STOP MOTION: TROUBLESHOOTING GUIDE

BEFORE TROUBLESHOOTING - MAKE A COPY OF YOUR PHOTO FOLDER

Before doing any troubleshooting, quickly duplicate the folder of all of your photos, so you have a backup copy. Many of the solutions below involve “batch processing”, which automates changes and saves a lot of time. That being said, unintended changes sometimes happen, and so, its important to have a backup just in case you need to run the process again. Never run any process or attempt to make changes to multiple files without always having one backup set.

ISSUES WITH “GAPS” IN IMAGE SEQUENCE?

If you are encountering errors when importing your JPG sequence into Photoshop that mention “Gaps”, this can be easily addressed by dividing the photos (while keeping them in order) into smaller groups (say, 45 - 60), and then placing them into sub-folders.

Once these are divided up, you can try to import smaller sequences and then just connect them in the timeline following the steps below. This should also help you narrow down which photo or photos are causing the gaps.

Start with sequence one following steps in tutorial. Then, go to the last frame of the first sequence, make sure the layer is selected in the timeline, then go to Layer > Video > New Video Layer from File, and choose the first image in the folder with the second sequence of images. This should import the next set of photos into a video layer above the first sequence, which can be dragged along the timeline.

Usually these will error if they are a different size or orientation than the previous photos, or if the naming convention totally changes. If its an issue with sizing or orientation, you could try to edit and save to see if works (keeping the same naming convention). If its a naming issue, either change it to fit all the others, or, if the photos after it have the same naming convention, then just separate all of those photos into their own folder and import as a sequence.

If neither of these fixes work, it is also an option to just delete the photo.

Photos in a non-jpg format

Photos which are not in TIFF or JPG format (such as RAW, CR2 or HEIC), will need to be converted before importing into Photoshop as a sequence.

There are several methods for doing this, which also depend on the file format. In general, the easiest option for this course (and since everyone has free access to Adobe CC programs) is to download and install Adobe Bridge, and use it to “Batch Convert”. Below is a short YouTube tutorial showing how to do this (but the steps might be slightly different depending on file format).

If working with images from a DSLR camera, it might be necessary to convert using Adobe Lightroom, after installing the needed drivers. Below is a link for using Lightroom to convert CR2 (Canon DSLR RAW image format) to a usable file format. Again, this might need to be adjusted depending on original camera / capture settings - if working with a Sony or Nikon RAW format, Google “Adobe Lightroom batch convert ________ to JPG” with whatever file format you are seeing on your photos.

https://fixthephoto.com/how-to-import-raw-files-into-lightroom.html

Also, a few reminders of your options with this different video format:

1. Pop out of Canvas and watch in a new tab if any of the features aren't working

2. There are fullscreen and CC (Sub-title) options available in the right hand corner. For being YouTube auto-captions, these are pretty clear. I think they must have improved their algorithm. Please email me with any accessibility needs.

3. If you are feeling pressed for time, but don't want to miss anything, you can watch with audio in 1.5 speed by hitting that little gear icon.