Mike Chaney's Tech Corner

Just noticed Flashpipe, so I apologise if this has been asked before.
I use DLP, and my photos automatically get downloaded to a structure that is
e:\photos\year\year_month\year_month_day\imagename throgh the use of arguments (I think!)
Can this be done in Flashpipe?

This was covered in the requested features thread, but I'll repeat here...

No, FlashPipe offers a more efficient way to download by date-shot.  Since FlashPipe does more than Downloader Pro, like move your raws to a separate "raw" folder, develop your raws and puts them in a "developed" folder, create email/web copies and puts them in a "web" folder, moves videos to a different folder if you like, and so on, it is more efficient to create a folder that shows the date range of the photos/videos on the card.

If you have a card that has photos from 5 days and videos from two days for example, doing it the Downloader Pro way, you'd end up with five different folders, one for each day.  In each of those five folders you'd have a "raw" subfolder, a "developed" subfolder, a "web" folder, and potentially a "misc" folder if you move "other" files off the card.  That's 20 new folders to store photos/videos from 5 days.  In addition, you only shot videos two of the five days so if you chose to move videos to the same location as your photos, you'd have to go search all five folders to find which ones the videos reside in.  And if you want all photos of a certain subject that you shot during the course of those 5 days, you'd have to keep backing up and going to different directories to find that subject in each one.

Simply put, this is a mess.

In FlashPipe what you can do is download your photos to a single folder that shows the date range and then auto-rename your photos by date so that they sort by day within that folder.  For example, instead of creating five different folders for your 5 day shoot like: 2009-10-01, 2009-10-02, 2009-10-03, 2009-10-04, and 2009-10-05, FlashPipe can create one folder called 2009-10-01..2009-10-05 and you can set the auto-rename so that files automatically sort by day within that folder, or camera first, then day, or basically whatever you want.  That way you have a folder that tells you which days are included and you can still sort out a single day or if you like, select all photos of one particular subject across all five days without having to back up and visit different folders.  You can keep your main structure of photos\year\year-month if you like: just select that in FlashPipe and change it once a month when necessary.

Mike

Mike, I appreciate the usefulness of being able to put videos in separate folders, etc. but I thought you can do that in your interface.  I put my videos just in a videos folder as I don't have that many, so I would specify that in Flashpipe. It's photos that I use a lot.
I hear what you are saying, but I don't want my RAWs to be developed, I use Lightroom and PS for that.
I'm afraid I can't agree with you on the 'date range' folder name at all.  HDD folders are just a way of storing images initially, as all the indexing work is done by DAM software like LR, so to a large extent where the images are actually stored is irrelevant unless you need to look from outside the DAM environment.
Also, I don't want to rename the images as you suggest, I want the original names to be kept intact.
I'm not on a DLP crusade here, believe me, but the flexibility in the 'argument' preferences is very powerful, but the one drawback is that only one folder can be specified, so all videos, etc. go there, and then they've got to be weeded out as you suggested.
This is why I was attracted to Flashpipe, but if the folder name can't be specified as say 2009/2009_10/2009_10_16 then my whole database structure would fall apart.
I'm not disagreeing with what you said, and it probably would be a better approach for some people, but it would be really good if there were options to specify a different folder structure if that's what the user wanted.

As one who once wanted Mike to implement the by-day-and-date folder system, I believe that FlashPipe in its current form works quite well with Lightroom given that LR has the option to move files once they are on the hard drive into this kind of system.  See my post here: http://ddisoftware.com/tech/flashpipe/now-i-see-the-light!/ (http://ddisoftware.com/tech/flashpipe/now-i-see-the-light!/).

Mike, you have already implemented the date-span folder system in the latest upgrade.  Might there be a way to add an option to download photos into folders arranged by month, but not specifically by day?

- Chris

Thanks for that.  Bearing in mind that I haven't actually used FP, it just looked interesting and I don't want to start the trial until I see if it could work for me.
I haven't fully studied your other post, but why not just use DLP which puts the files into a user defined structure. 
I just insert my card, DLP pops up and automatically downloads images straight to the year/month/day folder structure that I defined.
Importing into LR is easy and nothing additional needs to be done.
Are you saying that FP will only use a single folder for each download?  If that is the case, surely then if you were doing a shoot every day for 3 years say, then it would created almost 1000 folders at the the next level down from your main Photo folder.  Is that right?  If so, that does not seem like a workable structure.

