Thumbnail or photo scanning feature

[Nikon Girl]

I have done a weeklong shoot in raw and have over 100 photos that I need to compare and label before moving to editing. It does not appear affinity has a thumbnail or peek preview, can you please advise how I can glance and rummage through photos to sort and label rather than engage the arduous task of uploading each photo into  into affinity? I am a mac user. Thank you.

[thomaso]

Hi Nikon Girl,
Welcome to the Affinity forums!

On mac doesn't the Finder work for you? You can set it to icon view, adjust its icon sizes. Also the finder's gallery view may be an option which displays a larger thumbnail than icon view but only 1 at a time.

Additionally you can use QuickLook (space key) to display a scalable preview, if more than 1 image is selected then QuickLook opens them all in one window with navigation via mouse or arrow keys. Also, if you select in a finder window just 1 image and view it via quicklook then you can simply use the arrow up/down keys to switch the previewed files.

For labeling you can use the macOS label colors.

Or you could use the macOS Photo.app and its library feature. As far I know it copies (or moves?) all items in its own data base structure when creating its library. So it might be useful / wanted to delete the images from this library if the rummage is finished – unless you want to keep them in the library of the Photo.app.

Also commercial image cataloging apps are available (-> 'digital asset manager', DAM). I use one which unfortunately can't get purchased any more ('Media Pro'), for RAW I prefer Lightroom and CaptureOne, which are RAW developers & DAM catalogs, too. So I can't tell about others.

[David in Яuislip]

Take a look at https://www.fastrawviewer.com/

There's a 30day trial and it's £17.99 if you like it

Be aware that many of the free options work with embedded jpg previews rather than the raw data, good luck

[thomaso]

NeoFinder at https://www.cdfinder.de/en/info.html

Not especially for RAW, rather to catalog several file types, various image formats included.

[Old Bruce]

51 minutes ago, LondonSquirrel said:

I'd like to suggest a couple of options:

1. Hasselblad Phocus (https://www.hasselblad.com/phocus/), which appears to be free as well as not very well known. You need to register to download it but seems about all.

Phocus seems an order of magnitude faster at RAW compared to XnView. 

Wild! It works with my Canon CR2 files.

From the manual:

Phocus primarily fully supports Hasselblad 3FR and 3F files with more limited support for other format files. The Mac platform allows file viewing and limited editing of not only TIFF, JPEG, DNG and PNG files for example,but also more than 150 third-party digital cameras, including Canon, Nikon, Leaf, Leica, Sony, Fuji, Olympus etc. The Windows platform supports TIFF and JPEG files.

We Mac users get a bonus.

[Nikon Girl]

Hi Friends,

Thank you for your feedback. The Hasselblad Phocus does not allow me to skim through thumbnails or preview my photos. I'm not having any issues on my mac opening raw, I just need to scan through high volume to do comparisons and trash before I get into editing. I don't want to move my files into different software. I seem to only be able to do this in JPEG, but I'm no longer shooting in JPEG. Finder definitely does not work in the same way for NEF as it does for raw. Microsoft has a raw image extension, but it's not downloading on my mac. Any other suggessions? 

[h_d]

11 minutes ago, Nikon Girl said:

The Hasselblad Phocus does not allow me to skim through thumbnails or preview my photos

Might be worth persevering. Admittedly this is with Panasonic .rw2 raw files, not .nefs, but:

It seems a fast, feature-rich image browser and it doesn't move the files into different software, it keeps them right there in their Finder folders.. Might be worth checking out some of the view options, because it really does appear to offer pretty much exactly what you want..

[Nikon Girl]

Thank you for the suggestion, but I really prefer to check out thumbnails in mac before migrating photos into editing software. I'm downloading latest version of iPhoto to see if that will help. If anything else for viewing NEFs in thumbnail version comes up for anyone would love to hear about it. Thanks- Nikon Girl

[R C-R]

44 minutes ago, Nikon Girl said:

Finder definitely does not work in the same way for NEF as it does for raw.

Could you explain more about what you mean by that? NEF is the standard extension for Nikon raw image files. Finder (& Quick View!) should handle previewing them or their thumbnails in the same way as other image file types.

[Nikon Girl]

Hi RC-R,

Finder and Quick View do not. I'm still working with it, but they just appear as NEF icons, no imagery to sift through. I have no problem with JPEG thumbnail view for my other photos, but I recently started shooting raw and I can't be opening each one to see what it's all about. I'm downloading updated iPhoto software, will see if that works.

 

 

[Nikon Girl]

I'm gutted. I attempted to upgrade my iphoto, but mac wont allow the upgrade. My mac is 2015 and will not let me install 9.4. Says I need 9.1 or later to do so, but when I try to install 9.1, it says I need 9.0 and so on. Total mess. If anyone can figure out how I can see NEFs in thumbnails in my mac finder, I'd be really grateful. Thank you.

[h_d]

Apple discontinued iPhoto in 2015, so you may find yourself going round in circles. The current photo browser/catalogue for Mac is Apple Photos. 

