Missing People Images - Facial Recognition Functionality

[Dronenz]

I am currently evaluating ACDSee Home. I have struggled with the navigating around the user interface but am slowly getting to grips with it. I have noticed a number of inconsistencies in the management of "face recognition" functionality. Not so much the AI face recognition more just general useage.

I have catalogues about 3 years worth of images to date and spent time working through the face recognition process. I added about 20 jpgs to a directory that previously had no content and had been scanned. After adding the images they didn't show up in the "Manage People" screen when I selected the individual directory it took me a while to work out (again) how to get them to catalogue the individual directory. Nothing I did would get them to appear as recognised or unrecognised faces associated with the directory. I rescanned the directory numerous times and never got the message in the bottom right hand corner itemising scanned files.

Having worked out how to catalogue a single directory I selected another directory in my photo file system, this contained 34 files, 32 jpgs, 1 PSD, and 1 dop which is a DXO file. The application appeared to scan them but in Tools/Manage People the directory only contains 25 jpgs all named correctly and no unnamed images , these images were a modelling shoot, were all very similar and the 25 jpgs appeared almost instantaneoulsy.. I did this a number of times, restarted the PC (Windows 10 64 bit) and it made no difference, on some attempts the application appeared to be processing hundreds of files (bottom right hand corner).

So in my small evaluation, I have directories with no content and directories with 20% of the images missing. Not sure if this is an issue or if the application takes a long time to process data however I have an expectation that if the application doesn't tell me it's busy processing images its not.

[Greyfox]

Dronenz

...on some attempts the application appeared to be processing hundreds of files (bottom right hand corner).

From the help file...
"ACDSee automatically adds file information and thumbnails to the database as you browse. This process is called cataloging. Once the folder you are browsing has been cataloged, ACDSee begins the process of detecting faces in your images. As you open other folders, ACDSee will continue scanning for faces in the first folder, and will queue subsequent folders as you open them. You can view the scanning progress in the bottom right corner of Manage mode. ACDSee will continue scanning until Face Detection is complete on the folders you browsed.

So what you are seeing at the bottom of the right hand corner of the manage mode screen may be the processing of the Face Detection queue (but it might also be the progress indicator for thumbnail builds which also appears at that location. Without seeing a screen shot of the display I can't tell).

If it is the Face Detection queue, then until if finishes processing, not all the faces will be identified.

There is more information about face detection and the face detection queue in the help file.

In addition to reading the help file, perhaps you will find this post from Tristan H helpful https://forum.acdsee.com/forum/main/...8010#post58010

[Dronenz]

Hi Greyfox thanks for the response, I have tried to read the Help Files they didn't help very much. I have watched a number of youtube videos, none really answered any question I had. I recognise that facial processing takes time. What I didn't/don't know is how can you tell what is being processed and how far through the process has got as in a slider with a percentage indicator.

As far as your statement "So what you are seeing at the bottom of the right hand corner of the manage mode screen may be the processing of the Face Detection queue (but it might also be the progress indicator for thumbnail builds which also appears at that location. Without seeing a screen shot of the display I can't tell)." I think it's a processing thumbnails indicator. Terminology has been an issue for me as I try and get my head around this app. Really the only indicator of activity I can think of is Windows task manager which is showing very little CPU activity for ACDSee.

[Greyfox]

.. I think it's a processing thumbnails indicator. Terminology has been an issue for me as I try and get my head around this app. Really the only indicator of activity I can think of is Windows task manager which is showing very little CPU activity for ACDSee.

When you browse to a new folder (one that hasn't been cataloged before by ACDSee) that has a lot of images in it, you will see three different progress indicators in the bottom right hand corned.

The first is

This is indicating the build of thumbnails for the images in the folder.
At the end of that build, you may see this



Following that if you have Auto face detection enabled you should see


If you move away from manage mode before the count has dropped to zero, the process stops, but will recommence when you move back to manage mode.
Whilst there are images in the queue still to be processed, and you are in manage mode, if you go to Tools\Face Detection the option "Clear Queue" will be active.
When all the images have been processed and the queue is empty, that option will be greyed out.

[Dronenz]

Thanks once again for the reponse, I had found the "clear queue" under Tools/Face Detection. What wasn't clear was that moving away from the Mange mode would stop image processing. So my queue appears to be empty and my directory is still short of 6 jpgs. I can only conclude that it is never going to find the remaining jpgs. There are no Un-named files in the directory.