Just give FP a trial and work it out for yourself.  It is a simple prog and the 7day trial should be long enough.  If it proves no good for you, leave it and continue to use DLP.

Jeff

I probably will, but (like many others I've since read in this forum) I feel the lack of flexibility in the download folder structure is going to be a show-stopper.
This is a great shame as the copying to multiple locations is very attractive.

I tried DLP and found it more complicated than I needed.  Plus, I could not find out if it also downloaded videos as FP does.  Since we do take some video on my wife's cameras, this is a useful and time-saving feature.  FP's interface is very easy to use without too much switching between different tabs and menus.  Finally, the introductory price for FP is $10.00 cheaper than DLP.  As a matter of pure cost, I did not feel that DLP added enough to merit the additional expenditure.

- Chris

IMO, you're not making a very good case for creating so many folders.  If your DAM is going to do the work, why would you care that there are three days worth of photos in one folder instead of one folder per day.  The one-folder-per-day option is completely arbitrary while the time/date that you download info from your cards is deliberate.  Splitting photos by day simply makes no sense.  What if you are covering an event that goes past midnight?  Do you really want the latter part of the event in a different folder?  I honestly think that the only people who are doing this are the people who had been using DL Pro in the past and they did it because DL Pro didn't offer a better way.  It just doesn't make sense to arbitrarily create folders in an uncontrollable environment where the data on the card creates new folders without user confirmation/intervention.  If you really have a need to split your photos by day, just buy smaller cards and switch cards each day.  Or better yet, go to the folder and then decide whether or not you really need to split them by day!  If you do, select the ones from a certain date (that can be done by auto-renaming or even by the file date if you don't rename) and move the ones that really need to be in different folders rather than blindly assuming breaks by day.  You say you are using a DAM, so if you are that should be easy.  If you are not, then you probably won't want your images spread across so many directories anyway.

I see no argument for keeping the original file name either!  What information do you really get from _MG_1798?  If that's really important to you, just rename by date and leave the _IM_1798 at the end of the file name like: 2009-10-16 _IM_1798.  Best of both worlds.

And if you are worried about having almost 1000 folders off your main folder if you have three years of data, why worry about it?  Just select/create a year and let FlashPipe do the rest.  Use c:\photos\2009 as your folder and FlashPipe will create a folder each time you download that tells you the dates of the files in that folder.  You'll certainly have far fewer folders doing it that way than you will be forcing the software to create a new folder for every day you have images!

Mike

More complicated!?!  DLP requires one and one only 2 minute configuration when you install it, and that is it!
I insert my card, all images are downloaded to the structure I specified at first install automatically.  Nothing could be simpler!
Then I go into LR, import the images, give them keywords and forget about where they are stored.
Oh, and yes it does download video files.

Sorry, Mike but you have to accept that many people myself included just don't agree with what you are saying, and it's got nothing to do with 'not wanting to change'.  You keep banging on about the mess of folders that is created by DLP but I'm afraid I can't see that.  You keep saying that FP will create much less folders,  but it creates a horribly messy folder structure, and that is the important thing.
As I have said, most people will let their DAM do the indexing, so that your examples of what to do at 1.30am at a wedding just doesn't come into it.  Type in 'wedding' into LR and get them all without having to do any HD searching at all.  Doesn't matter a damn how they are stored.
However, where the structure does matter is when you need to look out side the DAM for images.  With the year, month, day structure it is neat on the drive and it is easy to find what you are looking for if you know when the event was.
For example, in your world, if I say gathered images from a family day out at the beach from several family members cameras over a period of time, the images would be spread out over several unconnected folders from the time they were actually downloaded not the shot time.  Now, according to you, you could rename the images and search under that name. But I don't want to rename my images. I would know that I was at the beach at the beginning of August 2009 and look there, and all the photos would be stored in the same place, i.e. on the date they were taken.
All this is done by one click in DLP with keywording in DAM.
I say again, it's about a manageable folder structure, not the number of folders.  Anyway, if you downloaded images every day, DLP would create 365 subfolders, and FP something like 365*3 for RAW, Develops, Video etc. etc.
I know you are never going to see what I and others are saying to you as being acceptable, but I can't help feeling that surely you should be listening to your customers - both current (I'm a long term QImage user) and potential - and offer them the option of defining what folder structure they want rather than what the program decided (with limited options).

