Portrait type photos are corrupted (grey area appear) when transferring from iPhone to PC

@Ryder_del_Fin, Refer my answer on the other post about this issue in Apple Communities: Portrait Mode Photos Corrupted (Gray Bar) - Apple Community

To summarise though:

• yes, I'm using the Windows iCloud app, not a web browser (although there's a partial workaround to the download size for unedited photos in a web browser, it doesn't help us with the grey bar issue).
• you can change the name of the folder where iCloud saves photos. I've called mine "Download" in the location you saw in my screenshot.
• no, using an external drive doesn't help. Not sure why you are seeing a difference?
• The only workarounds I found were to use a 3rd party cloud backup tool (I tested OneDrive, Dropbox and iDrive and both work to get the full resolution edited photo)

Other important points to note:

• the issue is not just "Portrait" mode photos. Can't remember what setting I used for the below landscape photo, but clearly the grey bar occurred.

• The issue doesn't only occur on Windows. It happens in certain circumstances on Mac too - see: Portrait Mode Photos Corrupted (Gray Bar) - Apple Community . I've seen another post from someone saying they saw it on Linux.

Note: My reason for mentioning the HEIF extension was that I was just adding to @davidg82's post to explain which extension on MS Store to use.   It's not really relevant to the grey bar issue - just friendly advice because someone was saying they didn't know how to display (valid) .heic files on Windows.  FWIW, I have Windows 10 and it certainly didn't recognize .heic files by default. I needed to install the extensions to be able to display the photo in an .heic file.  Based on my Google'ing, WIndows 11 doesn't support .heic out of the box either - you need to install the extension for it too. If you don't have the extension installed, you can still open the file with 3rd party tools that support .heic, or you can open it to examine it at byte level with an editor that supports doing so. As you're adamant photos with a grey bar are just mis-named jpeg files, it sounds like you've probably done that.

Hi Walter & everyone else posting here

I previously mentioned that prior to iOS 14, my iPhone 11 saved IMG_XXXX as HEIC, and for portraits there was also a file IMG_EXXXX.JPG showing the portrait effects, no artifacts. After the update to iOS 14, IMG_EXXXX are saved in HEIC format and have those gray artifacts after they get transferred to a PC. As a workaround, I changed the storage formats in the Camera app to 'most compatible'. Photos are saved as JPG and are fine after transferring to a PC.

Interestingly, on my spouse's iPhone 10, with Camera formats set to 'High Efficiency' , IMG_EXXXX are still saved as JPG even though it's now running iOS 14.3. I did some tests on my iPhone 11 after the update to 14.3. Selecting 'High Efficiency' for the camera formats still gives those broken IMG_EXXXX.HEIC files, unfortunately.

That comparison between different phone models makes me wonder if faulty hardware is somehow contributing to the problem ...

So, I've been experiencing this problem for about a month now. I hadn't notice before and I probably have more photos with this issue.

With the iPhone11Pro in July 2020, all Portrait mode photos did not exhibit this problem after importing to my PC running Windows 10. This started happening about a month ago, exactly on 8 April 2021. It can be that I have more photos like this, but I'm not sure and I have to go to my backups to check. I'm almost sure this is an iOS 14 issue, maybe 14.2 and later.

Since discovering this issue, I've attributed to the HEIF/HEVC extensions in the Windows App Store. However this is not right. I have a linux machine which can correctly connect to the iPhone filesystem and I have the exact same problem. The Portrait Mode photos also exhibit large grey area.

I could still try the iOS Beta, but I'd rather not mess with that.

And also, I could use the "Most Compatible" setting, but that kind of defeats the purpose and advantages of having the High Efficiency.

Finally, I tried using DiskAid/iMazing (the free version limited to 50 transfers) and I was able to download the original IMG_####.HEIC and the corresponding IMG_E####.HEIC without corruption (large grey area). I haven't tried other 3rd party utilities, but this is for enough to conclude that:

1) an update to the iOS caused this which the next update may eventually fix it OR maybe Microsoft will update the HEIF/HEVC Extensions to add built-in support iOS 14.5.1 or later

2) it is possible to correctly retrieve those problematic Portrait Mode photos as is, but using a 3rd Party app like iMazing, CopyTrans, and the subscription based ilk...

