Images in Storyline disappear from presentation after publish

I had this problem a year ago also, lost hundreds of hours of work.  I noticed that images that were just pasted into SL from clipboard were all lost, but those that were inserted from files were not lost.  I am pretty sure it is a Storyline issue in the File/Save operation, not RAM or video card, but it was impossible back then to even get acknowledgment of the problem. Best to save your images as files.

Yesterday I did a complete clean out of the system, the registry, uninstall/reinstall w multiple reboots according to Miker's suggestions.  It seems to have worked...  Still going through files that were damaged to see what's salvageable.

Nice to have SL back!

Hi Michael,

Thanks for the update - and for anyone else following this thread, I wanted to share Miker's answer here:

There are quite a few errors dealing with Storyline and KERNELBASE.dll as the cause.

KERNELBASE.dll is a part of Windows and helps with the successful running of most programs. This is most likely the reason for the corruption. Do you have any issues with using Storyline besides the corruption? 

Just to eliminate possible software installation issues, I will need you to perform the troubleshooting steps in this article.

NOTE: Make sure that you're following the steps (in the order they appear) outlined in the version of your Windows Operating System. ALSO, I'll need you to perform the repair in Microsoft .Net Framework and reinstall Adobe Flash Player as indicated in the "If you're still experiencing unexpected behavior" section of the article. 

Feel free to keep us posted on how Storyline behaves going forward! 

Thanks for posting that Ashley...

Since I wasn't sure which variable was in play, I went through all the steps Miker's link above.  It seems to have worked.  

Alas, if the file was damaged by the earlier installation, it remains damaged with this one as well.

Thanks Michael for the update - unfortunately once a file is corrupt/damaged - there isn't much else you can do to save it. :(  

I'm glad Miker was able to assist! 

I want to affirm when Bruce is saying here: Images that were pasted from the clipboard were lost, whereas images that had been directly inserted as pictures survived whatever calamity it was that caused the problem.

Hmm... In my cases, I lost every image, most of which were direct imports...

After cleaning out my machine a couple of weeks ago, SL worked fine till yesterday; now I'm back to square 1...

:-(

Hi Michael,

I know you had worked on a case like this with Miker before, did you open up a new case? If so, reference the previous one and the steps you've been doing here so that we can see what other options we can look into for this.

This is now happening to my team. They're running Storyline 1 with update 6 installed - I'm running the same but with update 5 and I'm having no issues with imagery, PNG or otherwise.  My teammates now have files with blank bounding boxes in place of images as happened to all above in this thread.

I have not been able to open their affected .story files and see the images that are supposed to be there. They show in the navigation pane - the slide thumbnails look fine. Since the files have been saved under the version 6 update, it seems the files themselves are now corrupted to the point where my Storyline version 5 also can't see the images.

If the solution is to start working offline from the corporate network I see that as absolutely no solution at all.

As for the 'suggested answer' Why is Storyline affected by my computer being connected to a corporate network with all the requisite safety features such as firewalls and so on? We work locally, with local files and a local version of Storyline, only sharing files over the network shared folders as required. The Storyline program should exist entirely seperate from anything to do with the network beyond checking for updates or verifying the serial number online. What gives? We need a proper fix, not a work-around that is going to be a roadblock to communication, workflow and therefore productivity.

I will not be updating to version 6 if this is going to happen to me.

Hi Glen,

As you can see reading throughout this thread, our team has not been able to find someone who is able to consistently reproduce the issue and it was happening to other users who were on Update 5, so I don't believe the update has impacted the behavior. 

With all that being said, we're still looking to see more files and examples of this to see if it's something we can replicate and then share with our QA team to replicate as well. I don't see that you've opened a support case yet, so if you'd like to share one of the affected files here I'm happy to take a look - and I can also open a case on your behalf so that we can gather a bit more information about the environment and set up of your system and that of your colleagues. 

Please let me know how you'd like to proceed. 

Well, unfortunately my team, in their haste to complete projects, deleted all the affected files and worked from back-up copies. They also somehow reverted to an earlier version of Storyline pre-update 5. Looks like we have a sasquatch situation here. No files, nothing for forensic analysis. There's only a lingering feeling of doubt and fear.

I'll let you know (and open a support case) if this happens again! Thanks for the help so far at least. Hopefully this is ironed out for Storyline 2... We're going to evaluate that soon, I've already downloaded the trial version.

