Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[johnnyboy]

I just gave MC a try with my photos again (tried it once a while ago, totally didn't like the workflow of it so quit using it).

To be honest I still find it totally non-intuitive.

I just added a bunch of the photos I imported from a recent trip into MC and moved them all to a playlist to group them into a nice album.
I'm going through the playlist trying to tidy it up, remove unwanted pictures etc so as I was going through the images I couldn't make them out clearly so I double clicked an image so i could go through the playlist and view the images one by one full screen.

While in fullscreen mode and going through the images I got to one I didn't want in the playlist so hit delete.
MC instantly came up and prompted me to delete the file from the library.

This is typical of the way MC treats images - it had put them into playing now and opened playing now fullscreen. When I had hit delete it was trying to delete them because it was acting on them in playing now.

Maybe it's just me (if you disagree with the way I think please say), but I really think MC needs to get away from the 'playing now' type model for dealing with images.
Sure leave a feature there to let people add images to playing now but MC needs to act more like every single other image organiser.
When I double click on a file within a selection of files (be it a playlist or a selection created from a search or using panes), MC needs to go to full screen mode and show me that image, inside the other images in my current view and let me navigate and act on those images inside their current context.

If I hit delete when in full screen mode for a file inside a playlist, MC should just delete it from the playlist.

Its such a core part of browsing and viewing images that it really does just totally ruin MC for me for dealing with my photos.

[Matt]

When I double click on a file within a selection of files (be it a playlist or a selection created from a search or using panes), MC needs to go to full screen mode and show me that image, inside the other images in my current view and let me navigate and act on those images

This is exactly what MC does.

...inside their current context.

The behavior of delete is debateable in this case.  I often play from the "Recently Imported" playlist after dumping from my camera.  I'm happy that delete lets me can out-of-focus files instead of just trimming the playlist.

Also, remember that you double-click again (or hit escape, etc.) to return to Standard View from a fullscreen preview.  You can also use the large image preview tooltip if you don't like jumping to fullscreen (which was added in a recent build).  This is to say that playlist management is really a job for Standard View.

[johnnyboy]

thanks for the fast reply.

Maybe I'm missing something but when I'm double clicking a file, its appearing to me that MC is just throwing all of them into Playing now then navigating them there.
If I escape out of full screen mode for instance - I am still on the original image I started on rather than the one I have navigated to while in full screen mode.

As for the delete, I can see your point about how it could be useful but from a logical point of view - deleting a file while inside a playlist makes more sense to be deleting it from the playlist rather than the DB surely?

How about giving us this as an option because it really does seem like it could be one of those points that could make equal sense either way.

If you dont want to add any more options then possibly have:

Delete = delete from playlist (makes most sense)
Delete + shift / ctrl = delete as in system delete as this is something alot more dangerous so should take more effort to do


Lastly, failing those two options, the very least should be that when you click delete from inside a playlist, the delete dialog that comes up should give us the option to delete from playlist which it doesn't currently do.


I'm loving the big mouse overs - they do look pretty

[park]

Mouse overs are great. I use them every day and do all my tagging based one them.

I agree with jonnyboy about playing now being a pain to work with for full screen "previewing" of images. That's why I avoid playing them, and just rely on the mouse over tooltips.

For me, "playing"¹ and "previewing"² the images full screen should be 2 completely separate things.

¹"Playing" images as a slideshow in MC is fantastic. The fades, zooms, tracks and all the other settings are really great. Playing images is great for when you have a playlist or album of images and you just want to sit and enjoy them. The functionality for playing images doesnt need changing at all.

²"Previewing" should be "one click to see it" "once click to get rid of it". (Technically, this is the way it works at the moment, but clicking "play" on an image, and then the "stop button" to get back to the previous view just feels wrong. If music is also playing, you dont intuitively know whether or not the music is going to stop as well.)
Like jonnyboy said, if you were using playing now to preview images, then when you hit "stop" to return to the previous view and tag the last image you were viewing, you have to go and find that image and select it yourself.

