JPEG files not being recognised by domestic DVD player

My wife and I have several digital cameras between us and I regularly
compose slide shows on my PC and burn them on to CD or DVD for showing
on our television(s). Until recently this has worked fine with the 2
DVD players and TVs that we had. I have recently bought an all
singing, all dancing Sony DVD recorder (RDR-HXD710) which is fantastic
BUT it has a horrible habit of not being able to read SOME of the jpeg
files. So far I have discovered:

1. it does not recognise ANY files from one camera BUT if I rotate
them and then rotate them back before burning to CD then they work
(this can be done in bulk in Windows Explorer);

2. it does not recognise files from another camera that have been
rotated from landscape to portrait in the Camedia photo package, even
after doing 1 above;

3. if files are reduced in size only nominaly then they are
recognised.

The trouble is that 2 and 3 above cannot be done in bulk and it is
tedious to go through the process file by file.

Any suggestions for why this happens and how to get around the problem?

wrote:
My wife and I have several digital cameras between us and I regularly
compose slide shows on my PC and burn them on to CD or DVD for showing
on our television(s). Until recently this has worked fine with the 2
DVD players and TVs that we had. I have recently bought an all
singing, all dancing Sony DVD recorder (RDR-HXD710) which is fantastic
BUT it has a horrible habit of not being able to read SOME of the jpeg
files. So far I have discovered:

1. it does not recognise ANY files from one camera BUT if I rotate
them and then rotate them back before burning to CD then they work
(this can be done in bulk in Windows Explorer);

2. it does not recognise files from another camera that have been
rotated from landscape to portrait in the Camedia photo package, even
after doing 1 above;

3. if files are reduced in size only nominaly then they are
recognised.

The trouble is that 2 and 3 above cannot be done in bulk and it is
tedious to go through the process file by file.

Any suggestions for why this happens and how to get around the problem?


Unless I am misunderstanding case 3, Irfanview should perform that
function in bulk.
Dave Cohen

wrote:
My wife and I have several digital cameras between us

Out of curiosity, what are the models of the cameras?

Like the other poster said, you can do most bulk functions with
irfanview (rotate, resize, etc.)

Unless I am misunderstanding case 3, Irfanview should perform that
function in bulk.
Dave Cohen

Thanks Dave. Have just downloaded Irfanview and first signs are good.
Thanks for the tip.

Out of curiosity, what are the models of the cameras?

Like the other poster said, you can do most bulk functions with
irfanview (rotate, resize, etc.)

Olympus C300 3.0 megapix - our first digi camera. Very good but now
showing signs of its age. Camedia software came from here so that is
also now somewhat dated and is not the most userfriendly.

Konica Minolta Dimage Z5 5.0 megapix - bought to replace my trusty
Canon EOS 500N. It is ok. Super 12x optical zoom and antishake but
rather disappointed with the colour rendition as compared with the
Olympus.

Fuji Finepix Z2 5.1 megapix - bought only recently for my wife to
replace the Olympus. Fantastic little camera, good colour and clarity,
and with 1Gig memory card is really all we need. Furthermore, the
pictures from this do not seem to cause any problems on the DVD
Recorder previously mentioned.

wrote:
My wife and I have several digital cameras between us and I regularly
compose slide shows on my PC and burn them on to CD or DVD for showing
on our television(s). Until recently this has worked fine with the 2
DVD players and TVs that we had. I have recently bought an all
singing, all dancing Sony DVD recorder (RDR-HXD710) which is fantastic
BUT it has a horrible habit of not being able to read SOME of the jpeg
files. So far I have discovered:

1. it does not recognise ANY files from one camera BUT if I rotate
them and then rotate them back before burning to CD then they work
(this can be done in bulk in Windows Explorer);

2. it does not recognise files from another camera that have been
rotated from landscape to portrait in the Camedia photo package, even
after doing 1 above;

3. if files are reduced in size only nominaly then they are
recognised.

The trouble is that 2 and 3 above cannot be done in bulk and it is
tedious to go through the process file by file.

Any suggestions for why this happens and how to get around the problem?

I've seen some web galleries that create really botched thumbnails if the images
have certain metadata attached (not EXIF, but something else that escapes my
memory at the moment). I would guess the player is having a similar issue, not
being able to read some embedded data and not recognizing the image file because
of it. Batch processing in Explorer likely strips that metadata, which is why
the player reads them afterward. It would also explain why resizing works:
because whatever you're using to do that processing is re-saving the files
without the "troublesome" embedded data.

Matt Ion wrote:
I would guess the player is having a similar issue, not
being able to read some embedded data and not recognizing the image file because
of it.

Good point. Along that thought, IrfanView has this feature under JPEG
lossless transformations where you can strip off EXIF and other
metadata without affecting image quality. I believe you can apply these
in batch too. (You need to download the JPEG lossless extension, does
not come default with Irfanview).

spoke thusly:
My wife and I have several digital cameras between us and I regularly
compose slide shows on my PC and burn them on to CD or DVD for showing
on our television(s). Until recently this has worked fine with the 2
DVD players and TVs that we had. I have recently bought an all
singing, all dancing Sony DVD recorder (RDR-HXD710) which is fantastic
BUT it has a horrible habit of not being able to read SOME of the jpeg
files. So far I have discovered:

1. it does not recognise ANY files from one camera BUT if I rotate
them and then rotate them back before burning to CD then they work
(this can be done in bulk in Windows Explorer);

2. it does not recognise files from another camera that have been
rotated from landscape to portrait in the Camedia photo package, even
after doing 1 above;

3. if files are reduced in size only nominaly then they are
recognised.

The trouble is that 2 and 3 above cannot be done in bulk and it is
tedious to go through the process file by file.

Any suggestions for why this happens and how to get around the problem?


Try Jpeg cleaner
http://www.photo-freeware.net/jpgcleaner.php
cleans unwanted junk from the files.

Suggestion:

The posters who suggested that your older cameras are producing
older EXIF or other non-image data that your new DVD player can't
handle sound right to me.

However you probably _don't_ want to lose the EXIF data if you
can avoid it. It may be that Windows Explorer or Irfanview will
write it back in a newer format which is compatible. If so then
whatever program preserves the data for you is the one you want.

Also, you want to do as little to the images as you can. You
especially want to avoid re-compressing the images if you can
avoid it, since that involves some loss of quality. Find out what
you can about the programs you're using with regard to this
issue.

If Irfanview can preserve the data, you might keep a copy of the
program and all of its plugins on a CD somewhere just in case
some future version of the program loses compatibility with the
old formats.

Finally, I'd contact the camera manufacturers to find out if they
are aware of this problem and see if they can give you more
information about it. They might also have free "firmware"
updates for the cameras that will help. ("Firmware" is the
software that programs the cameras internal processor, called
"firmware" because you can't change it without going through
very special procedures.

Alan

My wife and I have several digital cameras etc

Many thanks for all your replies. I had already thought that it might
be something to do with the metadata as Matt has ably described. I
alway keep separate copies on CD/DVD of all my original picture files
so there is no problem in loosing the metadata when I create separate
slide shows. I will therefore try clearing this in bulk using
Irfanview or the other program suggested.

Again, many thanks.

Nick