Wrong.  FlashPipe will download the images to a folder based on the date range the shots were taken!  The difference is, your way, you'll create a sloppy mess of 51 different folders because Uncle Fred left shots on there from that last month and a half, Grandma Lee has photos from two weeks on her camera, Aunt Linda has the date on her camera set to June 2008, and you have photos from only the one day.  So you'll get a mess of folders, only one of which you need and one of which matches the day you are looking for.  You can't even FIND Aunt Lindas photos because the date is wrong on her camera.  And down the road, a year from now, you'll never remember the exact day so off you go searching 10 different folders because you can't remember which day in August that was.

I'm not here to convince you one way is better than another; only encouraging you to try something a little different.  You don't seem to even know that FlashPipe can download photos to folders based on the date the SHOTS were taken, so I really don't think you've tried it the FlashPipe way.  But that's not really my purpose here.  My purpose is to show you how FlashPipe is designed, WHY it is designed that way, and you can make up your own mind.  If you don't like the way it does it, use another tool.  It's really that simple.

Mike

OK Mike, I wasn't aware that FP can download to folders based on the SHOT date. I was under the impression that it could only do it to folders based on the download date. (You only show that on the video.)
So, in our extremely silly beach example, if all the cameras are assumed to be set to the correct date, could I get the images to all download to the same SHOT folder even if they are downloaded on different days?

I have now actually tried FP!
What I did was to put 3 images and 2 videos on my card from different dates, downloaded from FP with the SHOT date selected, and very quickly the files were downloaded to 2004-08-30..2009-10-10.
So far so good.
However, I then put 3 more images from within the same date range thinking that FP would be smart enough to recognise the previous range folder, but no, it put them into 2005-06-24..2009-09-02.
In our 'beach' example, that would cause chaos would it not?  Would there not be a mess of folders all created individually from each camera with names like 2010-08-01..2010-08-03, 2010-08-01, 2009-08-04..2010-08-03 (if Auntie Jennie still had one from the previous year!), etc. etc.
The worst thing would be that it would be impossible to find these folders in FP structure as they would be mixed up at one level with all the other photo folders taken around that date range. The DLP Y/M/D method puts them all together automatically.
Maybe I'm missing something here, but I just don't see how you could identify all the 'beach' images easily from the FP folder structure. At least in the simple year/month/day you can home in within a few days, and with the Explorer tree on the left pane and preview on the right, a couple of clicks would do it.  (This is of course all ignoring the existence of DAM.)
There is so much potential in FP, that I think it's a shame that you wouldn't even consider implementing a Y/M/D structure in the options and then keep everyone happy!

In your second example, FlashPipe will tell you the date range folder (when that is set) it is going to create in the sub-folder column of the Output table so it's no surprise.
In the case you describe, I would then switch off the sub-folder option in Settings and select the existing folder in the Folder column of the output table.
Thus, there is total flexibility in this case and you can choose what to do; 8) Not everyone would want to do as you suggest automatically.  :o
Terry.

In the beach example, I was just pointing out that the maximum number of folders you would ever get from FlashPipe is one per camera.  Since each camera might have shots from different dates, the date ranges may be different but if the clock is set properly on the camera, the date you are looking for would be in the range specified.  One camera might have 2009-06-18..2009-08-03, a second one might have 2009-08-01..2009-08-03, and a third might just have 2009-08-03 because they only shot on one day.  But you'd still only have find one folder per camera.  If a new folder is created for each day, you'd have a folder for each day that had pictures from each camera: potentially dozens of folder.

But like Terry said, you can select the folder or "lock it in".  And even better, if you have a multi-card reader, you could plug all three cards in from all three cameras and if you download from all three at once, FlashPipe will create ONE folder that shows the date range of all photos from all three cards at once: so you'll get one folder for all three cards!  I think the flexibility is there: you just need to figure out how best to tailor it to your own unique situation/workflow.

