5. Import Images from a Digital Camera Before You Begin  2 Perform an Initial Scan for Media
See Also  3 Import Media from a Folder
4 Import Media from a CD-ROM or DVD 6 Import a Scanned Image 7 Import and Separate Multiple Scanned Images
You can import images directly from a digital camera and add them to the Organizer catalog. The method you use to do that, however, varies as much as digital cameras vary from one another. For a great many cameras, when you connect them to your computer using a USB, SCSI or FireWire cable, Windows automatically detects the camera, reads its memory card, and displays the contents in a new drive window (a virtual drive) within My Computer. For example, your computer might have only one hard diskdrive Cbut when you connect your digital camera, Windows presents you with a window that displays all the files on drive D, which is really the memory card inside your camera. At the same time, Photoshop Elements detects the virtual drive and launches its Photo Downloader to help you import the images into the catalog. This same process occurs if you use a memory card reader. When you take the memory card out of the camera, insert it into the reader, and connect the reader to your computer using a cable, Windows treats the contents of the memory card as a virtual (pretend) drive D or other drive letter. Once again, Photoshop Elements detects the virtual drive and launches the Photo Downloader. NOTE  | If the Photo Downloader does not launch when you connect your camera or memory card reader to the computer, you might have to use the driver that came with the camera to read its memory card. After copying the images to the hard disk using the camera's software, follow the steps in 3 Import Media from a Folder to import those images into the catalog. |
1. | Connect Camera or Card Reader
Connect the camera to the computer, or insert the camera's memory card into the card reader and connect the card reader to the computer. Adobe's Photo Downloader should automatically start and display the Adobe Photo Downloader dialog box.
If the Photo Downloader does not start automatically, you can start it manually. In the Organizer, click the Get Photos button on the Shortcuts bar and select From Camera or Card Reader from the list that appears. You can also choose File, Get Photos, From Camera or Card Reader from the menu bar. The Get Photos from Camera or Card Reader dialog box (which looks similar to the Adobe Photo Downloader dialog box shown here) appears.
 | 2. | Select Device
The card reader or camera should already be listed in the Get Photos from drop-down list. If not, open the list and select your camera or card reader (or its virtual drive letter) from the devices listed. After the memory card has been read, its images appear on the left side of the dialog box.
| 3. | Select Folder
Your digital images will be copied to the My Documents\My Pictures\Adobe\Digital Camera Photos folder. To change to a different folder, click the Browse button, select the folder into which you want to copy the new image files, and click OK.
TIPS  | You can change the camera preferences, such as the default folder in which images are stored, using the Preferences dialog box. Select Edit, Preferences from the Organizer main menu and then click Camera or Card Reader. You can also select your camera from a list and prevent the Photo Downloader from automatically starting when you connect your camera or card reader by using the Preferences dialog box. You might want to do this if the Photo Downloader is not detecting the camera or card reader properly or is reading its data incorrectly. To select a catalog to upload the images to (that is, if you use more than one catalog), click the Advanced Options button, click Browse, select the catalog to use, and click Open. To create a new catalog, click the New button instead of Browse, type a name for the catalog, and click Save. Click OK to return to the Adobe Photo Downloader dialog box. |
| 4. | Set Options
You can place the images you are importing into a subfolder of the folder you selected in step 3: first enable the Create Subfolder Using check box. Then select either the Date/Time of Import option (if you want the subfolder to use the current date and time as its name) or New Name (if you want to name the subfolder yourself). If you chose the New Name option, type a name for the subfolder in the text box provided.
Because digital camera image files are typically given nondescript names such as DSC00035.JPG, you might want to tell the Organizer to rename the files as it imports them into the catalog. Just enable the Rename Files to check box and type a descriptive name in the text box provided. The Organizer automatically adds a two-digit number to this description to create the filename. For example, if you type "Aunt Jane's Bday 2004 as the filename (notice the space I added at the end to separate the name from the number Organizer adds), files will be named Aunt Jane's Bday 2004 001, Aunt Jane's Bday 2004 002, and so on.
| 5. | Click Get Photos
Click the Get Photos button to begin the importing process. The files are copied to the hard disk; if Organizer is not already started, it is started for you automatically. The Getting Photos dialog box appears, displaying each photo as it's added to the catalog. You can click Stop if you want to interrupt the importing process for some reason; only photos already imported at that point will appear in the catalog.
TIP | You can copy images from your camera onto the hard disk and rename, resize, retouch, and reformat them at the same time. Although you can rename digital images as you import them, this alternative process might be useful because digital images typically need retouching and possibly reformatting as well. See 61 . After processing the images, you can import the images into the catalog by following the steps in 3 Import Media from a Folder. |
| 6. | Delete Files from Memory Card
After the files are imported into the Organizer, you'll see a dialog box asking whether you want to remove the images from the camera's memory card. Click Yes or No as desired.
| 7. | Redisplay All Files
You might see a dialog box listing images that were not imported; typically this is because the images are already in the catalog. Anyway, if you see the Items Not Imported dialog box, make a note of the images that were not imported and click OK to continue.
Next, the Organizer might display a reminder telling you that the only images being displayed right now are those you have just imported; click OK to dismiss this warning box.
Even if the warning box does not appear, the files you've just imported are the only ones displayed in the photo well; to display all files in the catalog, click the Back to All Photos button on the Find bar.
NOTE | If the imported images contain metadata keywords (tags), the Import Attached Tags dialog box appears. You can add new tags to the Organize Bin to match the attached photo tags, or associate the attached tags with existing tags in the Organize Bin. |
You can review the photos you've just imported and perform various tasks such as marking them with tags or collections markers, marking them for printing, and performing minor retouching by clicking the Review Photos button that appears on the Find bar. See 16 Review Images.
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