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Importing based on image date

NN635470787112153207UL
I am new to Capture One, so please forgive this question as I do not know if C1 can do (and I am still learning my way around the program).

Version: 8.0.2
O/S: Mac OS X 10.9.5
Camera: Fujifilm X-Pro1

Objective: I would like to import my images, directly if possible, from my X-Pro 1 to a subfolder within Pictures folder, based on the actual image date, not the importation date. I do not wish to store the images within the Catalog but reference only.

Currently I have created folder structures based on the importation date, such as:

~/Pictures/Photographs/2014/2014-11-23

I am using Image Capture and as it will recognise my camera (C1 will, it seems, not - I can import by inserting the SD card but that is second choice definitely).

If I cannot do this with C1, is there an easy way with Image Capture to achieve this?

Regards
Matt
Sydney, Australia
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Comments

8 comments

Date Votes
  • Paul Steunebrink
    Not much good news for you, I am afraid.

    CO8 does not read your images directly from camera, only from a card reader.
    And the import folder based on capture date, is a missing feature in CO8's import feature set currently.
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  • SFA
    It occurs to me that in many ways the folder structure based on date, no matter how familiar and comfortable we may be with the idea, may really be a little redundant in a modern computer system where a collection of data records (in this case images) can be selected/filtered/grouped (use you favourite terminology) in several different ways. Indeed a catalogue concept has to do some work to to create "folders" for us to understand when in fact it is a relational database where all the bits of the files are "held together" by internal links.

    If we think in terms of C1 Sessions we have what looks like a structured filing system but, on disk, it's often just random blocks of data linked together by by an internal index that allows the files to be re-constructed. The traditional "folder" as in a paper based filing cabinet does not exist.

    So one could just upload all of the files to a single "folder". C1 then offers the options to create groups of files by common criteria - date for example. One could then create a folder in the Library hierarchy for collecting stuff for that dates, select all of the images found for that date and move them to the folder if required.

    However is that really necessary when we can always find the files for a particular date using a filtered enquiry?

    I often shoot events over a number of days and I tend to import card full by card full grouped by camera. My folder ID may involve date and my file naming may involve date simply to make things more visible at the operating system file explorer level - but internally within the editor as a session or, especially, a catalogue it probably does not make much sense other than limiting the folder based selection to 2000 to 3000 files in a set. Usually at some point I then need to group the images in other ways often across all the days of the shoot - so the dated based folder is of little help to me anyway. The only real benefit of a folder per card full is the simple ability to back track and make sure that all cards have been imported (and the imported files have been backed up ...) Once that is done the folder structure is less helpful - possibly even a hindrance.

    Where the date may be more significant would be on output although for my purposes the interest would most likely be date and something else rather than date alone.

    So, if one was to just upload everything to, say, a Capture folder one could go through, make selections then filter by date, select all for the filter and move them to a date based folder. Or not but then consider collecting the output files using such a filter when it's time to process.

    To summarise, although I do use a folder based filing concept that is, basically, akin to naming for a date, I am wondering whether that is as effective as I think it is.

    I suspect, especially with the performance and feature enhancements in C1 V8, that I should re-think my approach although I can quite imagine it may take a while for me to become fully comfortable with any new workflow.

    The first step might be to collect everything in a single "Capture Folder" and then select and process to segregate to sub-folders as seems best for each shoot/project. They are not all the same.


    HTH.


    Grant
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  • NN635470787112153207UL
    Paul, Grant, thank you for the replies.

    I was thing about this a bit last night after posting and looked at the auto importer part of Image Capture. Coming to the conclusion to may be keep it simple with importing. That is, configure Image Capture to go to a single folder:

    ~/Pictures/Photographs/2014

    and then use C1 Catalog albums as I have been doing, after all that is what catalogs, projects and albums are all about - to do the work. Then I only need to once per year change the Image Capture destination.

    Regards
    Matt
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  • SFA
    Matt,

    You know answering your question made me think about how I import stuff as well -or perhaps more realistically what I do once I have imported the images.

    As I mentioned my current approach is really just to ensure I have all cards copied every day with minimal power use (for when away from a reliable and available power source) but with at least some ability to name the images (and then copy the named set to a backup disk) and view them briefly (curiosity usually get to me but also the need to perhaps share the results with others before full processing.)

    Once that is done one tends to stick with that folder structure (it could as easily be by date of course and often is - bit not always) even though there is no need to do so and indeed it may not be very efficient.

    For my purposes I would like time (down to seconds and decimal seconds) to be available for selection and sorting but I can live without it.