Mike

There is flexibility within the confines of the limited choices available within FP, yes, but TOTAL flexibility? Absolutely not!
Even the process you suggest involves extra steps and searching through a list of folders to work out what range the original images fitted into.  Hardly intuitive or easy.
Have you actually used DLP? That is total flexibilty in how you want to name your files, folder structure, shoot date, download date, camera name, location, etc.etc.  All in one click!
Look at the screens below of a few of the options available.

No you wouldn't!
Regardless of the number of cameras involved in DLP using the simple structure I use, if the beach trip was 1 day you would have 1 sub-folder with all the images in it.  If the beach trip was 3 days you would have 3 subfolders in a neat and obvious structure.  The number of cameras is irrelevant in my structure.  You could of course make DLP to do it in the way you like, i.e. by download date, by camera or what ever you want.

Well, you can type in any folder name you like  ::)
You call that intuitive and what about all those clicks for the tick boxes  ;)

BTW, suggest you use jpeg's for attachments, they are then readable on the forum screen.

Terry

Yes, but every time!
I didn't say it was intuitive, this is the word that gets bandied around about FP.
Setting it up takes approximately 1 minute, and then you never have to type anything in ever again. Extremely painless. (Sorry, don't know what you mean about tick boxes.)

There are rows that you can make for each transfer condition that you may like, regardless of how unique any one of those might be.
As Terry said, (and this is the main point) once you set up a row to do a special transfer with a specially named folder, and have a date param. set, you can turn that off when not in use, and on when needed.
Make row after row of your oddest setups. Flashpipe will remember them and use them only when you switch them on. !

Sorry Fred, I don't understand what you mean at all.  Could you explain what you mean in more detail. At the moment, I can't see how FP has any flexibility without manual intervention each time to rename or choose destination folders.
I'm trying to see how FP could help me, but, apart from the multiple destinations, at the moment I can't.

I will try to be clearer.
I have attached three snaps to the message.
Using them, I want to show you that you can make many rows with destination folders all set to accept the new uploads. I left the right hand columns blank since they would be filled in by the user, on a use by use basis.
You can see the first row is filled in as the shots were being uploaded at the time of the shoot to a new folder called Rodeo-2008.
You can name the right hand column as you see fit.
I can do 2009-rodeo for this year, or Rodeo-2009, or the whole date with Month Day and Year... I can type into the last box and have the auto date too.
I can have Flashpipe  auto name my sub folders for me.
I could go on and on, but the point is that you can set up rows, many rows, of preset destinations and file types, and leave these rows turned off until you need them.
You can set the right side column to auto date (see snap 3)  and it will always be current. You can add the event to the date.

I could go on and on.... but you can see that setting the rows to various jobs, and again more rows for various destinations, you have the versitility to make Flashpipe do anything you want, and it will keep those settings so you don't have to do it every time.

Fred

Thanks Fred, I understand more.
However,
1) I'm afraid I still don't see how the common Y/M/D format can be accommodated without manual intervention each time I want to download. Tell me, how can I use the Y/M/D folder structure in FP with multiple dates on the card?
2) Also, I don't want to name folders by events.  What if there are multiple events on the card?  That is what DAM is for.  I want a simple STRUCTURE to my folders that can logically be drilled down into if I ever need to access the files outside of the DAM environment - which very rarely happens.
3) I can see (I think!) what you guys are saying, but I'm afraid I just cannot see the advantage here for me.  I mean, I never, and I mean never, have to go anywhere near DLP except when I reinstall Windows. I just insert my card, and all the photos are downloaded automatically to my pre-defined structure.

I say again, different people have different ways of organising their photo library, and whatever works for you may not work for me and vice versa.  However, I wish that Mike would consider putting in the kind of structure that I and many others use (and have mentioned on this forum) as an option in order to keep everyone happy, because I love certain features of FP especially the multiple destinations which I feel at the moment is the only feature of FP that can't be replicated in DLP.  (Although I would be happy to be proven wrong on that one!)

Simply go into Settings and turn on the date range feature.
There are so may options to set to please as many as possible.

