sorting images:
It is assumed that when you shoot stereo that you end up with 2 structures of files, one from each camera.
When you go on a trip for many days or if you shoot some mono shots occassionally, you will end up with "singles" mixxed up in the stereo sequences.
This step is to remove the "singles" and move them into the "singles" directory. Camera misfirings and obvious mishots are also collected and moved to the singles directory here.

 

Directory structure is important.
Create:
Stereo\L and...
Stereo\R and...
Singles

inside the stereo\L directory copy ALL the images and directory structure that comes from the left camera
inside the stereo\R directory copy ALL the images and directory structure that comes from the right camera

 
simplify here:
MOVE all images so they are directly in the respective L or R directory, remove all subdirectories
 
View the L directory on the left and R directory on the right, like the image shows below. Try to have ONLY 2 explorer windows open, ideally on a dual monitor setup.
RIGHT CLICK on the task bar and select "tile vertically", this will give you good start for setting up an exactly equal view for both windows explorer windows.

ensure that you have the same amount of images from left to right in both windows, here it's 5,


ensure that both windows are sorted in descending alphabetical (numercial) order as well, ensure this by viewing by "details" then clicking on NAME so that it is in descending order. Do this for both L and R directories.

You can see here that the file names don't match up but the order of pictures roughly does.

there are 3 samples below
Sample 1:
IMG_0001.JPG and IMG_3548.JPG are matched up, but one is very blown out, along with the next one. I would move IMG_0001.JPG and IMG_0002.JPG from the L directory and IMG_3548.JPG and IMG_3549.JPG into the 'singles' directory, don't bother deleting anything yet.
The next image shows how the thumbnail view of the directories look now.
 
Here, all 20 images match up 1 for 1, this is good.
 
 
The first line is fine
The second line has 2 problems with it, IMG_0036.JPG and IMG_3584.JPG was a "dual misfire", I would move both of these images into the single directory.
also, IMG_3585.JPG (in the R directory) doesn't have a matching shot in the L directory, move this file into the 'singles' directory
The third line will be fine, once the above problem is corrected.
same for the forth line, it looks like it will be fine.
NOTE: IMG_0049.JPG was also deleted, it's not noticeable with this view at all, but it was a "double firing" without a matching shot on the R directory.
 
Here is the view after all those things in the above step was done. It looks good.
 
Here you can see that IMG_3655.JPG, IMG_3656.JPG, IMG_3657.JPG, IMG_3658.JPG are clearly not shot stereo. These were shot mono with a very long telescope lens, move them to the 'singles' directory, shown below...
 
from the R directory the 4 images are moved to the singles directory.
 
OK, this looks better, and in fact, it all matches up!
back to Index Now onto "renaming"