Cannot access ACF field in php code - php

Question

I'm trying to set a custom field featured_image with ACF and can't access it within my php code. First are screenshots of confirming adding the field to the latest post, then after is the php code.
I'm very new to WordPress so I'm expecting this to be a trivial misunderstanding.
I've run var_dump( get_post_meta(get_the_ID()) ); which doesn't show the existence of the 'featured_image' field. I've also created a text custom field, which also doesn't show up.
<?php $my_query = new WP_Query( 'cat=2&posts_per_page=3' );
while ( $my_query->have_posts() ) : $my_query->the_post();
// some variable code
?>
<div class="section-info background3">
<div class="section-details">
// some irrelevant html
<?php
$image = get_field('featured_image');
var_dump( $image );
echo $image;
$featured_image = the_field('featured_image');
var_dump( $featured_image );
$size = 'full'; // (thumbnail, medium, large, full or custom size)
if( $image ) {
echo wp_get_attachment_image( $image, $size );
}
?>
</div>
</div>
<?php endwhile; ?>
Which outputs
bool(false) for var_dump( $image );
NULL for var_dump( $featured_image );
Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

First strategy I'd go for in this case is to confirm that the data is present at the DB level.
Run a query against your DB:
SELECT * FROM `wp_postmeta` WHERE `post_id` = YOUR_POST_ID AND `meta_key` LIKE '%featured_image%'
If you can confirm that the data's there, then the next thing to do is ensure that you're passing the right post_id to get_field.
Because you're creating a custom WP_Query, and get_field usually infers ID from the global $post var, there's always potential for confusion. get_field optionally takes a second $post_id parameter.
If you can dump the contents of get_the_ID() inside your custom loop, and confirm that it matches the post whose featured_image field has the data, then send it along in the form of
<?php
$my_query = new WP_Query('cat=2&posts_per_page=3');
while ($my_query->have_posts() ) :
$my_query->the_post();
var_dump(get_the_ID()); // <-- this should match the ID of the post w/ the featured_image
$image = get_field('featured_image', get_the_ID());
var_dump($image);
endwhile;
wp_reset_postdata(); // always good practice to reset the globals after a custom q!