DPP4 Multiple versions of the same file?

[plattyaj]

I'm often trying to export slightly different versions of the same raw image. The most common usage is for me to output different resolutions for printing, Facebook and Instagram.

I know of two ways that work but neither is ideal. I don't think I've missed anything but just wanted to be sure. My usual method is to save the raw files (Save As works well for multiple files though I wish batch convert would allow saving to raw so I could update using a pattern) to a new name and then use those as I want.

The second way I know is to save the recipe I used to a file so I can change it and then re-apply the original. There's no way to do that for multiple files and you end up with extra files so I don't use that.

I haven't missed any form of versioning, right?

[Waddizzle]

Save the output files to different folders.

[plattyaj]

Thanks but the output filename (or folder) isn't the problem as I can change the filename on batch output simply.

The problem is saving the versions of the input (raw) file, especially in a way that works on multiple files with minimal duplication.

[Waddizzle]

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@plattyaj wrote:
Thanks but the output filename (or folder) isn't the problem as I can change the filename on batch output simply.

The problem is saving the versions of the input (raw) file, especially in a way that works on multiple files with minimal duplication.

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Save multiple copies of the original file using different names and folders.  You do not have a camera or software issue..

[plattyaj]

Yes thanks, that is what I'm doing, I was hoping there may be another way. I'm not sure I said anything about a camera or PC problem?

Probably the issue is that Canon don't use sidecar files so they would have to build it into their exif data. Oh well, it was worth asking.

[johnrmoyer]

This might not be useful for anyone else, but just in case, this is what I do.

I save multiple versions of the recipe file to different names because the recipe file is much smaller than multiple versions of the raw. If I am not planning to do further editing, I might also save multiple JPEG files with different cropping or color changes. If I intend to do much further editing, I save a 16 bit TIFF from DPP. For scaling to different sizes, I usually prefer to use graphicsmagick instead of DPP because I like the scaling algorithms. I use exiftool to add IPTC information to the JPEG files that I put on my web server. I never save changes to the raw file, but load a recipe file if I want to make further changes.

I might use letters and digits in the file name to remind myself what I did; e.g. IMG_1234c.JPG is cropped, IMG_1234cs.JPG is cropped smaller, IMG_1234bw.JPG is monochrome.

I run DPP on an iMac, but most of my storage is attached to a Debian Linux machine and shared to the iMac using SMB. I have Xquartz on my iMac so that I can display Linux programs on the iMac screen. The freely available Vmware Fusion also allows running a Linux virtual machine on a mac if one prefers to use a single hardware machine. I use "cp -pX files destination" when copying files to the Linux machine from the iMac to avoid littering the Linux file systems with sidecar files.

Before getting an iMac, I ran DPP in a Windows virtual machine on my Debian Linux desktop using qemu. Before I retired, my employer required Windows so I ran Linux in Vmware Player virtual machines.

I hope that someone might find this helpful.

[plattyaj]

Thanks for such a detailed workflow. I agree that recipe files are probably how it is supposed to work but the inability to save them in a batch mode (or even the way that the Save As allows you to save them from a single dialog even if you have to type the new name for each) really restricts it. I think if I know I'm going to do this in the future I'll try to remember to save the recipe for each as I go along.