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Someone emailed me an image. I see it in Gmail, and I can see it in a browser, but when I try to open it up on Photoshop, I get an error saying:

Could not open "XYZ.jpg" because an unknown or invalid JPEG marker is found.

Does anyone know what is the issue or if there is a workaround?

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Perhaps it is not actually a JPEG file? In Firefox, you can right-click an image and view its properties to confirm the file type. – Paul Lammertsma Sep 11 '11 at 14:52
Take a screenshot of your browser (press PrintScreen or use an 3rd party program), and then paste it into a blank image in Photoshop. If the image is large, it might take some stitching. – dbkk101 Sep 11 '11 at 14:55
@Paul Lammertsma - it seems that all other image tools (paint.net, etc all seems to open it fine as a jpeg) – leora Sep 11 '11 at 14:55
Perhaps those other applications discovered that the file is not in fact a JPEG, but a PNG, for instance. – Paul Lammertsma Sep 11 '11 at 15:01
@ooo Which version of PhotoShop are you using? – Alpine Sep 11 '11 at 15:02
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6 Answers

up vote 2 down vote accepted

Use Irfanview to open the image, if it is not actually a JPEG, Irfanview will tell you and ask if you want to change the extension to the correct one.

You could also save it as a BMP from Irfanview, it should open in any application then.

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The simple solution would be to copy the image from your browser and paste it into a new document in Photoshop.

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Try drag and dropping the image in a web browser.
After the browser opens the image, right click and save the image.
Then try opening it in Photoshop.

Another method:
You said that you can open it in paint.NET, you can open the image in paint.NET and do save as... and save it as a new file.
Then try opening that new file in Photoshop.

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that is what i tried in the first place. no such luck – leora Sep 11 '11 at 15:36
@ooo You said that you can open it in paint.NET, you can open the image in paint.NET and do save as... and save it as a new file. Then try opening that new file in Photoshop. – Alpine Sep 11 '11 at 15:41
up vote 0 down vote

Here is a way I found around this problem.

This is for Windows I assume you can find an equivalent with MAC using this method.

Right Click the JPG Choose Open With > Windows Picture and Fax Viewer Then Copy to (Or Save As) and rename the jpg file and save

Open with Photoshop

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this will reencode the file, which will lower it's quality – bortao Sep 21 '11 at 4:16
Depending on your use of the file this may not be an issue, I use it on a case by case basis when I run into this issue. – Lynda Sep 21 '11 at 5:29
up vote 0 down vote

Here's another workaround if you aren't able to determine the image's correct format.

Generally speaking, if you can open it in a browser, you should be able to right-click and "Save Image As". Your browser should automatically detect the image's file format. Saving and editing should then be straightforward.

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You could try to find out the mime type. A normal webbrowser should show you that in the image properties... Then you can find out which real filetype you've got!

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