I'd like a magnifying glass icon next to the "play" link, which would give you a full screen preview of that image. You could use left/right, or page up/down buttons, or even better, subtle left/right arrows over the top of the image, to scroll through the list of whatever view you are in. With a single click, the image would disapear and be selected ready for tagging.

The advantages over the tooltip would be:
1. You could move the mouse to point at stuff in the picture without it disappearing.
2. You get bigger previews. Good for portrait shots.

The advantages over playing images would be:
1. You are always interacting with the list of images in your viewscheme/playlist, even when viewing them fullscreen. Leaving fullscreen, you are at the last image that you were viewing.
2. You wouldnt need to use the play controls to interact with the images. So it'd be psychologically simpler to differentiate between the music that's playing and the images that you are tagging.

That's my reasoning anyway. For now, I'm just happy that we have big tooltips.

[cosmicfx]

I'd just to ask again for MC to start having more image organizing and editing features. To have more priority and control given to  image commands, to make it stronger as an image organizer.

It's obvious there are a number of people who feel it's just lacking a bit, just not majing the grade when compared to other top organizers, even the free one's like Faststone.

I'm not meaning to sound too critical , cause I love MC ... but I think for all most anyone whose top priority when using MC is for images ( which I do as I work with them ) , and music second ( as it's my fun part of it ), it really needs to be stronger, so that we don't find it necessary to use ANY other image organizer to fullfill our needs.

Thanks
Cosmic

[JimH]

"Previewing" should be "one click to see it" "once click to get rid of it". (Technically, this is the way it works at the moment, but clicking "play" on an image, and then the "stop button" to get back to the previous view just feels wrong.

Double click will play full screen.  Double click again to return.  Or escape to return.

Or Enter to play, Enter to return.

Cosmic,
Your comments aren't too critical, but can you be specific?

[dcwebman]

I'm still trying to get the feel of the image organizing because I would like to eventually move all my images to MC but it's still a little cumbersome. The only way I can see to use it like other organizers I have used is to move my images to Playing Now, resize the view so it's much bigger and then start going through the images and tagging them. Maybe that's the way it's supposed to work. I'm not sure how to effectively tag when it's in a playlist or Recently Imported. If I double-click the image, I lose the action window to tag it. And then that messes up your Playing Now if it had songs or whatever in it. I guess in a playlist you can make the thumbnails as large as they can be though. The whole process just doesn't seem as intuitive as other organizers.

One bug(?) I just saw when trying this is if I double-click an image to go to full-screen, if the image is smaller than the screen, it will be resized to fill the screen and could look terrible. It should leave the image as its original size in that case.

[Alex B]

And then that messes up your Playing Now if it had songs or whatever in it.

Actually, the current system creates a temporary image playback zone if the Playing Now list already contains playing tracks. However, this is mainly intended for playback only because as soon the separate image playback queue is stopped the temporary zone disappears.

A better option is to use a defined separate zone for sorting and tagging images. Each zone has an independent Playing Now queue and display so it is possible to load a playlist of images to PN without altering the other zones' PNs anyway.

If you have a dual monitor setup a good option is to detach and maximize the display on the second monitor.

Personally, I use four zones. The first three are for different playback setups and the fourth one is dedicated for tagging.

[JimH]

One bug(?) I just saw when trying this is if I double-click an image to go to full-screen, if the image is smaller than the screen, it will be resized to fill the screen and could look terrible. It should leave the image as its original size in that case.

I believe that's optional.

[Matt]

I believe that's optional.

Right, and it's off by default so a 100% zoom is the most applied by default.

[cosmicfx]

Hi Jim

Cosmic,
Your comments aren't too critical, but can you be specific?

I've just lost a whole long post which I wrote to you
So now this is the very abbreviated one , in which I'll include screenshot to help show ...

Here are some off the top of my head image features I'd hope to see in MC...

* Compare up to 4 images , with option to show info ... eg. screenshot ...