Which version of macOS are you running? One of the benefits of keeping your OS up to date (and your 2015 Mac should go all the way to Big Sur) is that you'll get support for the latest RAW file formats, possibly including the .nefs out of your camera.

Upgrading is quite a big step, but it sounds as though it might be worth it in your case. I just have the suspicion that your version of macOS doesn't offer support for your .nef files.

[Nikon Girl]

h_d, that is really helpful. I'm running Catalina and my computer is not letting big sur install as there is not enough space even though I've removed everything. I might try to mess with apple photos and see if there is any luck there. I would hate to have to buy a new computer over this...so crazy. Thanks for your support with this- N

[h_d]

Ah... If you're already on Catalina, and you've done all the updates, then I would have thought you'd be OK. I wouldn't necessarily go to Big Sur unless you have good reasons to do so. This isn't a Mac support forum, but if you haven't got space for the upgrade then you might want to check your local Apple Store for help, or the Apple Support Communities.

If you're on Catalina you should already have Apple Photos installed, though the move from iPhoto is a bit of a culture shock.

And I definitely wouldn't buy a new computer unless you really really want one. 

Out of interest, could you upload one of your .nef files, to to see if other forum users can work out what's going on?

[Nikon Girl]

I'm a bit confused as my MacBook Air early 2015 is 8GB and Big Sur requires approximately 16GB for installation, so I don't think it matters what I throw away, it won't be able to be installed. Not sure it makes sense to upload a file as I'm less concerned about opening a file than I am viewing hundreds of files as thumbnails. I open the photos I need to edit in Affinity, but would like to scan/preview them in mac thumbnail to determine what gets edited. This sux. I don't want to buy a new computer. Maybe will contact Nikon tomorrow to see what they have to say

[R C-R]

1 hour ago, Nikon Girl said:

I'm a bit confused as my MacBook Air early 2015 is 8GB and Big Sur requires approximately 16GB for installation,

You are confusing memory (RAM) with drive (storage) space. You may have only 8GB of RAM but your drive is much bigger than that.

BTW, I am running Catalina on my iMac & I have no problems using Quick Look previews & Finder thumbnails with the sample of .nef files I have downloaded from the web for testing.

[Nikon Girl]

Wow, If you could tell me what I'm doing wrong I would love it. I just get the icon. I've gone into Open With and made selections. Just can't fugure out what it is. So frustrating. Thinking you have a later mac or different software...

[R C-R]

21 minutes ago, Nikon Girl said:

If you could tell me what I'm doing wrong I would love it.

For Quick View previews, just tap the spacebar with one of the files selected.

For Finder thumbnails, click the icon just to the left of the one with 4 lines at the top of the Finder window, the one with two rows of 3 squares. This is known as Icon View. When in it, there will be a slider at the bottom right of the window that controls the size of the thumbnail previews.

[Nikon Girl]

None of this produces desired results and tried this all long ago, the NEF .afphoto icon remains. Space bar gives me an enlarged icon. Nothing turns the icon into an image in thumbnails. Icon view is much of the same purple .afphoto in NEF. Too tired to continue will approach tomorrow. So frustrating. Thanks so much for the support.

[Nikon Girl]

Also, I don't think it should matter, but I'm shooting with Z series. Will ask Nikon about this tomorrow.

[R C-R]

One more thing to check for Finder thumbnail previews:

With the Finder window open in Icon view, choose View menu's "Show View Options." Make sure there is a checkmark by "Show icon preview" in the option window that opens.

[Fixx]

As R C-R said above, quicklook and image preview tapping spacebar should work in any mac. Is the problem only with .nef files or with any files?

Previewing raw files with quicklook is not necessarily fast enough, the may be some delay when OS renders the preview. People use sometimes special software for culling raw photos, like Photo Mechanic, ApolloOne or mentioned FastRawViewer. There are also more sophisticated automated culling apps like FilterPixel, Optyx and Narrative Select (these have free basic versions available).

[Nikon Girl]

Thank you Fixx. I attempted that strategy earlier. In my case, it isn't a delayed view, it just isn't coming into view in thumbnail at all. Quicklook just enlarges the .afphoto icon image on all of my photos. The only way I'm able to see the photos is to open in affinity software and there is no way I can go through this batch one at a time opening them. I prefer not to have to use additional software to get a simple thumbnail preview. No idea what's up with my computer. I'm going to reach out to Nikon, if that doesn't work, I might bring my computer to the Apple store and see if they can find a fix. If anyone out there has any ideas I'm still open to suggessions. Thanks again- N

[Nikon Girl]

This is only happening with NEF files. JPEGs and all other images are fine in quicklook. I was so excited about shooting raw and now I'm starting to regret it🙄

[h_d]

If you could upload a .nef to this forum others might be able to see if they get the same issue. Camera makers do change the format of their raw files as they develop and release new hardware, so it might be an issue with the .nefs themselves rather than your computer.