Author: Tim Grey

Today’s Question: Is it true that data recovery only works for traditional hard drives and not for an SSD drive? If so, shouldn’t SSD drives be avoided for photo storage?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Data recovery is possible from SSD drives. It is a bit more challenging, and I would say there’s a somewhat greater risk of data being lost forever. But I do consider SSD drives safe for photo storage.

More Detail: Especially in the early days of having SSD drives available for computer storage, there had been talk about data recovery being impossible from SSD drives. This related to the way SSD drives store data and manage the use of the flash memory on the drive. This makes it more complicated to recover data from an SSD drive compared to a traditional hard drive, but recovery is still possible.

First and foremost, when it comes to the storage of photos and other important data I strongly recommend having a consistent and through backup workflow. For example, I use GoodSync (http://timgrey.me/greybackup) to create local backup copies of my data and I use Backblaze (https://timgrey.me/onlinebackup) to create an offsite backup. With a good backup workflow a hard drive failure is merely an inconvenience rather than a crisis.

If you do have a hard drive fail and you lose data due to an insufficient backup workflow, there are options for data recovery even from an SSD drive. There are software tools that enable you to recover data from a drive that is experiencing problems, and in many cases these software tools can recover files that were accidentally deleted.

In addition, there are a variety of service providers that can use advanced tools to recover data from an SSD drive. There aren’t as many options compared to traditional hard drives, but it is still possible to recover lost data from an SSD. There are also a variety of advantages with SSD drives over traditional hard drives, so I consider SSD drives to be an excellent storage option, provided you use a good backup workflow to protect your primary storage.

Today’s Question: If I put six small prints on my scanner and scan them all at once with the white background like below, is there a way to tell Photoshop to find the six images and make each its own JPEG?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, you can extract the multiple images from a scanned image using the “Crop and Straighten Photos” automation script in Photoshop.

More Detail: With a flatbed scanner it is obviously possible to set multiple prints onto the glass and scan all the images at once, creating a relatively large scanned image that is comprised of multiple photos. Fortunately, Photoshop is capable of then automatically cropping and straightening all the photos from that larger scanned image to create individual images.

The process is very simple. Open the image that represents the multiple scanned photos in Photoshop, and then go to the menu and choose File > Automate > Crop and Straighten Photos. No input is required from you, and Photoshop will automatically create a new image for each photo that was found in the original. You’ll still need to save those files manually, but the individual images will be created quickly and completely automatically.

Today’s Question: I have Time Machine backups dating back to 2020. I am sure the backups are taking up disk space. What is your recommendation for how many backups should be kept? What is the best method for deleting the old backups?

Tim’s Quick Answer: I do not recommend attempting to delete old backups with Time Machine. The backups are incremental, and Time Machine will automatically (and safely) delete old backups when the drive starts to get full.

More Detail: Time Machine is the backup application included with the MacOS operating system. It is an incremental backup application that preserves versions of files over time as space allows. This can be tremendously helpful for recovering files that were deleted accidentally, recovering an older version of a file from before a problem occurred, or even restoring to a new computer based on the backup of a previous computer.

Time Machine creates and preserves backups based on space being available on the hard drive being used for the backup. Those backups are created hourly for the past 24 hours, daily for the past month, and weekly going back as far in time as storage space on the drive allows.

I recommend using a dedicated hard drive for each Time Machine backup, with a drive that has about double the storage capacity of the drive being backed up. That way there’s no need to be concerned about old backups taking up space, because the entire drive is dedicated to the backup task.

When the hard drive starts to get full, Time Machine will automatically remove older backups. All files that are currently on the hard drive will be retained on the backup drive, but older versions of files that are represented by a more recent backup will be discarded to recover storage space.

In other words, as the drive fills you will lose the ability to go back in time to the oldest versions of files because those older backups will have been discarded. However, you will still retain a current backup of all files as they are on the hard drive. The bottom line is that if you’re using a dedicated hard drive for a Time Machine backup you don’t need to clear out old backups. You just need to make sure the drive is connected on a regular basis so the backup can be updated.

Today’s Question: I’ve been shooting with a Canon cropped frame sensor and decided to move to a Canon mirrorless full-frame sensor. If I shoot an image at 200mm on a full-frame camera and then crop it in Lightroom so it looks the same as if I shot it at 200mm on a cropped frame camera, will I be losing quality? Will it be lesser quality than what I get from the cropped frame camera? I’m trying to decide if I can do that to get the same quality results I’m currently getting or if I need to invest in a lens for the full-frame camera that will give me 320mm.

