# Lightroom rotating my images



## specialk (Oct 9, 2011)

I have rotated my images after import, but they don't stay that way.  What am I doing wrong??


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## Brad Snyder (Oct 9, 2011)

specialk, welcome to the forums.

Hard to say, based on the limited description you provide.  

Can you tell us more about your workflow, and what happens? What sort of image files? JPG, raw, other? What camera? Do you use any other software on the images before or after Lr?  Stuff like that?

Obviously, they're supposed to stay rotated,   typically problems like this involve editing the images prior to Lr.


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## specialk (Oct 9, 2011)

Hi Brad,

I shoot with a Canon 50d and I import my images right into Lightroom.  This last time I did not rotate them incamera before importing them.  They are all in raw format.  I painstakingly rotated all of them but when I came back to the images the next day most but not all were rotated back.  Ugh!  I am not editing them before Lightroom.  Could it be a preset issue.....I'm lost for answers??   Thxs for your help!


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## Brad Snyder (Oct 10, 2011)

specialk, then I dunno'.  Barring some accidental 'Select All, Undo' brain cramp, there's no reason for Lr to forget that you rotated the images.

Anybody else have any ideas?


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## Jim Wilde (Oct 10, 2011)

Sorry Brad, no brainwaves here.

One suggestion to specialk though, would be to enable the camera's auto-rotate feature to stop this happening again.


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## Amfoto1 (Oct 11, 2011)

First, of all, why are you having to rotate them in Lightroom at all?

Here's an answer I gave previously to someone with a similar situation (except it was a 30D in that case, below instructions have been changed to reflect 50D)....


**********************Hi, 

You probably just need to set up your camera to rotate the files properly in the first place.

Under the first "Wrench" menu tab (Yellow) the second item is "Auto Rotate"... there are three choices "Off", "On - Rotate in the Computer only" and "On - Rotate in both the Computer and the Camera". Check to see if this is set on "Off".

If so, I recommend the 2nd setting... "On - Rotate in the Computer only". This setting should solve the problem in your computer, but leaves the image alone when viewed on the camera's LCD (ie, doesn't rotate it "in camera", only "in computer"). The reason is that it's easy enough to turn the camera sideways to look at a vertical image, if needed. On the other hand, if the image rotates in the camera, too, a vertical shot displayed on the camera's horizontal LCD screen is awfully small.

Cheers! 

The "Rotate" under the blue "print play" menu of the camera just changes an individual or select group of images. 

************************

Now, as to why images you've rotated in LR that don't stay rotated, that's another situation... 

Is your copy of LR up to date? (I see you showing LR 3.5, which should easily recognize Canon 50D EXIF tag data). 

In the LR Develop module, right-click the cursor on the folder in question and choose "Syncrhonize Folder". 

A dialog box will pop up... be sure that "Scan for metadate updates" is checked and then click "Syncrhonize". (To save time, you can uncheck "Show Import Dialog before importing" before clicking "Synchronize".)

I'm thinking maybe the preview that LR is using for the file is not updating, it's showing the original one rather than the file after it's been rotated. 

Another idea... Do you have Canon software installed? Zoombrowser for JPEGs, or Digital Photo Pro (DPP) for CR2s? If so, maybe try rotating in the Canon software first, save your changes when you exit that program, then look at them in LR and see if they are rotated. Again, you might need to use "Syncrhonize Folder" to update the metadata... There's a tag in each image's metadata/EXIF that tells the software the image's orientation. 

​


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## Replytoken (Oct 11, 2011)

I have had this problem though several generations of LR and finally gave up. Sometimes LR honors my rotations, and sometimes it rotates them back without any reason. It is frustrating, especially if you take the time to rotate them, but as I could not figure out the source of the problem, I now rotate them "as needed". Perhaps I will re-examine the issue when time permits, but its not currently high on my list of priorities. FWIW, at least you know you are not alone in this problem.

--Ken


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## dblm (Oct 13, 2011)

Hi guys....

First post for me, just found this forum (seems like a nice place) to try to find a solution for the same problem...

I've been using LR since the first beta release, upgraded to every version, this is such a nice piece of software, solves all my problems... except that vertical  rotation thingy...

I chose not to use the auto-rotation option in my Nikon D3 camera, so I do rotate my verticals manually right after import in LR.
Generally it keeps memory of my manual rotations, but somtimes it just doesnt...
And (almost) every time I upgrade to a new version of LR, those rotations are quite erratic, but most are not kept so I have to do it all over again...
I only have this problem with my D3, not with other cameras (Nikon D200, where the auto-rotation option is ON, or Panasonic Lumix TZ10 which does not have the option).

Actually, this problem happens since I upgraded to LR 2.0, never happened in various versions of LR 1. It is not that much annoying, but just for this, I jumped many versions, only upgraded from 2.0 to 2.1 to 2.6 to 3.0 to 3.4 (though all the intermediate versions are not that much different, are they ?)...

So if anyone has a clue about all that, LR will be really perfect for me....

(and dont ask me why I dont want autorotate ON on my D3, this is not rational, I know, but just something I prefer)


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## Victoria Bampton (Oct 14, 2011)

Hi dblm, welcome to the forum!

There's a bug report or two running on the bug report forum, which you might like to add your vote to:

http://feedback.photoshop.com/photoshop_family/topics/photo_orientation_lost_in_lightroom
http://feedback.photoshop.com/photo...m_sometimes_changes_orientation_inadvertently

There's also some chatter about Nikon's ViewNX software being involved in some cases - I don't know whether that applies in your case?


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## dblm (Oct 15, 2011)

Victoria Bampton said:


> Hi dblm, welcome to the forum!
> (...)
> There's also some chatter about Nikon's ViewNX software being involved in some cases - I don't know whether that applies in your case?



Bonjour Lightroom Queen...

Thanks for the welcome, this really seems to be a place where I will spent too much time 

I've taken a look at those bug reports, and this is indeed exactly what I have been experiencing. I'll add my name to the list of victims from this bug, as it seems to be one indeed...

Just for information, none of my pictures has ever seen any software by Nikon (except for a few tests) since I discovered the magic of Lightroom.
And to be complete (sort of) on this topic, I've used LR on various PCs, laptops and desktops, with Windows XP SP2 and SP3 or Vista (I turned back to XP very quickly!) or Windows 7 (64 bits). Same problem everywhere : not often, just from time to time, but of course always at the worst moment...

As I said in my other post, it only happens with pictures from my D3. Not sure if only with raw (NEF) format, that I use 98% of the time, maybe not with jpgs. Now, might that be some sort of conflict between LR and the NEF format from a D3 ?.... I doubt that but I dont know anything about software engirneering...

Thanks again !


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