I much prefer the issue is solved via #1, because like some/most people I already have a system set up to download the photos from the phone to my Win10 machine, filter, categorize, file and archive them properly. This 3rd party trick is one more unnecesary complication.

TL;DR: this is for sure a bug with iOS 14.5.1 (possibly since 14.2), because both Windows (w/ iTunes) and Linux (w/o iTunes) download a corrupted Portraid Mode photo (in HEIC format), while a 3rd party app like iMazing will successfully download it.

Thanks for coming to my TED talk.

I would like to share a solution that worked for me after trying all other settings. To recap, Transfer Photos to PC "Automatic" setting caused my phone to time out with transferring any video or a large number of photos. Removing screen lock did not rememdy this. Transfer Photos to PC "Keep Originals" setting introduced the gray bar on all portrait mode photos. Downloading the photos from iCloud online was not an acceptable work around becuase when you download from a web browser it almost halves the photo quality. My solution was to download iCloud for Windows, and then copy from the "iCloud" folder to my external hard drive or other storage location. No time outs, no gray bars, and 100% photo quality. Hope this helps some of you!!!

Hello everyone,

same exact problem here with an iphone XR :

- original photos IMG_xxxx.HEIC are totally fine,

- modified photos used to be .JPG in an earlier iOS release and they were totally fine (but larger),

- modified photos are now IMG_Exxx.HEIC and they are corrupt.

The problem was brought by an iOS update (I don't remember which one) and I never managed to get a modified photo since then ... unless I copy it as JPG which is so inconvenient : larger size and I have to do a separate copy of these files after changing the transfer setting on my phone.

When I transfer this photo not through direct copy from the phone with a cable but using an external application (such as Phone Drive), the file is perfectly fine.

So Apple, it's not a hardware issue, it's not a Microsoft issue, it's a software issue on your side : please fix this.

iphone XR / iOS 14.4

Thank you

I discovered a trick: If you transfer the photos via DropBox (keeping the HEIC format) instead of USB, the photos are not corrupted anymore! There is no apparent quality degradation. The bit depth goes from 24 bits to 32 bits. The EXIF data is changed but nothing seems to be lost.

S314-EsPi Said:

"Portrait type photos are corrupted (grey area appear) when transferring from iPhone to PC"

-------

I. Contact Microsoft:

Find out what's going on, from Microsoft's end of things. If no fix yet, Apple probably has yet to play their role in this.

How to Contact Microsoft:

Start here, with the Virtual Support Agent. Start a chat with a rep, asking them where this all stands. I'm most certain that Microsoft has yet to do their part in catching up with all these changes made by Apple.

II. Provide Apple Feedback:

Do your Part. Seeing seven "Me To" marks as of this reply, this seems to be a common issue - most certainly a bug. So, inform Apple of this bug - Apple won't get back to you directly, but the more feedback they receive on this, the more they will know what bugs are occurring and needs to be fixed.

How to Give Feedback:

1. Go Here: Feedback - iPhone - Apple
2. Select: "Bug Report" for "Feedback Type"
3. Inform Apple: of how you came across this issue, and how you've troubleshot it thus far.
4. Proceed from there as necessary

As I undestand, you can either transfer the images as HEIC ("keep originals") or JPG (= automatic), but not both.

When choosing HEIC the image will display corrupted on Windows if it contains editing (such as portrait or other).

When choosing JPG (= automatic) the image quality is reduced and some EXIF information may get lost.

Apple has been informed of these problems, but does not help.

So you have to chose between faulty files or lower quality JPG (as for now, January 2021).

OK, I did some sleuthing with a hex editor, and I just realized the IMG_Exxxx.HEIC images are NOT ACTUALLY HEIC AT ALL! They are actually JPEGs. And this seems to be part of the issue.