Tim’s Quick Answer: The key issue to consider here is the resolution of the final image. If the two image sensors are of the same resolution, there will be more pixels available with the cropped sensor since the full-frame image would need to be cropped to achieve the same field of view. That doesn’t automatically translate to image quality, but it could depending on how large the image was going to be printed or otherwise shared.

More Detail: Comparing different sensor sizes in the context of focal length and effective resolution can be a bit of a challenge when the sensors are of a different size. The issue is simpler to understand when we assume the two sensors have the same resolution.

We commonly use the 35mm format as the basis of comparing different sensor sizes. As a result, a full-frame sensor is one that matches the dimensions of a single frame of 35mm film. A sensor smaller than this size is referred to as a “cropped sensor”, with a cropping factor that represents the relationship in size to a full-frame sensor.

A smaller sensor is cropping the image circle relative to a lens that could otherwise be used on a full-frame sensor. For example, if you have a 1.6X cropping factor, a 100mm lens from a full-frame camera will provide the same field of view as a 160mm lens (100mm X 1.6) when used on the cropped sensor.

In both cases the full image sensor is being used to capture the image, but a different portion of the scene is being captured. You would therefore need to crop the image from the full-frame camera to match the field of view from the cropped sensor. If the sensors had the same resolution, that would mean the image from the full-frame camera when cropped to the same field of view as the cropped sensor would have fewer pixels.

Of course, then you have to consider how many pixels are needed. If both images even after cropping provide enough pixels for the intended output, then they will effectively have the same image quality all other things being equal. If the images need to be enlarged to produce a print, the cropped sensor image will provide better output quality because it is closer to the final resolution. The more an image needs to be enlarged, the more the quality will be degraded.

Put simply, if you need to crop after the capture because you didn’t have a long enough lens focal length for the intended framing, it would be advantageous to buy a lens with a longer focal length in order to achieve better image quality. But this depends on both how large you need to print or otherwise share the image, along with how willing you are to spend more money to achieve improved image quality.

Today’s Question: Is there a way in Adobe Bridge to see the focus point for a photo in the preview section? If not, how can I request that Adobe look at including a focal point in the preview window?

Tim’s Quick Answer: To my knowledge there is no way to view the focus point from your camera for an image in Adobe Bridge. Some camera manufacturers do make this feature available in the software for their cameras, and there is a plugin available for this purpose in Lightroom Classic. I would certainly encourage requesting this feature for Adobe Bridge using the form on the Adobe website.

More Detail: While cameras generally record the focus point that was active at the time of capturing photo in metadata, viewing that information isn’t always easy. For example, Adobe Bridge does not provide an option for viewing the active focus point from the metadata for photos.

If you’d like to submit this as a feature that you’d like to see added to Adobe Bridge, you can complete the form on the Adobe website here:

https://www.adobe.com/products/wishform.html

Note that this form can be used to submit suggestions for new features for any Adobe software, not just Adobe Bridge.

In the meantime, depending on which camera you’re using you may be able to view the focus point using the software from the camera manufacturer. For example, I happen to use Canon cameras, and the Digital Photo Professional software from Canon enables you to view the focus point that was used.

For those using Lightroom Classic, there is a plugin available that enables you to view the focus point for certain camera models. You can get more information about that plugin here:

https://www.lightroomfocuspointsplugin.com

Today’s Question: When first import new images into Lightroom Classic they look great, then almost immediately the preview changes to something not so great. Can you help so the initial preview doesn’t change?

Tim’s Quick Answer: The solution here is to update the default settings so that the interpretation for the images in Lightroom Classic is closer to the interpretation from your camera.

More Detail: When you initially browse images with Lightroom Classic, Adobe Bridge, and some other applications, the preview will be based on a JPEG that is embedded in the raw capture by the camera. Shortly thereafter, the preview will be updated based on the interpretation of the raw capture by the software. In some cases, this can result in a preview that doesn’t look quite as good as the preview that was embedded in the image.

In Lightroom Classic you can improve the preview by applying different settings from the Develop module. I recommend using a preset for this purpose, which you can apply as part of the process of importing new photos into your catalog. That will result in improved previews right from the start of your workflow.

You can work with a sample image in the Develop module to create the new preset. I suggest looking at the profiles available in the Basic section of the right panel as a good starting point. In particular you might look at the “Camera Matching” section, since those are most likely to represent a closer match to the preview generated by the camera.

You can also apply other adjustments, such as to increase the value for Vibrance to boost the colors, and increase the value for Clarity to enhance midtone contrast. Any adjustments that provide a better starting point for the image can be applied as part of this process.

