my profile | my password | search | faq & rules | forum home

» Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE   » Community   » Film-Yak   » Graphics conversion filter question.

Author Topic: Graphics conversion filter question. John Spooner Expert Film Handler Posts: 186 From: South Australia, Australia Registered: Jan 2003 posted 06-05-2003 03:10 PM                     Dear colleagues. Quite often when opening attachments received, the attachment will not display and the advice "unable to load graphics conversion filter...." is displayed. If I press yes to proceed, I receive the Wordpad screen which is either blank or filled with lines of squares and symbols. What is the graphics filter, does it need to be installed and how can I open such attachments and view them? Keep it fairly simple as I know very little about the ideosyncracies of computers. John Spooner.  |  IP: Logged Adam Martin I'm not even gonna point out the irony. Posts: 3686 From: Dallas, TX Registered: Nov 2000 posted 06-05-2003 06:20 PM                     What email client are your using and on what operating system?  |  IP: Logged Dave Macaulay Film God Posts: 2321 From: Toronto, Canada Registered: Apr 2001 posted 06-05-2003 06:50 PM                     If an attachment is an unknown type, an assumption is made that it is a graphic and the graphic conversion filter is supposed to convert it to a screen image. The "type" is generally specified by the filename extension - .jpg, .gif, .bmp & .tif are some of the many graphics image file types. If the conversion tool doesn't recognize the file type of your attachment then you see that error message. There are also rather a lot of non-graphic file types, and if someone sends you a wordperfect document file (.wpd?) but you don't have wordperfect installed... well, the system has no idea what to do with it, and the usual default last-resort option is to try notepad or wordpad which will show a real mess if it is anything except a text file (wordpad will display Microsoft RTF and Word files to some extent as well I think). One rule: don't EVER open an attachment unless you know what it is - this is how 99% of all computer viruses are spread (virii?). Many viruses spread by sending emails from infected computers to everyone on the owner's email address list, so don't trust any email just because it says it's "from" someone you know. A current and rapicly spreading virus also exploits a problem whereby it can infect your system even if you don't open the email. Make sure you have all the current updates to your system installed, "windows update" should be in your start menu somewhere.  |  IP: Logged John Spooner Expert Film Handler Posts: 186 From: South Australia, Australia Registered: Jan 2003 posted 06-06-2003 12:23 PM                     Dear Adam. The e-mail system is Outlook Express 6 and Windows 98SE. Dave, Luckily I have a virus programme installed and only recently it detected a Trojan Horse and was able to heal the file. It is a free programme from Grisoft called AVG and automatically regularly updates, so I concur with you on the importance of such safeguards. Also Windows update is active and I receive the notifications as they occur. Do I need to purchase or download some extra software to enable these files to be seen? John S.  |  IP: Logged Don Bruechert Mmmmmmmmm, bird! Posts: 340 From: Manitowoc, WI, USA Registered: Jan 2003 posted 06-07-2003 08:56 PM                        John, What kind of attachments are you trying to open?? (File extension?). One other problem can be that the first time you went to open one the computer asked you what program you wanted to open it iwth. Not knowing what to say you might have picked the wrong one, and the computer remembers what you choose and then will ALWAYS try to use the wrong program to open that kind of file. There is a way to fix this if it happened, but we need more info on what you are doing. I use AVG too and think it is great - it finds many more things than Norton. Be aware though that it doesn't completely scan the mail in outlook express unless you switch folders - like from inbox to sent items or some such - then it scans before it goes into the new folder. It WILL, however, scan any new program that is attempting to run and block it if it is bad. Thus it still does protect you from trying to run an infected program in an email.  |  IP: Logged Adam Martin I'm not even gonna point out the irony. Posts: 3686 From: Dallas, TX Registered: Nov 2000 posted 06-08-2003 01:27 PM                     I have never seen Outlook Express deliver that particular message, so I can only guess that whatever application OE is launching to open the file is displaying it. So basically, "what Don said".  |  IP: Logged

All times are Central (GMT -6:00)

Printer-friendly view of this topic

Hop To: Select a Forum: Category: Operations -------------------- Digital Cinema Forum Film Handlers' Forum Large Format Forum Ground Level Feature Info, Trailer Attachments & REAL Credit Offsets Category: Community -------------------- Film-Yak Film Handlers' Movie Reviews The Afterlife Bob Maar's Joke-A-Thon Category: Classified -------------------- Equipment and Supplies Wanted/For Sale Help Wanted/Seeking Employment Category: System -------------------- Software Beta Testing Forum

The Film-Tech Forums are designed for various members related to the cinema industry to express their opinions, viewpoints and testimonials on various products, services and events based upon speculation, personal knowledge and factual information through use, therefore all views represented here allow no liability upon the publishers of this web site and the owners of said views assume no liability for any ill will resulting from these postings. The posts made here are for educational as well as entertainment purposes and as such anyone viewing this portion of the website must accept these views as statements of the author of that opinion and agrees to release the authors from any and all liability.