I use a script to set keywords on my pictures using the SET ATTR and using the tags metadata field. In Opus it works a dream, but occasionally the tags (keywords simply disappear).
After weeks of scratching my head I have discovered that his happens when I open an image in Photoshop 2017. When I re-save my edits, the keywords have disappeared.
On investigation I have found that keywords (tags) entered in Opus do not appear in the keywords field of Photoshop when you view the File Info.
However if you set keywords using the File Info method in Photoshop the keywords (tags) appear in Opus.
If I use the Opus metadata panel to add keywords they appear in Opus but still do not appear in the File Info of Photoshop 2017.
Any thoughts as to what might be happening here. As you can imagine it has the potential to be quite a serious problem to a photographer.
Further investigation seems to suggest the problem exists with PSD files, which I use a lot. Keywords entered in Opus do not appear in the File Info of Photoshop 2017, or at least on my system.
Not all formats support (all types of) tags, and of those that do Opus only knows a subset of them.
In some cases tags will be written into NTFS rather than the file itself, as a generic fallback, and some programs may not look there if they don't understand NTFS tags or if they have a prefered way to get tags from files of that format.
We are not talking about esoteric metadata fields here, we are talking about keywords (tags) an essential part of the metadata framework for any photographer. Some organisations will reject work that does not contain keywords - so it is pretty important.
It all works fine between Opus and Photoshop and JPG images.
However if you want to save work with layers you have to save in PSD or layered TIFF. If I re-edit these files to pass on to a new client I have to sure that the keywords are not being destroyed in the process.
If keywords (tags) metadata works in JPEG files, why does it not in TIFF or PSD. These are very standard image formats which Opus should surely support in terms of metadata.
I take your point about the interpretation of metadata by various programs. It is a nightmare. However, I do think that you should support common metadata fields in PSDs and layered TIFFS. As things stand, I simply cannot depend upon the integrity of the metadata transfer between the best file manager and the best photo editing program, and that is not a happy situation.
PSD is not a well documented file format, nor one with any kind of library provided by the proprietary vendor for modifying it or its tags. It would be reckless of us to attempt to modify PSD files, unless such documentation or a library exists that we are not aware of, as it could corrupt them.
Few things other than Photoshop & Bridge handle more than very basic PSD support, such as reporting dimensions and displaying the embedded preview image (both of which Opus does, which is more than a lot of software, and similar to most dedicated imaging tools).
I am not talking about the actual PSD format. I am talking about the metadata. Opus, as far as I can see, understands and interprets both the EXIF and the IPTC metadata except for the keyword (tags) field. For some reason Opus and Photoshop do not see the metadata in that particular field.
If I was seeing no metadata in PSD files, I might take your point. But Opus supports metadata in PSD files very well indeed, with the exception of the keyword field.
If i go back to a format where the keyword field is in kilter between Opus and Photoshop - JPEG - keywords from Opus appear in the keyword field in Photoshop. If I enter keywords in Photoshop and save the file as a PSD they do not appear in Opus, but all the other fields I fill in do (Description Subject, copyright etc). My question is why do most fields work but not the tags?
I do take your point about PSD, and after 20 odd years in the electronic imaging business I do understand something about the deficiencies of image tagging. It used to (and still does) drive me insane.
I decided to to a controlled test with a JPEG file.
I used the Opus metadata panel to set some keywords on a JPEG image. Naturally Opus sees the tags and allows me to change them at will.
However, when I opened the file in the latest version of Photoshop CC the tags were not there.
Back in Opus I could see them.
Next I opened the same image in Photoshop and wrote some tags via the FILE INFO button. Naturally Photoshop prompted me to save the image which I did.
Now the real problem: In Opus the tags had now disappeared. i.e. The JPEG was behaving like the PSD.
I suppose really that I have never looked for the problem as I assumed there was no problem. It was only when somebody I sent an image to complained about missing keywords that I realised there may be a problem.
I am now looking for an image tagger to see what that reveals.