When you are happy with the adjustments you’ve applied, you can click the plus symbol (+) to the right of the Presets heading on the left panel in the Develop module. Choose “Create Preset” from the popup to bring up the “New Develop Preset” dialog.

Enter a meaningful name in the Preset Name field, and choose the Group you’d like to include the preset in. Then make sure the checkboxes are turned on for all adjustments you want to include in the preset. If you’re going to apply this preset when importing new photos, you can simply click the “Check All” button to enable all adjustments for the preset. Click the Create button to create the new preset.

This preset can then be applied at import, or at any time later in your workflow by selecting the preset from the Presets list in the Develop module. This will update the settings for the images, so you’ll have a better preview and a better starting point for further refining the adjustments for the image.

Today’s Question: Is there a way to extract the original raw capture from a smart object layer in a Photoshop PSD?

Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, you can extract the original file from an embedded smart object in Photoshop using the Export Contents command.

More Detail: When you open a raw capture in Photoshop via Camera Raw or Lightroom Classic you have the option to open that raw capture as a smart object. What that means is that the raw capture file will be embedded in the smart object. This provides a variety of potential benefits, including being able to edit that embedded raw capture within the layered file, and therefore have the existing layers continue to affect the interpreted raw capture.

If you later are unable to locate the original raw capture that was used to create the smart object, you can simply extract the original file from the layered document in Photoshop. Note that this same process works for any type of image that had been converted to a smart object layer in Photoshop, not just raw captures.

To extract the original file, open the layered image and make sure the smart object layer is selected on the Layers panel. Then go to the menu and choose Layer > Smart Objects > Export Contents. This will bring up the Save dialog so you can choose where you want to save the file that is being extracted and update the filename if you’d like. After designating the location and filename, click the Save button and the original image file used to create the smart object will be extracted as an additional file.

Note that extracting the original file in this way will not remove the image from the smart object layer. It is simply creating a copy of the embedded image as a separate file.

Today’s Question: For raw captures do you recommend lossless compression or uncompressed, and would there be a quality difference between the two?

Tim’s Quick Answer: In general, I recommend using the lossless compression option for raw captures if your camera supports this, as it can significantly reduce file size without degrading image quality.

More Detail: Some cameras offer options related to the raw capture format in terms of whether compression is applied. With some cameras you can even choose between lossless compression and lossy compression.

Lossless compression operates by recording image data more efficiently, resulting in smaller file sizes. This compression does not alter the original capture data, it simply encodes the data in a way that requires less storage space. This enables you to take advantage of the benefits of raw capture while being able to store more images on a given media card. The only real drawback is that the compressed raw captures will be a little slower to process because the data needs to be decoded as part of that task. In general, you would not likely notice a significant performance issue related to lossless compression.

Lossy compression, on the other hand, further reduces file size by altering the original capture data to some extent. While this compression is generally of very good quality, there is some loss of fidelity. Out of an abundance of caution when it comes to maximizing image quality, I don’t recommend using lossy compression for raw captures.

Uncompressed raw captures could be a little faster to process when optimizing the image, but the file sizes will be considerably large than with a raw capture with lossless compression applied. Therefore, I prefer lossless compression for raw captures, but I would acknowledge that using uncompressed raw is the more conservative approach.

Today’s Question: I currently use the older Lightroom standalone version 6.14. I’m thinking of purchasing a Sony Alpha 1 camera and I want to continue shooting in raw. How can I import these files into Lightroom without upgrading to the subscription version of Lightroom Classic?

Tim’s Quick Answer: To import raw captures that aren’t supported by your version of Lightroom (including newer updates to Lightroom Classic) you can convert the captures to the Adobe DNG format using the free Adobe DNG Converter.

More Detail: Even if you’re using the latest version of Lightroom Classic, with a newer camera you may run into a situation where the updated raw capture format is not yet supported by Lightroom Classic. This is obviously especially true for those who have not purchased a subscription for Lightroom Classic and are therefore no longer receiving software updates.

The Adobe DNG Converter is often updated to support new raw capture formats more quickly than Lightroom Classic. This provides an option for working with your raw captures before they are supported by your software.

My personal preference is to retain the original raw captures as they came from the camera. Therefore, I prefer to treat the Adobe DNG Converter as a temporary solution while waiting for software to be updated to support the latest raw capture formats. However, for those who have decided to use the non-subscription version of Lightroom for as long as possible, the Adobe DNG Converter does provide a way to work with raw capture formats that will not be supported unless you subscribe to Lightroom Classic or switch to other software.

You can get more info and download the free Adobe DNG Converter on the Adobe website here:

https://helpx.adobe.com/camera-raw/digital-negative.html#downloads