Photo Mechanic™ Version 4.4.1 History

Below is a list of changes made to Photo Mechanic for Version 4.4.1, released February 1, 2006.

This version is available as a free update for registrations good through November 2005.

• Photo Mechanic now requires Mac OS X 10.3.5+ or 10.4.
  
• (Mac) Photo Mechanic is now a Universal Binary so it runs natively on Intel-based Macs.
  
• The Revert TIFF-based RAW to original command now has an option to backup a photo's existing IPTC/XMP (e.g. embedded by Photo Mechanic 4.4+) into an XMP sidecar file.
  
• Update IPTC/XMP now synchronizes the tag and color class between a RAW+JPEG pair.
  
• RAW+JPEG can now join across folders. Add the folder containing RAW photos to a contact sheet along with the folder containing JPEG photos. If the names match then the RAW and JPEG photos can be joined as RAW+JPEG pairs. This is very useful for the Update IPTC/XMP command and image preferences like tag and color class.
  
• Fixed problems with certain variables used for folder naming in Ingest.
  
• (Win) Fixed several problems and made improvements to the Favorites and Navigator panes. Fixed a problem with drag & drop to Favorites folder not copying to the correct folder. Mapped network drives are now queried for mount status before adding to Navigator and Favorites to prevent system error dialogs. Creating a new folder in the Navigator now makes the folder visible and selects it for renaming. Drag reordering of Favorites now shows an insertion indicator. Navigator now works properly with Cut/Copy/Paste of folders. Navigator should automatically refresh when changes to the file system occur outside of Photo Mechanic. Navigator no longer expands paths on double-click of a folder.
  
• Added a new "Remember folders..." command that remembers the state of a multi-folder contact sheet as a Favorite that can later be launched.
  
• Added a checkbox to Contact Sheet pane of the Preferences dialog that allows you to turn off the generation of high-quality thumbnails for speedy browsing of large TIFF photos.
  
• Fixed a problem where some photos would be skipped when performing lossless JPEG rotation.
  
• Exif thumbnails are now updated for Save As with the JPEG format.
  
• Sidecar files for Bibble, Raw Developer, and LightZone are attached with RAW files and copied, rename, and deleted with the RAW file.
  
• IPTC Info navigates through visible items only, and it navigates through selected items only if the photo on entry is selected and more than one photo is selected.
  
• IPTC Info navigation now makes sure that the Contact Sheet that it came from scrolls to keep the current photo visible on screen.
  
• Added a "Code Replacement"feature to the IPTC dialogs. By selecting and loading a tab-delimited text file with a list of codes and corresponding replacement text strings, you can enter "\code\" and Photo Mechanic will replace this with the corresponding replacement text.
  
• FTP As now has better support for FTP servers that don't allow PWD command.
  
• Added a JPEG size estimator to the Send Photos via Email dialog.
  
• Brought back the (Mac) Command-Ctrl-F1 through Command-Ctrl-F9 or (Win) Shift+F1 through Shift+F9 keyboard shortcuts for filtering individual color classes. F1 views all color classes.
  
• Added keyboard shortcuts for Select Rotated and Select Others (invert).
  
• Source and destination paths are refreshed after drag and drop copy/move to Navigator and Favorites folders.
  
• Locked files that are copied or ingested are now unlocked on the destination.
  
• Fixed several minor crop tool annoyances when cropping in zoom mode.
  
• Added new preference for dealing with malformed JPEGs that have multiple IPTC records (which are created by other programs). You can choose to read/update the first or the last IPTC record (previously Photo Mechanic would only recognize the last IPTC record).
  
• IPTC records formatted as UTF-8 are now recognized.
  
• IPTC category lists with illegal UTF-8 encodings no longer hangs PM when clicking on the popup menus in the IPTC dialogs.
  
• You can now select and change or select and delete items from the IPTC Stationery Lists editor when the words have illegal character sequences in them (characters replaced by '?').
  
• Fixed a problem when captioning malformed JPEG photos that have duplicate Photoshop markers or IPTC records in the Exif block (e.g. from LightRoom).
  
• Fixed a problem with the Revert TIFF-based RAW to original command for certain TIFF-based RAW formats that have malformed IPTC blocks.
  
• Improved speed of captioning large PSD files.
  
• Fixed problems captioning certain PSD files.
  
• Fixed a problem with certain photos that had incomplete resolution info when using the Set Resolution tool.
  
• Fixed a problem with adjusting capture date/times on Nikon NEF files.
  
• (Mac) Fixed problems with setting Photo Mechanic as the application to launch for Image Capture.
  
• (Mac) Tab key now toggles selection between preview panes in 2-up modes.
  
• (Mac) Added 'Esc' key shortcut to close FTP Progress window.
  
• (Win) Fixed problems with Color Class Filter widget when mouse is released outside the bounds of the control.
  
• (Mac) Having the Favorites/Navigator pane collapsed in Contact Sheet windows no longer causes a slowdown.
  
• (Win) Added a new spelling checker that has several language-specific dictionaries.
  
• (Win) Fixed highlighting problem when tabbing between IPTC fields and improved tab ordering logic.
  
• (Win) Added double-buffered drawing of the thumbnails in the IPTC dialogs and Adjust Capture Times dialog.
  
• (Win) Alt+] and Alt+[ now work as advertised in the IPTC Info dialog for Save & -> and Save & <-.

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