As I am seeing this problem on JPEG images (at least on my system) I think you would after agree it is a real problem for any photographer using Opus.
I will report what I find when I find a suitable image tagger. Many thanks for your patience.
I decided to concentrate on JPEGS to take the PSD format out of the equation.
I edited the tags in a JPEG file using Windows Explorer. The behaviour was as expected. I could read the keyword tags in Opus, Explorer and Photoshop 2017.
I then took the JPEG confirmed that the keyword metadata was visible in Opus and opened the file in Photoshop 2017. I did not touch the metadata. I made a small edit to the background of the file and saved it out of Photoshop.
When I viewed the metadata in Opus on the saved file, the keywords had vanished. See the attached image
I have now had a chance to check a good number of my images and the keywords are missing in a great many. My bet is that these files are the ones I have re-edited for different clients and then re-saved from Photoshop. It is kind of worrying.
Anyone any thoughts on this one? At the moment the only way I can set keywords on my images is to do it through Windows Explorer and then to remember never to change the keywords in Opus. I also have to remember to copy the keywords to the clipboard before I edit an image so that I can paste them back after the save.
It is real pain. I did find a reference from some years back where Adobe changed something in a particular version of Photoshop and it caused people very similar problems. Unfortunately no indication of what that might have been.
I have been experimenting further using the latest version Adobe Bridge to set metadata on a JPEG image.
I have found that any changes made in keyword (tags) metadata in Opus are immediately mirrored in Bridge and vice versa.
As you would expect, changes to keywords in Bridge are immediately visible in the File Info of Photoshop.
However if I change the keywords in Opus and open the file in Photoshop the keywords are not there. In order to make them appear I have to make an edit to the keywords in Bridge or Windows Explorer and save the change.
I wasn't able to reproduce your problem on my setup(Photoshop 2017, Bridge, Dopus 12.3.3 x64, Windows 7 sp1 x64). Tags that are written in Dopus's Metadata Pane appear in both Bridge and Photoshop as keywords and vice-versa. I've tested both psd and jpg files.
It would be better if you could provide the exact same image you are having problems with and a step by step instruction what have to be done to get this error.
I normally add metadata to my images via a VB script into DOpus. Obviously my first thought was that there may be a problem with the script, so I ran my tests using the Opus metadata panel.
1.Open the Opus metadata panel and add the tags (keywords)
Check the keywords are there in the Opus metadata panel and through my VB script. They are.
Open the image in Photoshop 2017 and go to the file info. The keywords are missing.
Make an edit to the file and save it out again.
The keywords have disappeared from the Opus file.
Add the keywords through Bridge. Keywords appear in Opus and Photoshop
Add the keywords through Photoshop file info. Same result as 6.
My Photoshop release is 2017.0.0 release 20161012r53 x64 and I am using Opus 12.3.3 Beta
Obviously the one thing that separates my setup from that of Sh1ro is that I use the latest release Windows 10. Perhaps there is something in my preferences in either Photoshop Opus (or both), but I have no idea what it may be, but, as yu can imagine, loosing keywords on files when you make edits in Photoshop is no joke.
Then I opened it in Photoshop and the tag was in Keywords. On this particular screenshot I have already done some editing. After that the picture was saved in Photoshop.
I checked tags in Metadata Pane and everything was in place, the picture itself updated and Photoshop added its metadata to Creation software.
3)Then I tried adding Tags/Keywords in Bridge, Photoshop and Dopus in random order, everything went without a problem.
I am using Photoshop 2017.0.1 20161130.r.29 x64 , Windows 7 SP1 x64 and latest beta of Dopus (12.3.3). Also I don't know if it will help you in any way, but Photoshop is not updating Keywords in real time, I have to close and open a file in order to see the changes in Tags/Keywords. Well most likely you already know it.
Here's a video showing how it works here. The tags I enter in Opus show up in Photoshop, I then modify them in Photoshop and they show up in Opus, and then I modify them once more in Opus and they show up in Photoshop.