*more image resize options , like print size , resolution ...etc ... eg. screenshot ...



*Batch editing functions eg . files convertion , colour balance , etc , ... also to have it in right-click context menu for easy access ... screenshot ...



* Custom categories and symbol type rating. A symbol of a star or a colour coded symbol is easier to see when working with many photo's , than with just the number ratin ( eg "5" ). screenshot example ...




*Fullscreen editing tools... eg screenshot ...



I also thought it could work wonderfully if MC used the same in it's fullscreen toolbat , as with MC's present customizable main window toolbar. But with editing option shortcut tools.I made a mockup to show what I mean ...screenshot ...




*And lastly , some features I'd love to see in the Image editor ...
- magic wand and other selection tools
- filters eg ... emboss, effects , sepia ...etc
- batch editing
- watermarking (also batch)
- white balance
-blur/sharpen
- advanced resize options
-histogram
- lossless rotation ( I don't believe the MC editor gives lossless rotation at present .)
- all I can think of right now...

Thanks
Cosmic

[park]

I think that MC should leave the editing to other programs and focus on the organization and tagging. With XMP tag data being saved in MC, those images should still be easy enough to find in other dedicated editing programs.

[Doof]

I'd like a magnifying glass icon next to the "play" link, which would give you a full screen preview of that image. You could use left/right, or page up/down buttons, or even better, subtle left/right arrows over the top of the image, to scroll through the list of whatever view you are in. With a single click, the image would disapear and be selected ready for tagging.

I like this idea.

I think that MC should leave the editing to other programs and focus on the organization and tagging. With XMP tag data being saved in MC, those images should still be easy enough to find in other dedicated editing programs.

And I agree completely with this. It's nice that MC has some basic image editing tools. I wouldn't mind seeing some of them improve, like the image resizer and the red-eye removal tool. but I'm not looking for a Photoshop/Paint Shop Pro replacement. Especially considering MC already has the ability to send any file to an external program. Maybe the solution is to make it easier for MC to open up media files in their default editor. Media Editor and MC's image editor can handle the bare essentials, but leave editing to others.

One thing that would be really nice to have is the ability to convert image formats to other formats. There are other tools that can do it, but I don't trust them to preserve all of the metadata like MC could.

[Matt]

I'd like a magnifying glass icon next to the "play" link, which would give you a full screen preview of that image. You could use left/right, or page up/down buttons, or even better, subtle left/right arrows over the top of the image, to scroll through the list of whatever view you are in. With a single click, the image would disapear and be selected ready for tagging.

We're confused about this one.  It sounds the same, just different.

Double-click shows fullscreen.  Double-click again returns.

Enter shows fullscreen.  Enter again returns.

Neither disturb the playing audio.  You can switch images with next / previous or Pg Up / Pg Down.

[cosmicfx]

I think that MC should leave the editing to other programs and focus on the organization and tagging. With XMP tag data being saved in MC, those images should still be easy enough to find in other dedicated editing programs.

I like this idea.

And I agree completely with this. It's nice that MC has some basic image editing tools. I wouldn't mind seeing some of them improve, like the image resizer and the red-eye removal tool. but I'm not looking for a Photoshop/Paint Shop Pro replacement. Especially considering MC already has the ability to send any file to an external program. Maybe the solution is to make it easier for MC to open up media files in their default editor. Media Editor and MC's image editor can handle the bare essentials, but leave editing to others.

One thing that would be really nice to have is the ability to convert image formats to other formats. There are other tools that can do it, but I don't trust them to preserve all of the metadata like MC could.

I'm definitely not looking for a Photoshop replacement, as I don't think any program can replace photoshop in that area for what it does and for what I use it for.

