Hey I'm Paul. I have an early MacbookPro 2011, with 2.3 GHz Intel Core i7 and 8GB RAM.
My hard drive slowly started to crash but it was over a few weeks. I've lost 30,000 Raw files, which were mainly reference.
NOW, I had 2 back up's, one on a WD My Book and one a LaCie little big disk. Both of these libraries are also corrupted.
I can SEE the Library, 30,000 master files etc, but nothing works, it's almost 200GB. I was on the phone to an Apple Aperture tech for almost 2 hours after I got my computer back and everything we tried made Aperture unable to open with that selected lib.
This happened on 31st of March and I've tried to rebuild the library from scratch which took ages, just to get a 1/10th of it done. I bought Disk Drill to no avail and now I'm just stumped.
Every tech I've shown it to, says there it is. Tries to copy it to another HD and it just will not allow the data to reconstruct.
I'm so lost I just don't know how to get this all back. Do you think I'll just have to do it one folder at a time as that seem to be the only thing that works. I tried a merge today and that didn't work either.
How on earth do you find lost referenced files when the files in the folders I'm opening aren't even the right photos and they've nearly all been renumbered.
It's like a tornado has ripped through a book library, strewn 30,000 pics all over the floor and now it's time to pick up the pieces but where do I start? It's the best way to describe it .
Paul from Australia
I still don’t know if it is your Library that is corrupt, or the image files.
If you haven’t already done so and since you’re on >10.7, you should restart your Mac holding down the Option(Alt) key and choose the Recovery partition as your startup disk. Run Disk Utility from there.
Whatever … I don’t use a Referenced system, but if I did, I would put all image files … everything … in one big folder. Reconnection and/or moving image files around, becomes very very simple if you do this.
For any kind of Finder use, you can create Smart Folders (you could create these at time of import if you wanted to create the same sort of structure you presumably have now).
Paul,
If your drive is that fragged, you need to get your data off of it, reformat, and reinstall the OS and all apps. I wouldn’t try to fix things at this point… it’s time to go into recovery mode.
As far as the masters, I’m honestly not sure I understand what you’re asking. But if your Aperture library is so messed up that mismatched files are showing as masters, as much as it pains me to say this, you may want to basically start over. Salvage what RAW files you can (masters) and import into a NEW Aperture library.
This level of help is really, really hard to do without seeing your system. Since you have access to the Apple stores and the Genius bar, you may want to ask them to help.
@PhotoJoseph
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Thanks Joseph,
gfsymon, I just re-read my last post and it sounded really rude, Sorry, it was not meant to be, my apologies.
I just upgraded my Capture NX2 to 2.3.2 and found this….
This is a direct QUOTE FROM OFFICIAL NIKON WEBSITE that has not be altered in anyway, I’m covering myself but remove it if it’s not allowed, I’m just trying do the right thing buy everyone. This is a DIRECT cut and paste in bug fixes.
“Additional modifications to the Macintosh version.
When NEF files edited using the unsharp mask function and then saved were later opened, or copied and opened, the images sometimes appeared corrupted. This issue has been resolved.”
This is interesting as I’ve used NX2 very sporadically over the last year and I do love a bit of Infrared Photography so it’s awesome for that but now that Camera Raw is so good it’s personal preference. I still prefer NX2.
Re the cyber bullying, it was a Facespace page. I was one of 4 mods who basically walked away after 3 weeks. We’d been cyber mates for over a year and decided to have a VERY small page with no more than 20 people on it where we’d literally talk about editing and shooting techniques etc.. we’d even get others to edit our work for us.
Now I knew he had a temper and was hot headed but I didn’t realise how bad it was until we started this group. The 1st 10 days were actually amazing, 20 good cyber friends being open and honest and editing things we we’d get stuck on. We’d have brain storming/think tanks etc. It was so much fun. It was private too so no one could see. He was so paranoid, actually he’s a whack job, he could have planted timers to go off if things went sour with someone. He confessed he just couldn’t take criticism yet he was in his 40’s and I thought boy have you picked a shocker of an industry to enter as a mature age student. Yet he dished it out NUMEROUS times a day, L:) The irony.
I’m all for creating a space like that again in the future but you need want to find a way to edit off site, because when we’d repost the photo, it would have a rough work flow attached. I just make it a comprehensive work flow now so no d’loading would ever be necessary ever again.
I also only do it with people I knew much better too b ut there’s always a rotten egg!
Be wary people, it’s an horrific experience that lasted for a good 3 months. I ignored EVERYTHING so he gave up. I was still getting e-mails from friends up until a month ago saying did you know …xxx… is saying this about you?? So 4 weeks of silence and this happened on the 2nd of JAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Be alert, no alarmed ∑8-0)
Paul
Paul,
How devastating. I’m so sorry to hear this… and you had backups. Two of ‘em!!
I don’t know how much I can help, but I’d like to understand more of how things were set up. You said your internal drive died, and that had your library and 30k referenced files. Referenced means they live outside of the Library, so did you just have them sitting in a folder outside of the Aperture Library, but on the same drive? Or were they actually managed, meaning they live inside the Aperture Library?
The two backups you had… what kind of backups were these? Finder copies? Vaults? Time Machine?
