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Blurry RAW photos in Photos app

D

djmange

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 27, 2021
6
6
Finland
Hi,
I've noticed that edited RAW photos are blurry in the Photos app in macOS Ventura 13.0. Also the zooming is not working on these edited photos. RAW photos are nice and crisp before I edit them. File format is .ARW

This is what I do:
Import RAW photos from my hard-drive to the Photos app. Select a photo, click edit, I do my edits and click Done. Move to the next photo and do some edits, and so on. After I've done my edits and go back to check the edited photos I notice that all edited photos are blurry although they weren't when I edited them.

Edited photos become crisp if I click on the edit button and the click Done. But if I move to the next photo and come directly back to the previous photo, then it's again blurry. Must be some kind of saving problem in the Photos app, right?

This problem/bug is only affecting new imported and edited RAW photos on macOS Ventura 13.0.

All photos (no matter if they are edited or not edited) before macOS Ventura 13.0 are crisp and good.
 
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I've noticed a similar thing. It seems like photos wants to upload all the images to iCloud before it will re-render the preview (or full-res JPEG?). Like you, I can edit the photos, and see the results in full detail when I go into Edit mode. But when I leave Edit mode, the previews either don't show the latest edits, or are blurry. I had the same problem before Venutra though.. After the photos uploaded to iCloud, it seemed to sort itself out.

I'm having another problem with Ventura though, my RAW files from toy Sony a7II don't always upload to iCloud. They seem to fail, and go into a 'Failed to Upload' folder. so at the moment, I can't get past this blurry state, as they never seem to upload at all!
 
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djmange said:
Hi,
I've noticed that edited RAW photos are blurry in the Photos app in macOS Ventura 13.0. Also the zooming is not working on these edited photos. RAW photos are nice and crisp before I edit them. File format is .ARW

This is what I do:
Import RAW photos from my hard-drive to the Photos app. Select a photo, click edit, I do my edits and click Done. Move to the next photo and do some edits, and so on. After I've done my edits and go back to check the edited photos I notice that all edited photos are blurry although they weren't when I edited them.

Edited photos become crisp if I click on the edit button and the click Done. But if I move to the next photo and come directly back to the previous photo, then it's again blurry. Must be some kind of saving problem in the Photos app, right?

This problem/bug is only affecting new imported and edited RAW photos on macOS Ventura 13.0.

All photos (no matter if they are edited or not edited) before macOS Ventura 13.0 are crisp and good.
Click to expand...
I'm having the same problem..I downloaded new macOs Ventura, raw photos edited thru Photos App are blurry and grainy.. Called Apple Support, no help. Something to do with new operating system.
 
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Now Canon RAWs take a very long time to load in the Finder. This is very unfortunate.
 
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I too am having this issue with edited RAW images. They are fine when first downloaded but if I edit they become terribly blurry. I also notice that when I am moving from one photo to the next, the photo becomes lighter, I can see it change as it loads. So weird. Never have had a problem with Photos prior to Ventura. I sure hope they have a fix for this soon. Hate to send a blurry photo to a client. 😩 None of the photos I have added to my MacBook after the Ventura update are going to iCloud either. The phone pics are there but nothing from computer.
 
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I was tempted to upgrade later (this week?) when 13.1 is released, but then I stumbled across this thread.

Can anyone report if things have improved? RAW files are rather important to me and I don't want any shenanigans.

Otherwise I'll just keep sitting on 12.6.1. 😒

Thanks!


tappazee said:
Yes this has started happening to me on Ventura - Photos now useless for RAW as far as I can tell. Anyone have any fixes?
Click to expand...
djmange said:
Hi,
I've noticed that edited RAW photos are blurry in the Photos app in macOS Ventura 13.0. Also the zooming is not working on these edited photos. RAW photos are nice and crisp before I edit them. File format is .ARW

This is what I do:
Import RAW photos from my hard-drive to the Photos app. Select a photo, click edit, I do my edits and click Done. Move to the next photo and do some edits, and so on. After I've done my edits and go back to check the edited photos I notice that all edited photos are blurry although they weren't when I edited them.

Edited photos become crisp if I click on the edit button and the click Done. But if I move to the next photo and come directly back to the previous photo, then it's again blurry. Must be some kind of saving problem in the Photos app, right?

This problem/bug is only affecting new imported and edited RAW photos on macOS Ventura 13.0.

All photos (no matter if they are edited or not edited) before macOS Ventura 13.0 are crisp and good.
Click to expand...

halfnormalledtonowhere said:
I've noticed a similar thing. It seems like photos wants to upload all the images to iCloud before it will re-render the preview (or full-res JPEG?). Like you, I can edit the photos, and see the results in full detail when I go into Edit mode. But when I leave Edit mode, the previews either don't show the latest edits, or are blurry. I had the same problem before Venutra though.. After the photos uploaded to iCloud, it seemed to sort itself out.

I'm having another problem with Ventura though, my RAW files from toy Sony a7II don't always upload to iCloud. They seem to fail, and go into a 'Failed to Upload' folder. so at the moment, I can't get past this blurry state, as they never seem to upload at all!
Click to expand...

Tbear09 said:
I'm having the same problem..I downloaded new macOs Ventura, raw photos edited thru Photos App are blurry and grainy.. Called Apple Support, no help. Something to do with new operating system.
Click to expand...
 
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I have the same problem. It seems every time Apple do a major update, they completely ruin a perfectly good app.
 
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I am having the same problem too, when I auto-enhance the RAW files it becomes blurry then I need to remove the auto-enhance and reapply it to make it clear...I just came back from a trip to Asia with 1000 photos to edit and this happens...great.
 