But for instance, photo comparing , I have to use another photo organizer (acdsee) , instead of just sticking to MC.
For photo resizing, even although MC as that tool , it doesn't have the full range of options, So again I have to use another resizing from.
With batch editing, Mc can batch edit tags AS well audio files conversion, But it can't batch convert image files...So I have to use another "image organizer" (acdsee) to do batch convertion ...instead of just using MC.
Alot of very simple filters and editing tools are available in many other even basic organizer, even in fullscreen mode ... so again , when working with many photos, I am forced to work outside MC.

Again , I'm definitely not looking for another photoshop. But to have what I feel is a complete program for my needs.

For audio files it works 110%. It organizes them perfectly, and allows a user to set them up for listening pleasure with many options, besides just organizing them.
Image files are obviously different, a visual experience, needing a different approach to audio files. Just simple photos I take with my camera would benefit alot from having these few extra options and features. Comparing these few here, batch editing those there ...etc, within MC might not be needed to all, but if other simple organizers and top range organizers, those that are free and those that are not have these features ...then why not MC?

Thanks
Cosmic

[Matt]

But for instance, photo comparing , I have to use another photo organizer (acdsee) , instead of just sticking to MC.

Try holding shift while tapping Pg Up / Pg Down to switch images.  It keeps your zoom (mouse wheel) and pan (mouse drag) positions.

I use this all the time to keep the sharpest picture from a burst of shots.

[cosmicfx]

Try holding shift while tapping Pg Up / Pg Down to switch images.  It keeps your zoom (mouse wheel) and pan (mouse drag) positions.

I use this all the time to keep the sharpest picture from a burst of shots.

Thanks Matt, but it doesn't compare them sided by side or up to 4 photos. I use this especially when comparing my artworks before finalizing , or after editng a copy of an original, often with the images info.

Thanks
Cosmic

[)p(]

Double click will play full screen.  Double click again to return.  Or escape to return.

Or Enter to play, Enter to return.

Cosmic,
Your comments aren't too critical, but can you be specific?

For me the basic requirements to start tagging images with mc are:

1. Organizing iptc keywords into a hierarchy with the ability to drop images on keywords and vice versa.
2. Automatically detect and remove red eyes on import with a good quality filter.
3. Version stacks

Peter

[johnnyboy]

I agree with the above sentiments pretty much.

For audio I dont see much that needs added really to have a great and powerful audio everything.
For images I feel it is lacking quite alot personally.

Here's the main points I feel:

* Options - There needs to be an options category specifically related to images (photos)
* Browsing and playing images need to be treated as totally seperate things. Unlike audio, images are all about visual, full sized images is just a view mode. Double clicking them is not playing them - its choosing to view them in a different mode and so needs to be treated as such. If I add files to playing now then I want to show a slideshow etc in which case they again are treated differently. This exact behavior can be set in the 'images options'.
* Full screen images should have a toolbar similar to the one that video's have that appear but with some basic controls on it.
* Easy ability to 'Edit image' which should create a copy of the file, call it [filename]_edited and send it to my pre-set default editor (photoshop). This should be configurable in options as to how the backed up image will be dealt with (ie whether to create an 'edited' or to just directly edit original)
* Version stacking playing on above feature request.

Now that MC has specific areas 'Audio', 'Images', 'Video' - it really should have seperate option groups related to these three areas - it would make it ALOT simpler and clearer.
'Jump on play (if has display) is a pretty vague sounding option and you have to decide if you want video to do one behavior as well as images - it should be seperate for these two obviously seperate things. - Even finding this option isn't too obvious.

A toolbar specifically for images would also be VERY useful. With audio you mainly just want to edit some text (ie inline so no tools required) or play the track. With images you want to do far more to them frequently.

I think its time MC steps up to its 'all media' responsibilities and starts thinking about them as seperate items which need different tools (one toolbar to try set all the tools for all these types is both confusing/cluttered and wont fit on the screen).

[johnnyboy]

oh yeah - and I fully agree - please dont waste time trying to do many editing tasks - leave this to my dedicated image manipulation programs - MC's forte is organising (and audio playback).

[marko]

I too miss the ability to do a side by side photo compare. I like the way that Elements handles this task.