I have another question, on my trawls around this app I identified a JPG in a directory which had been processed and had face recognition applied (not the right terminology but I think it explains the situation). But the file was in the wrong directory. I moved the file to the correct directory. I now expected the app to recognise the removal and "delete" the recognised face from the list of recognised faces automatically, it didn't. It still shows the image as being in the directory under Manage People. Do I have to delete the image to get it to disappear from the display. I've tried rescanning the directory to no avail..

[Greyfox]

So my queue appears to be empty and my directory is still short of 6 jpgs. I can only conclude that it is never going to find the remaining jpgs. There are no Un-named files in the directory.

Some faces in some images are not seen by ACDSee as suitable for Automatic face detection. If you have run Auto face detection on the images in a folder, and find that the bounding box has not been placed around certain faces, then if you really want those faces named, you have to apply the bounding box manually yourself using the tools in View mode, Note that faces manually "boxed" are not used as reference faces for Auto naming.

I identified a JPG in a directory which had been processed and had face recognition applied (not the right terminology but I think it explains the situation). But the file was in the wrong directory. I moved the file to the correct directory. I now expected the app to recognise the removal and "delete" the recognised face from the list of recognised faces automatically, it didn't. It still shows the image as being in the directory under Manage People. Do I have to delete the image to get it to disappear from the display. I've tried rescanning the directory to no avail..

You don't say how you moved it. If you moved it outside of ACDSee, for instance using Windows File Explorer, then ACDSee won't know anything about that, and it will result in (a) the creation of an orphan entry in the database relative to where it was, and (b) depending on whether the ACDSee metadata was embedded in the image, the possible loss of all of the ACDSee metadata for the image in its new location. For ACDSee to asset manage properly all copies, moves, and deletes must be done using ACDSee.

To get rid of orphan entries, you could try Tools\Database\Optimize database. Make sure you tick ""Remove orphans from database".

Warning. Make sure you read the warning on the second dialog. If you have images cataloged that are physically on a external drive and it is not connected when you run optimize, it may delete all the database records for those images. Also note that removal of orphan entries relating to images on NAS drives or network shares using the Optimize tool may not be successful.

If you did move the image using ACDSee, then it should have updated the database record for that image. That would NOT remove any face ID that was present for that image (nor should it). The thumbnail for that face in people mode should now lead to the image at its new location.

[Dronenz]

Thanks Greyfox I'm embarrassed to concede that this program has beaten me. Despite your best efforts and they have been excellent the "Help" function is sucky. Sometimes I'm not sure I'm even using the same program as the pseudo help file is referring to. Most programs are relatively logical and a user can generally stumble around without too much trouble, but this program is something else. I would love to be able to find the answers to a number of questions I have but have generally failed. I did find a reference to manually moving files in file manager rather than ACDSee in a forum post. Currently, before I uninstall my trial version I would love to be able to see a "bounding box" around a face, any face. It seems so simple but alas not for me.. Some many questions so little time, so much functionality, so well hidden..

"Some faces in some images are not seen by ACDSee as suitable for Automatic face detection. If you have run Auto face detection on the images in a folder, and find that the bounding box has not been placed around certain faces, then if you really want those faces named, you have to apply the bounding box manually yourself using the tools in View mode, Note that faces manually "boxed" are not used as reference faces for Auto naming."

[Greyfox]

Thanks [USER="23802"]... I would love to be able to see a "bounding box" around a face, any face. It seems so simple but alas not for me.. Some many questions so little time, so much functionality, so well hidden..

You can view the face "bounding boxes" in View Mode. There are two buttons in the bottom tool bar relating to this, as shown in the attached screen shot, one that toggles the display of the face outline (or bounding box), and the other that enables manual adding or editing a face ID.


In the above screen shot I have the face detection pane turned on.

Hope that helps

[Dronenz]

I have downloaded a trial version of ACDSee Professional 2022 and lo and behold the functionality has improved and I have seen a "bounding box". I will play with this version for a while to see if it more closely resembles the "Help File".. I can understand that the Home edition was a crippled version but the website should be clearer about what is significantly different.

[Greyfox]

I have downloaded a trial version of ACDSee Professional 2022 and lo and behold the functionality has improved and I have seen a "bounding box". I will play with this version for a while to see if it more closely resembles the "Help File".. I can understand that the Home edition was a crippled version but the website should be clearer about what is significantly different.

For a comparison between the three versions, Home, Pro and Ultimate, see https://www.acdsee.com/en/product-comparison/

If you do any image processing or compositing that requires the use of layers, then I would recommend the Ultimate version.