Sounds good Glen, and please definitely keep us posted! 

Is this issue addressed at least in Articulate Storyline Update 7 - Build 1410.2419 (10/24/2014)? I am also facing this issue. 

Yesterday I was working on a file and I saved it. Today, I had to update audio script, so opened the file to save as a new version to work on that. Before I could save, images and video disappeared from all the slides and all I could see was text captions.

I could see all the images in the side pane as well as story view, but not when previewed or published. I inserted all the images through Insert ---> Picture. They are either jpg or png. I used a .storytemplate for slide BG. All of them have disappeared. However, when I try to insert the same image, it is visible with the same file name in a particular slide.

I work on my local drive and I have no issues of RAM. Also, my file size is only 2.64 MB. I am afraid I may need to re-do the entire project :(

I was hoping there would be some fix for this issue and hence tried to install update 7 but in vain.

Kindly help me in this regard.

Thanks

Jagan

Hi Jagan,

Update 7 of Storyline 1 dealt mostly with issues that were introduced with the release of iOS8 for Apple devices. You can see the release notes here for all of our releases.

Our QA team has been made aware of the issues with the missing images, but it's not something we've been able to replicate on our own files. If you'd like us to take a look at your file as well we're happy to do so - can you share a copy of it here with us or send it along to our Support team? 

Hi Ashley!

Thanks for your reply!

I am afraid I won't be able to share the source file as it is a confidential document. Is there any way I can get in touch with the support team through chat or webex so that I can get a proper response?

Regards

Hi Jagan,

If you connect with our Support team that is a private way to share your files and they'll be kept confidential within our team as well. The other options for connecting with our team are detailed here. 

Hi Ashley!

Thanks for your response.

I can send some sample slides to the Support Team. 

Regards

Thanks Jagan - once you've sent them along if you'd like to share the case number with me, I'll follow along too. 

We have also lost countless hours with this issue (including just last night), and while we haven't figured out why it happens, we have discovered a couple ways to restore the images...which have saved us from having to recreate the projects from scratch.  I can't promise they'll always work for everyone, but they have worked for us on different occasions.

If you encounter the "missing images" problem, try one of these solutions:

• Open a new, blank Storyline file, then import slides individually from the problematic presentation into the new Storyline project. We've found that the pictures will sometimes reappear properly.
• Find the folder(s) where the pictures for your presentation are stored, and copy those pictures into a new folder with a different name. Go to the slides and right-click on the blank images, and select "Change picture"...and choose the correct image from the new folder you created. The picture should now appear - though you may have to adjust size, etc.

I agree that it's perplexing (and frustrating) that this issue has not been identified/corrected by Articulate at this point. We have also submitted cases in the past regarding this problem, to no avail.

Hope this helps...

Does anyone know if this issue exists with Storyline 2? If not then maybe Articulate could compensate affected users by offering a heavily discounted (free???) upgrade in lieu of the costs incurred with reworking projects?

Hi Ashley!

Please find below the required details for you to follow up...

Case Number: 00433130
Reference ID: ref:_00D30Txo._50040fG0Fp:ref
Case Details: Images Suddenly Disappearing from Articulate Storyline project

Thanks

Hi Adam!

I am on your side and I totally agree with you. When we put so much of time, effort, and money on their products, it's their responsibility to help us in such issues and provide a solution in addition to tips to avoid future issues. Unlike Captivate Chat help, only premium customers are provided that option to directly interact with a technical guy except for this forum help.

Regards

Hi Dave!

I appreciate your timely inputs on this issue. It worked! 

Yesterday I imported some of the slides into a blank file, it didn't work. But now when I followed the steps mentioned, it worked fine. The BG was intact. I renamed the Image folder and then used Change picture to add the pictures in the same place. As mentioned, there were some alignment and formatting issues, but that was minimal work load compared to the total re-work.

I thank you again for sharing this tip,

Regards

Hi Dave,

Thanks for sharing that workaround here and I apologize that the issue has continued for you. As you can see from this thread, we've looked at a number of files from different users and have not been able to recreate the scenario on our end - but we continue to look into files and cases where this may be happening. If you're able to consistently recreate the behavior you can reconnect with the previous cases you had or start a new case so that we can take a look at what's happening.