# When photos fail to process

> What Processing failed means on a CoreHue gallery photo, why your client never sees a broken image, and how to fix it with Try again, Replace or Delete.

Source: https://help.corehue.co/docs/galleries/photos-failed-to-process/

If a photo shows **Processing failed**, its upload finished but CoreHue couldn't prepare the viewing images. Your client won't see it in the gallery. Try processing it again or replace it with a new export.

## What photo processing is

After a photo uploads, CoreHue makes smaller viewing versions of it so the gallery loads quickly on phones, laptops and big screens. While that happens, the tile shows **Processing**. It normally takes moments.

If something goes wrong, CoreHue tries again on its own a few times. Only after that does the tile change to **Processing failed**.

This is different from a file that didn't upload at all. Those appear on the **Failed** tab of the upload panel, where you can retry them. See [Uploading photos to a gallery](/docs/galleries/uploading-photos).

## What your client sees

Nothing. Photos that failed to process are left out of the gallery your client sees, so there's never a broken image or a grey box. It does mean the photo is missing until you fix it, so it's worth sorting out before you send the gallery.

## Fix photos that failed

When a chapter has failed photos, a banner at the top of the chapter tells you how many couldn't be processed.

1. Choose **Try again** in the banner. CoreHue processes every failed photo in that chapter again, using the files you already uploaded.
2. For a single photo, open its **⋯** menu and choose **Try again**.
3. If a photo still fails, re-export it from your editing software and use **Replace** in the photo's **⋯** menu. The new file takes the old one's place in the chapter.
4. If you don't need those photos, choose **Delete** in the banner to remove all the failed photos in that chapter.

## Why it happens

Most of the time the file itself is the problem:

- **The file is damaged or incomplete.** An export that was interrupted, a copy from a card that didn't finish, or a cloud-synced file that hadn't fully downloaded when you uploaded it.
- **The export is unusual.** Files saved with uncommon settings for print or archiving can trip things up.

Re-exporting as a standard sRGB JPEG and using **Replace** fixes almost all of them. See [Supported photo and video file types](/docs/galleries/supported-file-types) for export settings that work well.

## When a photo still won't process

[Contact us](/contact) with the gallery name and the file names of the photos that won't process. **Copy filename** in the photo's **⋯** menu makes that quick. If you can, attach one of the files so we can take a look.

For problems with videos, see [Why is my video still processing?](/docs/gallery-video/video-still-processing)

## Frequently asked questions

### Will my client see a broken image?

No. Photos that failed to process are left out of your client's view of the gallery until they process successfully.

### Does Try again upload the photo again?

No. **Try again** reprocesses the file you already uploaded, so it's quick and uses no extra upload time. If that doesn't work, **Replace** lets you upload a fresh export.

### Why can't I open or set a failed photo as the cover?

A failed photo has no viewing versions yet, so **Open**, **Info** and **Set as cover** are swapped for **Try again** in its menu. Once it processes, they come back.

### A photo is stuck on Processing. What should I do?

A big upload can take a little while to finish processing. Refresh the page after a few minutes. If it still says **Processing**, [contact us](/contact) with the gallery name and file name.