I would also welcome a solution to the problem mentioned above, whereby, [enter] can open the image for full screen preview, page up/down moves you through the image list, and when you [enter] to return, you're back at the image you started with, not the image you were last previewing...

Also, I know that we have "send to..." and an MRU entry for the last used command, but I often wish that the "send to..." external was not quite so deeply buried.

-marko.

[cosmicfx]

I too miss the ability to do a side by side photo compare. I like the way that Elements handles this task.

I would also welcome a solution to the problem mentioned above, whereby, [enter] can open the image for full screen preview, page up/down moves you through the image list, and when you [enter] to return, you're back at the image you started with, not the image you were last previewing...

Also, I know that we have "send to..." and an MRU entry for the last used command, but I often wish that the "send to..." external was not quite so deeply buried.

-marko.

I agree, the "send to external programs" should be shorter and maybe at the top of the right-click context menu.
Or have an option to be able to select one's own default editor within MC, as someone had already pointed out somewhere.

For audio I dont see much that needs added really to have a great and powerful audio everything.
For images I feel it is lacking quite alot personally.

Here's the main points I feel:

* Options - There needs to be an options category specifically related to images (photos)
* Browsing and playing images need to be treated as totally seperate things. Unlike audio, images are all about visual, full sized images is just a view mode. Double clicking them is not playing them - its choosing to view them in a different mode and so needs to be treated as such. If I add files to playing now then I want to show a slideshow etc in which case they again are treated differently. This exact behavior can be set in the 'images options'.
* Full screen images should have a toolbar similar to the one that video's have that appear but with some basic controls on it.
* Easy ability to 'Edit image' which should create a copy of the file, call it [filename]_edited and send it to my pre-set default editor (photoshop). This should be configurable in options as to how the backed up image will be dealt with (ie whether to create an 'edited' or to just directly edit original)
* Version stacking playing on above feature request.

Now that MC has specific areas 'Audio', 'Images', 'Video' - it really should have seperate option groups related to these three areas - it would make it ALOT simpler and clearer.
'Jump on play (if has display) is a pretty vague sounding option and you have to decide if you want video to do one behavior as well as images - it should be seperate for these two obviously seperate things. - Even finding this option isn't too obvious.

A toolbar specifically for images would also be VERY useful. With audio you mainly just want to edit some text (ie inline so no tools required) or play the track. With images you want to do far more to them frequently.

I agree with the above quote too...

oh yeah - and I fully agree - please dont waste time trying to do many editing tasks - leave this to my dedicated image manipulation programs - MC's forte is organising (and audio playback).

I don't agree with this one. Please MC, Please do please dont waste spend time on editing tasks, especailly batch editing and a more jacked up MC Image Editor, for basic photo requirements. I'm not asking for another Photoshop.

[marko]

* Easy ability to 'Edit image' which should create a copy of the file, call it [filename]_edited and send it to my pre-set default editor (photoshop). This should be configurable in options as to how the backed up image will be dealt with (ie whether to create an 'edited' or to just directly edit original)
* Version stacking playing on above feature request.

A D.I.Y. work around while we wait for these to appear in MC?

-marko.

[cosmicfx]

A D.I.Y. work around while we wait for these to appear in MC?

-marko.

I nice post Marko. I'll definitely be studying it this weekend, But also now that I know what "stacking" and "version tracking" are, I definitely want that too.
I hope that alot of this knid of image handling and features aren't too far in the distant future for MC.

Thanks
Cosmic

[Mr ChriZ]

I too miss the ability to do a side by side photo compare. I like the way that Elements handles this task.

I would also welcome a solution to the problem mentioned above, whereby, [enter] can open the image for full screen preview, page up/down moves you through the image list, and when you [enter] to return, you're back at the image you started with, not the image you were last previewing...

Also, I know that we have "send to..." and an MRU entry for the last used command, but I often wish that the "send to..." external was not quite so deeply buried.

-marko.