You can SEE the files on the damaged hard drive, but can’t copy them. Same thing with both backups? Have you tried doing a copy as a terminal command instead of dragging in the Finder?
If copying one folder at a time works, that’s great. That’s something. I had a similar issue once with a drive where copying in small chunks was the only way to recover; large copies always caused the drive to spontaneously dismount. It took ages but I was able to recover my data.
As far as finding lost referenced files; if you were truly working referenced then presumably you would have been using a consistent structure for your files (i.e., storing masters in folders of the project name, or in a yyyy/mm/dd hierarchy, etc.). So I’m not sure what you mean when you say that that the photos aren’t in the right folders and they’ve been renumbered… do you mean that your structure and naming scheme has been blown apart and that files are, as you say at the end, randomly scattered around and renamed? Yet you can still copy a photo and open it and recognize it as one of your missing files?
@PhotoJoseph
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Thanks all for your help, my HD was replaced no questions asked, as was one of my external HD’s. I’ve started to rebuild it from scratch as the option key on start up didn’t work for this .lib and trying the option command click on the .lib crashes Aperture immediately every time. I have to work referenced as I have so many files that my MBP isn’t big enough to hold them all but using a thunderbolt drive doesn’t really make much difference time wise. So I appreciate your help, I thought I’d put it out there as the genius bar at apple couldn’t get it going either and they spent nearly 2 hours with me just on this library alone.
I appreciate your time,
thank you
So if you have referenced files and it’s the Library that has become corrupt and you have Time Machine backups of the Library … why don’t you just go ‘back in time’ to a good version?
If you don’t have Time Machine backups of your Library … but you can still open it … I’d try exporting a Project as a Library, as a test, because if it works, it will save a lot of time and will retain your edits etc. You must choose NOT to export Previews if you do this … (IMO it’s probably previews that are causing issues, although it could be corrupt image files too.) Once exported and if they are OK, you can easily combine multiple Libraries into a single Library.
Hey gysymon, I have already told you that BOTH my back up’s were corrupted, one was a time machine back up on a WD, and the other was an Intego back-up on a LaCie little big disk. The internal HD has been replace, it’s useless, gone. It needs a forensic lab and I don’t have that kind of money for recovery. I did an interesting thing today as a test. I downloaded , YES I KNOW!!! Just read on, a free anti-virus/malware program and it found 1 .exe Trojan file, no problem with that. What I found VERY interesting was the amount of corrupt photo’s and photo files, there were pages of them. The scan has been going for well over 7 hours and it’s only finding problems with photo’s. I did not it expect it to find a problem with anything. The photo with the virus attached to it was one I lost and re-downloaded from photobucket some time ago. I know that the .exe couldn’t have done it but I honestly think something else did as I was being majorly cyber bullied. On numerous photographic websites by one person. I’ve since found out he’s been dealt with by the police as I was only one of many.
Any thoughts on that?? Possible or not?
Paul,
Heck, anything is possible. A .exe file shouldn’t be able to do anything to a Mac, but who knows… there are people far more clever than I out writing these things.
You were being cyber bullied? How so? I think it’d be interesting to know what you mean so others can look out for this. However unless he sent you any files or to any websites, it’s unlikely he was able to infect your computer. But again… anything is possible.
-Joseph
@PhotoJoseph
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Thanks for your swift reply Joseph,
I am subscribed and even bought AE Training to see if that would help but it didn’t (in regards to reconstructing my library ONLY) I did learn some interesting tips and tricks though :)
I must have been working referenced because the files and project names are all there, BUT some have totally different pics in them, not all. The saddest thing is that some of the folders with my finished folio pictures in them have the referenced raw photo, but the edited copy is gone in some cases, where it was sitting right next to it.
I’m going to keep working referenced and have just bought a LaCie 2Little Big Disk with 6TB.
What I wanted to ask you was when I find Masters, should I move them into the new Library or copy them as I need to delete all the junk piling up from other library attempts. Will it copy a new master for me so when I delete the old ones they will be OK, or do they need to be all moved so they won’t vanish when the old junk gets deleted down the track?
Oh the WD, was a time machine back-up and the little big disk was an Intego Manager Pro back up. It’s really weird I know, but as I said every tech I’ve shown or spoken with on the phone is just stumped and never seen anything like it.
I also sent the Apple Genius Bar into overdrive when they saw the destruction of my internal HD. The tech did a basic search in the spotlight box and it told him 6 weeks to find system preferences!
Many thanks,
Paul
Paul,
you don’t say what version of the OS you’re running, but whichever it is, you need to run Disk Utility and ensure that its health is good. This step may repair damaged file structure.
You also say you have used Time Machine and that your images are Referenced. Why don’t you simply restore your Library from a Time Machine backup?
I doubt very much that your image files are damaged. They must be good on one of your two backups. So all you need is to get a working Library, then if necessary, ‘re-connect’ your images.
Thanks gfsymon,
I’m running 10.7.3 and have done multiple Disk Utility check, all of which are completely fine. Yes believe it or not but the time backing back up is corrupt, as my disk had been failing for weeks, so I didn’t notice but now I look back it ALL makes sense.
I’ve literally found 2 files that were damaged but the rest are just all over the place. If you know a quicker way to reconnect a lib, than one folder at a time I’d love to hear it
kindest regards
Paul