    Sometimes it seems quite difficult to adapt from something one feels comfortable with to something even just slightly different despite knowing that there is every chance that benefits will accrue - so thanks for the question that encouraged me consider what the options are when previously I have not really bothered to do so.

    I would be very interested to read about your opinion of how you were able to make it work for you (or not I suppose!) when you have developed the process.

    All the best,



    Grant
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  • NN635470787112153207UL
    Grant,

    Not tried yet but this is my current line of thinking.

    1. Import images using Image Capture to a folder ~/Pictures/Photographs/import

    This can be skipped if you will be importing from a SD card.

    2. In C1, import:

    IMPORT TO
    Store files: ~/Pictures/Photographs/2014 or /Shared/Photographs/2014 if you want all users to access
    Collection: Recent Imports Only

    NAMING
    <Image Year (yyyy)>-<Image Month (MM)>-<Image Day of Month>_<Image Name> (e.g. 2014-11-25_DSCF0001.raf)

    You might want to insert <Camera Serial> between the date and image name that way the chances of a duplicate from multiple cameras, SD cards are practically nil (I take it you are a Professional or advanced amateur as you stated you did events with multiple cards).

    BACKUP TO
    Might use this to store on my Time Machine network disk as a safety.

    3. Add images to appropriate Projects and Albums in User Collections as appropriate.

    4. Delete the contents of the ./import folder (if Image Capture used).

    This will work for me I think. I see a number of upsides.

    a. I will create a catalog per year (currently using 'Catalog 2014').

    b. Images will be stored in folders by year so there is some 'order' on disk and only need to create an additional folder per year.

    c. The image naming convention reduces duplication, and using grep (or similar) can easy from outside C1 find images from particular cameras, years, months etc, and browsing the folders will at least enable identifying when images were taken etc a lot easier.

    d. Use the Projects and Albums in C1 to do the heavy lifting.

    I think that will work... 😁

    Regards
    Matt
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  • Ario
    As good as the catalogs are for organizing, searching, rating....I still want to have my raw files organized in a solid and rationale structure to which I can refer with all the software I use at present (Capture One, Lightroom, Iridient, PS, DXO...) and to which I can refer also with tool that are not available now but may be available in the future.
    To do so I rename every image using the capture date and time (eg 20141124_084359) and store in folders named by date and caption (eg 2014/11/2014_11_24_example).
    Ingestamatic and PhotoMechanic (and may be others) are excellent tools for this task and I can also add Keywords and other metadata during ingestion so that they will be available with any sw i am going to use downstream.
    I will never touch this OS based structure with the catalog tools which I use for the logical organization only. (groups, albums, smart albums...).
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  • SFA
    Ario,

    Good points.

    I use Sessions so the Catalog questions don't worry me at the moment.

    My other regular (though less and less frequently used) converter/editor will happily work alongside C1 in the same structure. It does not use the catalogue concept. Perhaps a little messy when sharing space that way but it doesn't worry me usually. Should it ever start to worry I can tidy up.

    I have considered using catalogues for the processed images. For my purposes I don't see a great need to keep everything ready for renewed "live from the original" output processing on an immediate basis. I might be wrong about that but right now I don't see the need. So long as the file naming convention is good identifying the source of an output image should not be a problem.

    I am somewhat aware that older works may become obsolete as software advances and the massive "total collection" catalogue would, to my mind, be compromised by automatic updates as much as it might benefit from them. Not so for "frozen" output files. They are what they are and should probably stay that way.


    Grant
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  • BeO
    Top Commenter
    Ario:
    As good as the catalogs are for organizing, searching, rating....I still want to have my raw files organized in a solid and rationale structure to which I can refer with all the software I use at present (Capture One, Lightroom, Iridient, PS, DXO...) and to which I can refer also with tool that are not available now but may be available in the future.


    I am with you regarding the software-independence. For me, the oringial files need to be independent from any software and accessible and structured on the file system to my aliking, to the operating system requirements and backup strategies.

    Capture One offers the Recent Import Collections, so there is not a big need (for me) to use the import date as the folder structure. If I am back from a longer trip and do the import, I don't care about the import date (for my hard-disk folders) but rather the folders should be organzied (as Matt) regarding the capture date.

    As Capture One doesn't offer to create sub folders by capture date, I found a compromise, I organize Year/Month. I use a temp folder to copy from the card, preview with Nikon View NX (which shows me also the focus point which I am interested in), delete unwanted images. I do this locally (Notebook).
    Then I do the import with Capture one into the monthly folder (which resides on a NAS), images named by capture date and time (eg 20141124_084359). As I have pre-selected and deleted images, network traffic is lowered.

    Of course, every workflow is different. I imagine if one does multiple shoots and imports a day, import date is more appropriate.

    Best
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