++

[dcwebman]

Actually, the current system creates a temporary image playback zone if the Playing Now list already contains playing tracks. However, this is mainly intended for playback only because as soon the separate image playback queue is stopped the temporary zone disappears.

A better option is to use a defined separate zone for sorting and tagging images. Each zone has an independent Playing Now queue and display so it is possible to load a playlist of images to PN without altering the other zones' PNs anyway.

Ahhh, that was the problem. I wasn't playing the tracks at the time, hence the images got put into my playing list, not the temporary queue. I'll try the different zones too.

One bug(?) I just saw when trying this is if I double-click an image to go to full-screen, if the image is smaller than the screen, it will be resized to fill the screen and could look terrible. It should leave the image as its original size in that case.

I believe that's optional.

Right, and it's off by default so a 100% zoom is the most applied by default.

Where is this option to not enlarge small images? The only one I could find was under Options\Playback\Image playback settings under the Display heading: "Stretch small images to fill display". Mine is unchecked which I would assume means the small images won't resize them to fill the display. There must be another option you're referring to or this one isn't working.

[Matt]

Where is this option to not enlarge small images? The only one I could find was under Options\Playback\Image playback settings under the Display heading: "Stretch small images to fill display". Mine is unchecked which I would assume means the small images won't resize them to fill the display. There must be another option you're referring to or this one isn't working.

That's the option ("Stretch small images to fill display").  It's working fine for me -- I get black borders around small images in Display View with this option unchecked.

[dcwebman]

That's the option ("Stretch small images to fill display").  It's working fine for me -- I get black borders around small images in Display View with this option unchecked.

OK, I figured out the problem. If a song is playing, it works fine. However, if there is no song playing, double-clicking on an image doesn't use this temporary queue and uses Playing Now instead. And since it's using Playing Now, it uses Display View which doesn't honor that option. Display View then messes things up. If you do something other than pressing Esc or whatever to immediately get back to the Standard View, you are suddenly left in Display View trying to find a way to get back to Standard View which means you have to get the menu to select Standard View or remember Ctrl+1. Seems to me that double-clicking an image should always use that temporary queue.

[Matt]

OK, I figured out the problem. If a song is playing, it works fine. However, if there is no song playing, double-clicking on an image doesn't use this temporary queue and uses Playing Now instead. And since it's using Playing Now, it uses Display View which doesn't honor that option. Display View then messes things up. If you do something other than pressing Esc or whatever to immediately get back to the Standard View, you are suddenly left in Display View trying to find a way to get back to Standard View which means you have to get the menu to select Standard View or remember Ctrl+1. Seems to me that double-clicking an image should always use that temporary queue.

What's your "Jump on play setting" in Options > General?  We recommend "Display View (if has display)".

Personally, I never use "Playing Now" when dealing with images.  You shouldn't even have to know that it's there or that it's changing.

Also, make sure you're using the latest build since audio + image playback changed recently.

[dcwebman]

What's your "Jump on play setting" in Options > General?  We recommend "Display View (if has display)".

Personally, I never use "Playing Now" when dealing with images.  You shouldn't even have to know that it's there or that it's changing.

Also, make sure you're using the latest build since audio + image playback changed recently.

I have that option set to "Display View (if has display)". I don't really want to use Playing Now for images. It just seems to act differently if playing songs or not. And I am using the latest beta build.

[Matt]

I have that option set to "Display View (if has display)". I don't really want to use Playing Now for images. It just seems to act differently if playing songs or not. And I am using the latest beta build.

I'm sorry, but I don't understand what you're seeing.  Images should always be played in Display View.  The stretch option should always be honored.  Could you explain what you're seeing again?

Thanks.

[dcwebman]

I'm sorry, but I don't understand what you're seeing.  Images should always be played in Display View.  The stretch option should always be honored.  Could you explain what you're seeing again?

