour labels using the toolbar, but not when using the number keys. At least that's how it happens on my two systems. So I have now voted!

LR2.7 seems OK though!

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

I just voted, To be honest, this was the first I was aware of this "Photoshop family" forum, otherwise this is the first place I would have voiced my issue, given the attention it has gotten. And I would have been vote number 1.

In fact , you have inspired me to report another bug relating to the Stars and Color Label display, see http://feedback.photoshop.com/photosh...

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

HERE WE GO AGAIN - after crossing my fingers with Release 3.6 and it wasn't fixed, I was extremely disappointed to see that this problem still has not been fixed with Lightroom4.

As I tried to emphasize before, this seems like a significant problem that MANY Lightroom users should be upset with because it defeats one of the prime purposes of using Lightroom, to be able to filter quickly and accurately.

I have been using the workaround (i.e. using the keypad) but the key problem with that is it limits the number of flags I can use (i.e. where is the purple color label key?)

Any thoughts?

[LRuser24]

Yes, still present in 4.0 - and the problem has my vote now, too.

This is a slightly disturbing bug because some photos may get the wrong label unnoticed - or even worse, get marked "rejected" leading to their later deletion. However, I was not able to reproduce this bug using the reject button - only using the color labels as described by the OP (didn't try the rating). But if someone uses color labels to categorize photos leading to their deletion, this may be an equally severe problem.

P.S. I don't think there is a label key for purple 😉

[cygie]

For some time I have suspected that I was "loosing " images that I had filtered based on their colour label. I have narrowed it down to changing the colour label of an image in just one particular way.

I think that the errors occured in in Lightroom 3 but they it always occurs in version 4

Using Develop mode

I label several images to one colour eg blue

In the filmstrip using the colour label filter select for example blue and purple which will still show all the images labelled as above

Using the colour buttons on the toolbar under the image, change the colour label of an image to purple, Since the filter is set to blue and purple the image should still be present in the filmstrip but it is missing

Searching for the image via other means eg filename I find that the colour label has been reset to none instead of changing to purple

This only happens if the colour change is done using the toolbar buttons, using any of the text menus that access the colour labels the problem doesn't occur.

The error is not limited to blue and purple labels

Am I missing something? Can anyone replicate this ?

regards

Wes

[LRuser24]

Still happens in 4.1 RC 😞

[cygie]

I have had several people give me links to other posts that span a couple of years regarding the same problem, so one would think that by now Adobe would manage to get this sorted !

[Benjamin Warde]

This issue has been fixed in Lightroom 4.1, which is now available. To download the 4.1 update, go to the Help menu in Lightroom and choose "Check for Updates".

Thanks,
Ben

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

Which product are you using?
Which version?

And area you sure you aren't just using a Grayscale or Bitmap image (which can't have color)?

[David Mohr]

Also, Gwen, could you have used one of the Type Mask Tools by accident?