Withe latest IOS release, I now find that apart from downloading my Photos in reverse order, when I add them to the storyline in installs any original pictures instead of those I've edited.
 
Have now downloaded a similar (non Apple) app to iMovie. What I have found is that whilst this replacement app works the same way, the photos, when dragged into the 'timeline' reverts back to the unedited versions. This seems to point to the problem definitely being in the Photos App itself.
 
Same still here with Version 8.0 (531.0.100). It seems to clear itself up after a while. Also, photos cannot be added to a shared album while in the "blurry" state.
 
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Recently upgraded my Macs to Ventura and Photos is now unusable for RAW image management.

Once a RAW image has had edits made to it, like you all say the resulting image appears low-resolution or blurry. But it's more than that: attempting to export or share the image won't work and attempting to edit the image in an external application will result in this 3306 error message.

error 3306.png

What I think is happening is Photos under Ventura is generating a corrupt jpeg preview of the edited RAW image. The only workaround I've discovered is reverting the image to its original state and then re-applying the edits. But that has to be done on every. single. image. one. by. one.

I've ruled out camera specifics - happens with a RAW image from my iPhone 14 Pro or one from my Nikon DSLR - and I've ruled out it being a library or computer specific issue as it occurs on both my 2017 iMac Pro (Intel) and 2022 Mac Studio.

Apple just plain broke RAW management in Photos on Mac with Ventura seven months ago and apparently hasn't noticed.
 
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Still having this issue on 13.2, I'm going to download 13.4 now and see if that helps, it's so frustrating! Will report back after the update.
 
Cory Bauer said:
Recently upgraded my Macs to Ventura and Photos is now unusable for RAW image management.

Once a RAW image has had edits made to it, like you all say the resulting image appears low-resolution or blurry. But it's more than that: attempting to export or share the image won't work and attempting to edit the image in an external application will result in this 3306 error message.

View attachment 2202848
What I think is happening is Photos under Ventura is generating a corrupt jpeg preview of the edited RAW image. The only workaround I've discovered is reverting the image to its original state and then re-applying the edits. But that has to be done on every. single. image. one. by. one.

I've ruled out camera specifics - happens with a RAW image from my iPhone 14 Pro or one from my Nikon DSLR - and I've ruled out it being a library or computer specific issue as it occurs on both my 2017 iMac Pro (Intel) and 2022 Mac Studio.

Apple just plain broke RAW management in Photos on Mac with Ventura seven months ago and apparently hasn't noticed.
Click to expand...
I have exactly the same issue. Do you find that reverting to original and then reapplying the edits is a permanent fix? For me, after reapplying the edits it's not long before the same issue starts happening again and I have to repeat the process. So stupid.
 
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superkatalog said:
same here... :(
Click to expand...
Same here too plus I found that if just lighten up one RAW photo,
after you cannot use the plugin to edit in RawPhotos or Affinity or in Pixelmator. The photo becomes broken
The solution is to revert to original and then AVOID absolutely any Photos tool and use external ones

Ventura 13.4.1 on a brand new Mac Studio: if I could I' go back to Monterey
 
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Onimusha370 said:
I have exactly the same issue. Do you find that reverting to original and then reapplying the edits is a permanent fix? For me, after reapplying the edits it's not long before the same issue starts happening again and I have to repeat the process. So stupid.
Click to expand...
Sorry for the late reply. I have found that workaround is good enough to get me an edited RAW image to my next destination - whether that’s into an iCloud sharing album or an external editor like Photoshop. What I haven’t tried is revisiting the same image at a later date, so I can’t speak to that.

i can’t believe this has been fixed by Apple yet, or how it ever got overlooked in the first place.
 
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Just to top it off, yesterday I copied my library onto a new external SSD. Now every single photo that id edited in photos is in the “blurry” state, and reverting to original isn’t even an option. Stupidly, the solution was to rotate every image 360 degrees which removed the edits (and blurriness), so I’ve now got all my pictures back but without any of the edits I’ve made.

I miss the Apple software reliability of the late 00’s, feels like I’m on windows trying to use Photos :(
 
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Onimusha370 said:
Just to top it off, yesterday I copied my library onto a new external SSD. Now every single photo that id edited in photos is in the “blurry” state, and reverting to original isn’t even an option. Stupidly, the solution was to rotate every image 360 degrees which removed the edits (and blurriness), so I’ve now got all my pictures back but without any of the edits I’ve made.

I miss the Apple software reliability of the late 00’s, feels like I’m on windows trying to use Photos :(
Click to expand...

If my photos have been "touched" by any Apple Photos tools then it is impossible to edit them with any of the external apps plugin. Just the original can be edited

I would like to find another solution to organize my photos other than Photos

Today Photos didn't even wanted to import my photos from the iPhone , not talking about editing raw photos
Apple importing from Apple
I had to logout and log back in

I miss that good software too!
 
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Shot using Raw for the first time tonight on my old Canon.

Having the same blurry issue - Ventura 13.5.2

Did Sonoma resolve this issue?
 
Good news about the blurring when you edit RAW pics in Photos app
I had a few photos taken with my iPhone and several taken with my Sony, all RAW
I was looking at the effect of Auto Enhance on one taken with the iPhone, where ApplePhoto doesn't blur it, just to compare with the effect using another app
I inadvertently clicked on a RAW taken with my Sony: no more blurry afterward !
I don't know when Apple fixed it, I'm with Ventura 13.7. Could have been the last update or one or two prior this one
The importance is that it has been fixed 🙂
 
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