I have songs in Playing Now but nothing is playing and the stop button has been pressed.
Click the Images button in the tree.
Find a small image thumbnail and double-click it.
You are put in Display mode but at least on my monitor it's a huge display mode and the small image has been resized to fill the screen.
If I move the cursor up to get the menu, the screen resolution has changed to something like 680x480 and it almost looks like it's in theater view.
When you get back to standard view and go to Playing Now, you can see the image was placed in there.

Now if you repeat this process and a song is playing or paused, it will use the image temporary queue and the screen resolution doesn't get changed and the small image is displayed correctly. Going back to Standard View, the image is not in Playing Now.

I hope that clears up what I'm seeing. If not, I can try again.

Oh, one thing is that I'm doing this with dual monitors. I haven't tried it on a single monitor only system yet.

[Matt]

If I move the cursor up to get the menu, the screen resolution has changed to something like 680x480 and it almost looks like it's in theater view.

Perhaps you changed the Full Screen display resolution.  Right-click the display > Display Settings > Resolution > Desktop Resolution (which is the default)

Now if you repeat this process and a song is playing or paused, it will use the image temporary queue and the screen resolution doesn't get changed and the small image is displayed correctly. Going back to Standard View, the image is not in Playing Now.

Ah, because in this case images are played in a hidden zone.  Display resolution is configured per zone, so the hidden zone is using Desktop Resolution.

Life would be easier if we disabled the Options dialog.

[glynor]

Life would be easier if we disabled the Options dialog.

True.  You'd have fewer customers too (which some would argue could make life significantly more difficult).   

[johnnyboy]

Marko - I had a look at your solution and to be honest its a very well thought out clever solution that must have taken a lot of work and thought to do.

The problem is I'm a lazy git - my photos are something I enjoy and not something I want to be giving me more work.
I want tagging and managing them to be a thoughtless, easy to do simple process and so am not interested in anything that doesn't make it so.

I dont want to have to think every time I simply want to crop or resize or edit a picture - I just want to quickly edit it, not think about all the extra steps I need to take to do this successfully.

[marko]

johnnyboy, I wholeheartedly agree with you.

About a year and a half ago I was in an awful mess trying to maintain an MC image library and an Elements image library. It was not going well, photos were being added at an alarming rate and nothing much was being done with them, so I set about trying to bend MC to do some of the things I'd miss most if I dumped Elements. Those were my results. It does work, but it's a little too convoluted. It was only ever meant to be a stop-gap until MC took over the reigns natively.

One of the things I don't like about this system is that it generates new files @ up to 3 megs a pop.
I'd like to see MC adopt the system used by Lightroom and Picassa, whereby changes made to images such as crops, red eye, exposure etc. are kept in the database and applied to the image at the time it is viewed in the application. If you tried viewing the same image file in another program, you would see the original file.
The changes are applied to files being emailed, uploaded or exported locally as new files, so the drive space overhead is nil until you choose to export files for whatever reason.
Lightroom wants to be a big player, so you might expect that, Picassa is free. If freebie picassa can do it, surely MC could too, no?

-marko.

[glynor]

Space savings are a (nice) side benefit of Lightroom's method.  The real point is "unlimited, forever undo" and lossless editing.  Especially important when working with JPEG images (every recompression kills those JPEGs).

[dcwebman]

Perhaps you changed the Full Screen display resolution.  Right-click the display > Display Settings > Resolution > Desktop Resolution (which is the default)

Ah, because in this case images are played in a hidden zone.  Display resolution is configured per zone, so the hidden zone is using Desktop Resolution.

OK, resolution cleared up. For some reason, the initial resolution was set at 320x240x32. I know I didn't change it, at least not intentionally.

It still doesn't resolve the problem (in my opinion) that double-clicking an image when a song is not being played or pauses, puts the image in the Playing Now after viewing. I think that double-clicking an image should always use that hidden zone regardless of the fact what is happening to audio at the time. In fact while checking it out again, somehow the double-clicking I was doing put every image in my Playing Now and I lost my songs that were there. Yes, I got them back by using the Recent Playing Now's playlist, but still.