Fred

Sorry Fred, but I'm obviously being incredibly stupid about this.  Thanks for your tolerance.
I can only see file rename options, and an option to download to subfolders based on a range. I can't see how the Year/Month/Day folder structure can be supported by FP despite what you say.

It's likely my fault for not explaining better.
The subfolder naming when turned on Automatic, It says Create Subfolders by date.
Then if RANGE is turned on, it will show in the Subfolder name that the shots on the card were taken on dates from (10-15-2009 to 10-17-2009)
Sorry, I just can't explain it any better than that.
Maybe someone else can do better?

Fred

Thanks again, Fred.  That is not what I am asking for.  My (and many others) folder structure is Y/M/D. For example, in my structure, photos from today would go automatically in DLP to 2009/2009_10/2009_10_18.
If I have photos on the card from today, yesterday and the day before, the images would go to 3 folders as above but + 2009_10_17 and 2009_10_16.
You said earlier that FP can do this. All I am trying to do is see how?

In the above example, you have pictures from 2009-10-18 so as soon as you insert the card, FlashPipe's subfolder will already say "2009-10-18".  That's the only day for which you have pictures on the card so your subfolder will automatically show that.  So set the "To Folder" to 2009/2009_10, click "Go" and you're done.

The next time you download, you might have pictures from October 24.  So you insert your card and click "Go" an you're done.  Your pictures will go into 2009/2009_10/2009-10-24.

The only differences using that method between FP and DL Pro are:

• Obviously you'd have to change your "To Folder" once a month
• If you have say three days of photos, DL Pro will create three new folders: 2009/2009_10/2009-10-24, 2009/2009_10/2009-10-25, and 2009/2009_10/2009-10-26.  FP will create one folder: 2009/2009_10/2009-10-24..2009-10-26.

That's based on what you like to do.  For me, splitting 2009 into months is just extra work all the way around.  I don't use DAM software because I don't need it.  I create ONE folder for the year and I let the download date(s) dictate the folder.  So in my 2009 folder I'll have a folder named 2009-10-24..2009-10-26 automatically: that tells me that I downloaded photos from that date range.  Sometimes I'll add a description to that manually like 2009-10-24..2009-10-26-Siesta-Key so I can look at that and tell that the folder contains photos from those three days and that the subject of the photos was Siesta Key Beach.  It's elegant, simple, and most importantly deliberate!  I haven't arbitrarily created three new folders just because there were three days worth of photos on the card.  It creates one folder that automatically shows the date range of the photos in that folder and after the download, I can make a conscious decision as to whether or not they NEED to be split further.  If I came back from a three day beach trip with the family, I'd likely leave all three days in one folder: no sense splitting them so I can only see one day at a time when I want to print all photos of Uncle Jesse playing with the kids on the beach for him to take home.  If one of the three days was actually a boating event that I want to separate, I can make that decision to split those to another folder (and I can do that easily based on file date) but that should be a conscious decision, not a decision made by a program automatically.  But that's just me.  ;)

Mike

Mike, the simple answer is that FP can't do what I want to do and DLP can. It's as simple as that.
There is no point in arguing whether one method is better than the other.  I think you're system is a mess, and you think mine is!  That's the way it is.
The simple fact though is that for me, DLP and LR offer a much more streamlined and simple approach to downloading and classifying.  You can't see that, and that's fine, but what I've been asking since nearly the beginning of this thread is could you not keep everyone happy and implement what I and others have been asking for as an option?

And as I've said many times before, the answer is no!  If you don't like the way FP does it, even though I've basically proven you can do what you want with FP, then use DL Pro.  Talk about simple!  And as I've also stated, my purpose here is to inform (about features) and show you what FP can do.  If you refuse to try my suggestions and/or you just don't like the way it works, you already have DL Pro.  Go use it.

I have no plans to create software that goes off on its own creating an arbitrary number of download folders based on image data.  I think that's probably the 6th time I've said that.  One of my goals with FlashPipe is that the user should know where their images are going before the transfer.  I've explained the details of why software-creation of a potentially limitless number of folders during transfers is a very bad idea so I don't plan to go over this again.

Mike