EM writes no Star Rating back into NEF files

NN267892UL

• October 12, 2010 11:39

Hello,

for some odd reason, EM does not sync back Star Ratings into my NEF Raw files.
Funnily enough though, the Star Rating is passed over to CatureOne but when I check the NEF file with exiftool, basic IPTC data was written back to it without the star rating. JPGs are handled fine.

I have a fresh installed Windows 7 64 bit system and use EM2 with SP2.

This behaviour would be a "No Go" for my intended couple C1+EM2.

Any ideas?

Regards
Michael

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  rmoorlag

  • October 17, 2010 21:15

  Hello Michael,
  
  How did you note that EM did nog sync back star ratings in the NEF's?
  Did it worked properly before?
  
  In my situation (also Win7 64 bit and EM2 SP2) i tested what You described on some NEF and it's seems OK. Normaly I use DNG's and they are more compatible. Why don't you use them?
  
  However, star ratings in genaral are not very compatible with different applications. A star given with EM I can see in Capture One but not in Nikon ViewNX or Adobe Bridge. But when i build a new catalog and put in the images, al star ratings are being showed correctly.
  
  Because of the bad compatiblity of star ratings, I always synchronize them in my Keywords. The Keywords field is the best compatible IPTC field. So, Every 1 star image I give a keyword RM:1STAR, Every 2 star imgage RM:2STAR an so on. Peter Krogh gave this advise in his 'DAM book for photograpers' and since then i'm using it.
  
  Roelof

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  photomy2

  • October 29, 2010 18:29

  One way to sync raw files is using XMP sidecar files. However, they are not written automatically rather a manual step under Actions in EM. AND, they are not written automatically to the folder that the file is located in rather you need to select the proper folder. It will remember the last folder a XMP sidecar file was written to.
  
  Of course, the program on the other side, such as Photo Mechanic or other, needs to be setup to default to XMP sidecar files for the metadata. If Photo Mechanic is used, it can be setup this way and to automatically write this metadata back into the NEF files in the IPTC and XMP fields in the proper fashion. This is nice because then these setting will also show up in Nikon browser programs.
  
  The color labels actually are written as the Urgency number code. So, Photo Mechanic needs to be told to sync Urgency number and color labels, which is a checkbox in preferences.
  
  If you do not have Photo Mechanic or similar program that is flexible in its settings, you will NOT be able to sync back directly to Nikon browser programs for labels and ratings. This is because of the very poor way that EM writes to NEF files. EM does IPTC writing only with some strange modifications. No proper writing that I am aware of to XMP fields. It will get rid of much of the XMP data that may have already been there. There is hardly any program other than EM that will ever be able to see your contact data after EM has done a write to the NEF file. It is there but, but in such a non-standard fashion, no other program can see it.
  
  If you look inside the metadata of a NEF file (via Exiftool) after EM has written directly to it , you will probably NEVER want EM to ever write diredtly to your NEF file. Let programs like Photo Mechanic, IMatch, Nikon programs, and maybe others that know how to do it correctly, do this type of action.
  
  Bottom Line: EM is not very good for photogs that like to edit and use NEF files directly. Not there yet. Better for DNG people.

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  James McDowell

  • February 12, 2011 00:06

  Try this
  
  http://home.earthlink.net/~matthewjheaney/damtools/
  
  These add in scripts and com libraries will sort this out (windows only.) I can confirm that these bits of code that Mr. Heaney wrote work in every version of Windows I've tried, right up to Win 7 64Bit.
  
  Perhaps something like this can be added in a future release.

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