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Warning: Capture NX can corrupt NEF files

M

Mitch Alland

Guest
It's happened to me twice: when I've had some 12-14 "steps" in NX the file has become corrupted and cannot be opened in NX, which just keeps hanging with a spinning ball on a Mac. Trying to open these files in LightZone I get an image of some diagonals: clearly these NEF files have been corrupted.

This is when I realized that, unlike Silkypix or LightZone, which keep it's adjustments in a separate file and never touch the RAW file, NX uses the brain-dead approach of savings all its processing step in the original NEF file; and I was brain dead for not having worked on copies. Given the flakey nature of NX it is essential to make a copy of the original NEF file and to work only on that.

Has anyone else experienced this problem? Is there any way of extracting the original RAW file element from the files that NX has butchered? Any tool for doing this? I must say that this is an irresponsible way to design a program of this nature!

—Mitch/Tsumeb, Namibia
http://www.flickr.com/photos/10268776@N00/
 

Steen

Senior Subscriber Member
Maybe worth to try if the file can be opened by NX on a pc ?
As far as I recall there have been some other issues with NX on Leopard. Are you using Leopard ?
I'll send you my e-mail address, and then you can send me the NEF file with YouSendIt.com and I can try to open it, if you like.
/Steen
 
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harmsr

Workshop Member
Mitch,

I have never had this issue ever. I am running a new MacBook Pro Intel machine with all the updates to Capture NX and Leopard.

I do not use Nikon Transfer so can't comment on that one.

I use either Nikon View or Expression media for initial sorting with no issue either.

I have never really paid attention and will no have to go investigate what Capture NX does with its instructions to the RAW file. However I never work on the original RAW file in any program. I always save the images direct from the card out to my RAID drive as originals and then work on copies which I keep on the main HD until I'm done processing that shoot. I then have a total of 4 folders to keep on the RAID drive under that shoots main directory folder (originals, worked on RAWs with sidecars or whatever, modified TIFFs, and prepared JPEGS).

Best,

Ray
 

kit laughlin

Subscriber Member
Perhaps I am paranoid (if only in this regard?) but I use Bridge to convert all uninspected files to DNG and save on to one external FireWire drive, and at the same time, the NEF version of the file is put on to one of the internal drives. Metadata is added to both versions in the process. These NEFs become my source files, and the "archived to DNG" drive is disconnected before I start work on the NEFs. Step two is to make a DVD of all of the NEFs (why I stick to 4G CF cards: one card fits on one DVD, and the NEFs are quite a bit smaller).

THEN I look at the NEFs, and sort, delete, etc. Output (while I have lunch) is on to a second internal drive. This approach, I feel, is a reasonable balance between efficiency and the start fear of drives failing. I will not upgrade to Leopard until all image-related problems are sorted; I de-installed Leopard on the new quad-core G5, in fact, for this reason. The latest version of Tiger has no problems that I am aware of. YMMV.
 

woodyspedden

New member
For those using Leopard I would recommend downloading the very latest version of NX (believe it is 1.3.1)

I have heard some of the Leopard issues are fixed in this release but since I still use Tiger I can't confirm this

Woody
 

kit laughlin

Subscriber Member
Woody, a few years ago I was the guy who first posted that upgrading to the latest OS stopped Final Cut Pro's most basic function: capturing sound and video. At that time, I did not have an archived version of the previous OS—and lost a full week of work as a result. Not that I think this is deliberate on the part of software developers, but I no longer beta test for free! The graphic artist I was working with at the time upgraded the machines over lunchtime...

My suggestion to anyone is that, if your current OS (Windows or Mac) is working, and allowing your various softwares to run properly, then wait for at least a few iterations of the new OS before upgrading. cheers to all, kl
 
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