Nikon NXStudio does not load images or thumbnails for tiff files edited with Affinity Photo

[OrangeGuitar]

I used Nikon NX Studio 1.1.1 to adjust NEF file. Export to tiff format, but store in same folder as NEF file. NXStudio properly displays thumbnail and loads image.

Go ahead and edit the tiff file in AP, save (in my case, with layers, but don't think that matters) to original location. NX Studio not able to display the thumbnail, will not load the image.

Tried this with another editor (nameless), saved as tiff, worked fine.

AP 1.10.4 on macOS 12.1, but actually this has been going on for a while.

I would hope others are interested in this, as NX Studio is Nikon's answer to LR, apparently. I would think there are probably other issues to be addressed to make AP and NX Studio a good workflow.

(Don't need to see this in the forum, but only way I can find to report what I am seeing.)

Edited January 20, 2022 by OrangeGuitar
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[walt.farrell]

Welcome to the Serif Affinity forums, @OrangeGuitar.

It is likely that Photo is saving the TIFF file in a compressed format, and that Nikon NX Studio does not understand compressed TIFF files. Use File > Export (not Save) and you'll be able to access the compression settings by pushing the More... button in the Export dialog.

[OrangeGuitar]

Thanks for your reply.

Based on what you suggested, I tried exporting using various settings.

Issue does not seem to be compression (which NX Studio seems to handle, as it creates compressed files when it exports NEF to tiff, and it is able to load those images.)

Going to another (nameless) editor, I see that I can control pixel order. NX Studio can handle interleaved, which is the default in the other editor. Interestingly, the other editor warns against picking non-interleaved, as "some programs cannot handle" it. Like NX Studio, apparently.

Unless there is a way to control the pixel order in AP, that would seem to be the end of the line.

[OrangeGuitar]

Further info.

Trying more export options (after re-reading walt.farrell post), compression also seems to be involved. I have not tried all the export options, but there are options that work when all compression is removed. That's good.

So, thanks for the assistance.

[Milan M.]

Nikon NX Studio loads images and thumbnails for .tiff files edited in Affinity Photo, only those must not be saved with a transparent background. "Transparent Background" must not be highlighted in the document window before saving.

[OrangeGuitar]

Thanks Milan M.,

I tried doing some exports with compression and NO transparent background, but that was a no go. That's not exhaustive, I know, so I guess I will keep experimenting. Sure would be nice to save some space.

[Old Bruce]

3 hours ago, OrangeGuitar said:

edit the tiff file in AP, save (in my case, with layers, but don't think that matters)

Maybe the layers do matter.

[Milan M.]

Nikon NX Studio is an application for editing RAW images from Nikon cameras and converting them to TIF or JPG and not for working with layers. That's what Affinity Photo is for. That's why I don't see the point of opening edited photos in AP in NX Studio. NX Studio doesn't work with layers, they need to be merged and then the file can be opened in NX Studio but I don't see any point in that.

[OrangeGuitar]

I cannot claim to have a workflow that I am settled on. I am trying out the idea of using NX Studio as a DAM (LR replacement).

[Wings Tanar]

Nikon Studio 1.1.1  Affinity Photo 1.10.4.  macOS Catalina 10.15.7

Load HEIC file into Affinity.  Do nothing other than export as TIFF RGB 16-bit.  Locate file in Nikon Studio.  Spaceholder appears but thumbnail will not display.  Metadata is visible so Nikon Studio has recognised it as an image file but cannot interpret it. (i.e. as reported in opening thread).

Repeat process but export as TIFF RGB-8bit.  All works as it should.

TIFF RGB 16-bit is recognised and displayable in Finder,  Preview, Safari, Affinity Photo and (believe it or not) Aperture.

Conclusion - Affinity Photo is working as advertised.  Nikon Studio is not (i.e.not with all TIFF formats).

Unfortunately, this forum is probably not the best place to report an issue with Nikon software and I doubt Nikon will be that interested in fixing something that (from their point of view) is working they way they meant it to - just not working the way we have tried to use it.

 

 

 

[OrangeGuitar]

Point taken. Pretty much what I was thinking when I woke up this morning. Certainly should not be in the bugs portion of forum. Thanks to all for helping out.

