Lightroom: Labeling Problem when assigning Color Labels under a Filter on currently assigned Color Labels

This issue has been fixed in Lightroom 4.1, which is now available. To download the 4.1 update, go to the Help menu in Lightroom and choose "Check for Updates".

Thanks,
Ben

I can repeat this on a Mac as well. Check the number count in a smart collection set with a colour label and when changing the colour to another the count will often go down by two or more.

To fix the issue, in pseudocode:

GetCurrentImage().RemoveColorLabel(Red);
GetCurrentImage().AddColorLabel(Purple);

should be replaced with:

tempContext = GetCurrentImage();
tempContext.RemoveColorLabel(Red);
tempContext.AddColorLabel(Purple);

This ensures the image context of the RemoveColorLabel and AddColorLabel are the same image, even if the current image context has changed due to filter doing its job.

I've had (and reported) this problem or one very similar to it since v2.7. As I see it there is a disconnect as changing an images color label seems t be a two step operation. In step one the color is removed from the image
At that point the image in focus loses focus and the next image gets Focus (auto Advance)
In step 2 the image with focus gets assigned the new color label.

A partial workaround is to turn off Auto Advance

Cletus, I just tried out the auto advance "on" vs "off" and the problem persists in both scenarios on my computer.

Changing a color with Auto Advance On would have the same problem as changing the color when a color-filter is enabled, because both Auto Advance and Filter-By-Color change the image context while the color is changing.

As I said this is a partial workaround. The label color changing issue is also apparent when the Color filter is off.

With Auto Advance ON select several images from the grid
Assign the color Red to these selected images
Deselect these images and select the first red labeled image.
Change its color to purple
The result: The selected image now has no label, the next image has a Purple label.

With Auto Advance OFF select several images from the grid
Assign the color Red to these selected images
Deselect these images and select the first red labeled image.
Change its color to purple
The result: The selected image now has a Purple Label, the next image is not selected

So let me say 2 things, one subjective and one objective:

1) It is really refreshing to see some actual people addressing this issue after over a month of dealing with Adobe technical support and feeling like I was on an island or at least had the worst malfunctioning computer / keyboard or mouse in the world

2) This problem did not seem to exist in earlier versions of Lightroom and it seems to be affecting a rudimentary function of the program that should not have changed through the versions, so it would make sense to me if someone in programming or QA would just take a look at the selection/flagging/labeling code and simply change it back to the way it used to be! Or am I simplifying the problem/solution?

One more thing to add -- I just downloaded the Lightroom 3.5 RC to see if by chance the problem had corrected itself -- the problem still exists both with the non-filtered auto advance scenario described by Cletus above as well as with the filters-on, non-auto advance scenario I have been experiencing from the start.

Is it possible to get this problem addressed/noticed by the 3.5 RC Adobe people to give it some visibility?

How can it be that so many people are discussing possible workarounds and pseudocode on how to fix the issue, but the vote count is only 2 at this point of time ?? :(

Beat

I just voted, To be honest, this was the first I was aware of this "Photoshop family" forum, otherwise this is the first place I would have voiced my issue, given the attention it has gotten. And I would have been vote number 1.

In fact , you have inspired me to report another bug relating to the Stars and Color Label display, see http://feedback.photoshop.com/photosh...

HERE WE GO AGAIN - after crossing my fingers with Release 3.6 and it wasn't fixed, I was extremely disappointed to see that this problem still has not been fixed with Lightroom4.

As I tried to emphasize before, this seems like a significant problem that MANY Lightroom users should be upset with because it defeats one of the prime purposes of using Lightroom, to be able to filter quickly and accurately.

I have been using the workaround (i.e. using the keypad) but the key problem with that is it limits the number of flags I can use (i.e. where is the purple color label key?)

Any thoughts?

Yes, still present in 4.0 - and the problem has my vote now, too.

This is a slightly disturbing bug because some photos may get the wrong label unnoticed - or even worse, get marked "rejected" leading to their later deletion. However, I was not able to reproduce this bug using the reject button - only using the color labels as described by the OP (didn't try the rating). But if someone uses color labels to categorize photos leading to their deletion, this may be an equally severe problem.

P.S. I don't think there is a label key for purple ;-)

For some time I have suspected that I was "loosing " images that I had filtered based on their colour label. I have narrowed it down to changing the colour label of an image in just one particular way.

I think that the errors occured in in Lightroom 3 but they it always occurs in version 4

Using Develop mode

I label several images to one colour eg blue

In the filmstrip using the colour label filter select for example blue and purple which will still show all the images labelled as above

Using the colour buttons on the toolbar under the image, change the colour label of an image to purple, Since the filter is set to blue and purple the image should still be present in the filmstrip but it is missing

Searching for the image via other means eg filename I find that the colour label has been reset to none instead of changing to purple

This only happens if the colour change is done using the toolbar buttons, using any of the text menus that access the colour labels the problem doesn't occur.

The error is not limited to blue and purple labels

Am I missing something? Can anyone replicate this ?

regards

Wes

This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
Lightroom: Problem using toolbar buttons to change colour labels.

Still happens in 4.1 RC :-(