I repeat. The IMG_Exxxx.HEIC images are NOT ACTUALLY HEIC - THEY ARE JPEG images with the wrong extension!

I tried emailing myself the picture, and got a JPEG, that works. Further examination reveals that apart from a few bytes of metadata, the JPEG I got via email matches byte for byte with the IMG_Exxxx.HEIC file, EXCEPT THE HEIC FILE IS SHORTER - that is why the grey areas are there - the file is truncated, and the grey area is the missing data.

I also tried uploading the image via the Dropbox app, and got the WORKING IMAGE THAT IS ACTUALLY A HEIC through that. Another curious thing is that the filesize of the Dropbox file (which is actually the correct HEIC file) is always 512 bytes smaller than the broken misnamed JPEG file.

So it seems like in the transfer process, a JPEG is made, like when you pick "Automatic" instead of "Keep Originals", but the phone takes the NAME AND SIZE of the HEIC file, but the DATA from the JPEG file.

Hi Walter,

Sadly, You are not getting my point.

It is correct that HEIC/HEVC was introduced with iOS 11.

But whenever you use a portrait mode, then iOS generates 2 images: IMG_XXXX and IMG_EXXX.

Since iOS 11 until iOS 14 (not included) the IMG_XXXX was in HEIC while IMG_EXXXX was in JPG format whenever we choose the "Keep Original"

Starting from iOS 14 both images started to be in HEIC file extension and the issue of the corrupted image started to show up:

• The IMG_XXXX.HEIC is totally OK (but doesn't include the portrait effect)
• The IMG_EXXXX.HEIC is not OK (which include the portrait effect)

If we choose "Automatic" in iOS 14+ then both will be JPG and everything seems to be OK but that's not what we want to achieve.

There are 2 possible solutions for Apple:

1. Rollback the change where in "Keep Original" will produce HEIC file for the IMG_XXXX and JPG for the IMG_EXXXX
2. Fix the issue where IMG_EXXXX will be HEIC and picture won't be corrupted as shown in previous feedbacks.

I assume that Apple will choose option #2 to fix as they probably want to fully migrate to HEIC format..

I too am very frustrated by this persistent issue. I have two iPhone 11's and am able to reproduce this issue on each. I agree with the others who are questioning loyalty to Apple. Premium products don't allow flaws like this to persist, overpriced ones do.

I have also experienced the crash when transferring too many photos in Automatic and have found correlation with the display timeout. If I need to transfer a large amount of photos using the "Automatic" mode I first go to Settings => Display & Brightness => Auto-Lock and set it to "Never". This keeps the screen on and reduces the likelihood of crashing. Don't forget to set it back to your preferred setting when done.

My workflow for dealing with this issue when I upload my photos and videos is to transfer all unedited photos IMG_#### using "Keep Originals" and then I transfer the ones that are IMG_E#### under the "Automatic" setting.

If you are reading this and having this issue please upvote and add a comment, we need this fixed!

Also disappointed to come across this issue today. For me it was any edited HEIC file on the phone, which includes portraits.

I had to view recent album with 'Edited' filter, upload all those files to iCloud Drive (not iCloud Photos), download to Windows PC, rename with "IMG_E", and overwrite the USB copied files.

What a pain!

As I mentioned on an earlier page, the grey bar files are incomplete JPEG files (despite the file extension claiming they are HEIC). So they can't be "fixed" in any way, the grey area is missing data.

Well, bad news, iOS 14.5 is out and it did not fix the issue : bottom of IMG_E****.HEIC is desperately grey.

And again, there is no problem when the transfer is done through external methods (i.e. third party app or DropBox etc.), so it's definitely not a hardware issue, it's purely an iOS issue that Apple does not seem to acknowledge.

It's only the manipulated one.

A way not to use DropBox is:

1) On the phone, select the photos and "send to" (the box with an up arrow).

2) "Save to files".

3) Select any application (I use Firefox).

4) In iTunes on PC, select "File Sharing", then select the files and "Save..." (The save button is on the bottom right, you may have to scroll the "File Sharing" view if you have many items.