[v_kyr]

Nikon NX Studio has the following TIFF file format restrictions ...

Quote

TIFF (extensions ".tif" and ".tiff"), RGB mode only; CMYK mode is not supported; editing is only available for uncompressed files or files with LZW compression

 

[Wings Tanar]

Yes - but Affinity Photo offers 8-bit and 16-bit TIFF files but it seems NX Studio cannot display 16-bit TIFF files (as exported from Affinity).  I don't have any other mechanism for creating 16-bit TIFF's so I can't investigate further.

 

Cheers

[OrangeGuitar]

v_kyr, Wings Tanar: Thanks for the info. Good to know.

I tried exporting uncompressed files, and that worked for 16-bit with the examples I tried using Affinity. I could not get LZW compression to work with 16-bit, did not try with 8-bit. 

[Wings Tanar]

Ahaa - missed that.  16-bit uncompressed works for me, too.  Given that there are at least 48 combinations of options for exporting to a TIFF file via Affinity, couldn't try them all.  Seems that Walt Farrell had the right answer at the outset.

Solves my problem - which was converting HEIC files from iPads and iPhones with minimum loss (i.e. TIFF rather than jpg) into a form readable by NX Studio.

Why ?  Because most of my images are from Nikon cameras and I use NX Studio as a file viewer front end for Affinity - scanning usb drives / folders / SD cards etc to delete rubbish, rename files and then pass to Affinity for processing.  It also works with scanned images, jpg files from archives etc. etc but not HEIC

Life would be much easier if Affinity Photo incorporated a file viewer (hint hint).

 

 

[R C-R]

3 hours ago, Wings Tanar said:

Life would be much easier if Affinity Photo incorporated a file viewer (hint hint).

Can't you use the Mac Finder, with or without Quick Look, for that? It seems to work fine with some test HEIC files I downloaded from the web.

[Wings Tanar]

Yes, I could do.  There are lots of options out there and Finder is one of them but the fixed thumbnail size is a limitation.  A front end file viewer for Affinity would be a much more elegant solution.  Switch on computer, click on Affinity icon, select folder - see all files in folder.  Set thumbnail size and scan through deleting rubbish.  Select image - go into edit mode.

It would be just like using Nikon Studio as the front end but without the "limited to Nikon" aspect.  Obviously Nikon aren't going to make their free application work with competitors' files (justifiably so) - but the Affinity team might be persuaded to develop a front end module a bit like Adobe Bridge.

 

Cheers.

[R C-R]

4 hours ago, Wings Tanar said:

There are lots of options out there and Finder is one of them but the fixed thumbnail size is a limitation.

I am not sure what you mean by that. Icon view in Finder has a slider that adjusts the thumbnail view size, & if that isn't large enough you can tap the spacebar to use Quick View, which opens one image at either its actual size or as large as the screen will hold if it is larger than the screen. With one file open in Quick View, you can use the cursor keys to move between any files in that folder.

You can also use the 'smart folder' & search Finder features to show files in different folders in one Finder window, which I don'yt think you can do any other way.

[Wings Tanar]

 Icon view in Finder has a slider that adjusts the thumbnail view size.  Believe it or not, I never knew that.  Never occurred to me that Finder/View/Show Status Bar led to displaying a thumbnail sizer slider.  Thanks for the info.

Anyway, we are now way off topic and I've got a few hundred images to sort, catalogue or discard, rename, add metadata to, convert from raw, archive and backup - all of which I can do in Nikon Studio - then enhance (hopefully) in Affinity.  \

Nice talking to you all.

[R C-R]

4 hours ago, Wings Tanar said:

 Icon view in Finder has a slider that adjusts the thumbnail view size.  Believe it or not, I never knew that.  Never occurred to me that Finder/View/Show Status Bar led to displaying a thumbnail sizer slider.

Try it with something entered in the Finder search field, like maybe "HEIC" & then selecting Kind "HEIF image" from the popup. This should find all your HEIC files & display them in the Finder window, even if they are in different folders. If you click on one of them, the status bar will show the file path to it. Then if you want, you can double click on any folder in that file path to open that folder.