Dynamically generated folders based on filenames

I stumbled upon this product as I look for a File Explorer​ alternative. I am a tech-enthusiast photographer, but not a programmer. Currently evaluating the software but I am pretty sure I'll be purchasing several licenses :blush:

Several times a week I do shoots with many people and need to create a folder with a subfolder for each person. The images are named Lastname-Firstname-date-imagenumber: Smith-Bob-200201-1234.jpg

Currently I use a photo program to save all the images to dynamically-generated folders based on the 1st 12 characters of the filenames. I end up with what I need. I then use Filezilla to FTP these images to my online archive for customer viewing.

My question: is there a way for your product to create these dynamically-generated folders? Ideally it would just create them at the FTP destination but that's icing on the cake.

Thanks for your help!

Yes. It's basically what Opus does for a living :wink:

I would rename the files locally, then upload them via FTP. That way it is much easier to deal with disconnections and other errors when sending the files, since you can easily see what is and isn't there and just repeat the operation and skip/resume to finish it.

The rename can be done using Regular Expressions mode.

Old name: (.{1,12}).*
New name: \1\\\0

That will take up to the first 12 characters of the filenames as the sub-folder name, and move each file into its corresponding sub-folder.

If you save that as a rename preset, you can access it quickly (without the Rename dialog opening at all) via the menu attached to the Rename button on the default toolbars.

You could also make a top-level button or hotkey if you use it a lot and don't want to have to go into a menu for it. Rename PRESET="My Preset" will apply My Preset directly to the selected files.

Wow, fantastic. Instant. Normally I do this action on the JPEGs that I've exported out of my CR2 RAW images though a photo program (Capture One). I see that DOpus can do CR2 conversion to JPEG.
2 follow up questions then:

  1. I actually have the CR2 images already in name-based folders (I currently use a spreadsheet and Better File Rename 6 to rename all images on the memory card-but perhaps DOpus can do this too!).
    Could I have DOpus do the following:
  • Comb through a folder of subfolders
  • Convert all CR2 images in those subfolders into HD size JPEGs
  • Move all the CR2s into another folder so that the folders now only contain the converted JPEGs
  1. Can DOpus do a "center crop" on the images-just the middle 50% of the images when (or after) it does the JPEG conversion?

Screenshot attached showing how the folders look with the CR2s.

Comb through a folder of subfolders

Yes

Convert all CR2 images in those subfolders into HD size JPEGs

Yes. Conversion is fast, but the quality is only ok for previews, culling etc. The in-camera conversion will deliver better jpgs. You'll be better off with a specialized raw converter like Capture One.

Move all the CR2s into another folder so that the folders now only contain the converted JPEGs

Yes

Can DOpus do a "center crop" on the images-just the middle 50% of the images when (or after) it does the JPEG conversion?

Yes, with the help of external tools like ImageMagick.

There are two modes, fast and full, and the full conversion should be good quality (and a lot slower).

You can configure the Raw plugin (Preferences / Viewers / Plugins) to select the mode, and lots of other options (white balance, etc.), with separate profiles for thumbnails, viewer, and image conversion (each per camera model, if desired).

Thanks. I checked out the Raw plugin and switched to Fast. Yes, this would be only for previews for customers to make their selections. I would always go to the CR2 files and through Capture One for the final files for the customer.
Where could I find out how to do the combing and moving in this process?
Thanks for the awesome assistance.

Now I am confused...

You can configure the Raw plugin

I tried, but never managed to get decent results, so I just used the in-camera jpgs.

Full decode conversion was 5-10 sec per file, which is fast compared to the 30-60 sec the stand-alone raw converter suites needed.

Admittedly, I never tried the fast decode.

Until today. Turns out, this mode is blazingly fast (1-2 seconds) and the quality is on the level of the in-camera jpgs. Canon gets converted slightly better than Sony.

Interesting. Thanks for making me try again :slight_smile:

  • Crop and convert:

    I think ImageMagick can convert raw to jpg, so it probably makes sense to do the crop and conversion at the same time using that, rather than convert to jpg and then crop (which is both slower and lower quality, at least assuming ImageMagick can do a quick thumbnail/preview extraction on the raw files like Opus can).

    I haven't had a chance to look up the appropriate ImageMagick command line to do that, but it's usually fairly simple once you find the right part of the documentation (the hardest part, since ImageMagick can do so much and has so many command line options).

  • Finding the files to work on:

    There are two ways you could do this.

    The simplest would be to run the Find command to generate a list of CR2 files below the starting folder(s), then run a second command on the results. (The Find command will let you automate most of what you can do via the Tools > Find Files UI, saving you having to click and type into the UI every time you want to do a particular search.)

    The more complex way would be to have a script which searches for the files itself, and then runs ImageMagick etc. on them automatically, without needing a second step. The script could be similar to the 'Fetch' command: Find and copy related files script which can search for related files and demonstrates how scripts can enumerate folders. (There's also a more simple example in the default script you get when creating a new script button.)

  • Moving the files:

    That part will just involve running a copy/move command on the files after the ImageMagick command. The other bits are the harder parts.