[Alex B]

It still doesn't resolve the problem (in my opinion) that double-clicking an image when a song is not being played or pauses, puts the image in the Playing Now after viewing. I think that double-clicking an image should always use that hidden zone regardless of the fact what is happening to audio at the time. In fact while checking it out again, somehow the double-clicking I was doing put every image in my Playing Now and I lost my songs that were there. Yes, I got them back by using the Recent Playing Now's playlist, but still.

Actually, it is not a hidden zone. A better adjective would be temporary. As long as this zone has a running PN you can acccess it like any other zone.

A "hidden image zone" is used when audio files and images are sent simultaneously to PN.

I have a lot of playlists that contain images and audio files. The audio files play from PN and the images start playing in a slideshow. When I load one of these lists I usually want to replace the old PN list. This is one best features of MC and any changes to the behavior should carefully considered.

Have you tried this:

Actually, the current system creates a temporary image playback zone if the Playing Now list already contains playing tracks. However, this is mainly intended for playback only because as soon the separate image playback queue is stopped the temporary zone disappears.

A better option is to use a defined separate zone for sorting and tagging images. Each zone has an independent Playing Now queue and display so it is possible to load a playlist of images to PN without altering the other zones' PNs anyway.

If you have a dual monitor setup a good option is to detach and maximize the display on the second monitor.

Personally, I use four zones. The first three are for different playback setups and the fourth one is dedicated for tagging.

It works fine for me. Whenever I want do serious tagging and sorting I switch first to my "TaggingZone".

You can easily toggle between the zones by pressing Ctrl+T or by right-clicking the DSP button. It is also possible to add the Zones button to the toolbar.

[dcwebman]

Actually, it is not a hidden zone. A better adjective would be temporary. As long as this zone has a running PN you can acccess it like any other zone.

I was using "hidden zone" because that's what Matt called it. Sure, I can use multiple zones to avoid conflict but that doesn't change the fact that double-clicking an image works differently in the same zone if audio is playing/paused or not. If it's supposed to work that way, fine. Just seems like it should be consistent.

[gappie]

I was using "hidden zone" because that's what Matt called it. Sure, I can use multiple zones to avoid conflict but that doesn't change the fact that double-clicking an image works differently in the same zone if audio is playing/paused or not. If it's supposed to work that way, fine. Just seems like it should be consistent.

i agree that it should be consistent. the problem is that the way people use it especialy the old method, is so inconsistent, that it is tough to keep everybody happy. i had some good hope when they started to change the image playback. and one version that was on the beta forum only, really was nearly perfect for me. but for a lot of people not, so... at this point consistency is only possible when making a dedicated zone for image playback. for me consistence means, having a playing now for images just like you have with audio that does not disappear when you close the play back or detached display but just show up above playing now or in the tree. guess they will come up with something.

[park]

A third "Image preview" horizontal pane, so that it goes
Tree> List> Image preview
would be an idea. You could then resize each of the panes, and collapse the tree etc. to make each one as big as you need, and always be able to see a reasonably sized image while scrolling through the list, without having to hover over or double click to play it.

It would make the panes pretty much useless though, so much of tagging mode's usefulness would be diminished. Maybe, the details list could be split into two panes. I never really need to see more than a few image thumbnails at a time, so losing some of the space in there wouldn't hurt as much.

If implemented, I'd still like some kind of link on the image preview to see the image full screen, and the ability to return to the list without having to hit the "stop" button. Just a single click anywhere on the screen to return me to where I was.

[)p(]

For me the basic requirements to start tagging images with mc are:

1. Organizing iptc keywords into a hierarchy with the ability to drop images on keywords and vice versa.
2. Automatically detect and remove red eyes on import with a good quality filter.
3. Version stacks

Peter

I'll add a number 4. to my list.

4. Read and write rating field compatibility with Vista's XMP Rating data.

With 4. in place I can start using mc but still do my basic tagging in photoshop elements until 1,2, and 3 are added to mc.

Peter