Modifying the EXIF date/time for a group of photos...

[Michael J. Mahon]

I have a collection of photos taken by different photographers at the
same event, and I plan to rename them prefixing the date and time when
they were taken (from their EXIF data) so I can sort them in time order.

Since some of the cameras had their date and time info incorrectly set,
I need to first correct the EXIF date/time info by a "relative"
correction.

My usual approach is to use Exifer to do this, but it doesn't recognize
the EXIF data from a Nikon D80 (!). So I looked for other tools--even
a tool that could set the EXIF date/time from the file date/time (since
I could then use Exifer to modify it).

I found Microsoft's Photo Info tool, which promised to modify the EXIF
data exactly as needed, but when I used it on a (large) collection of
files, I found that it did not adjust the EXIF date/time info in each
individual file by the increment, but instead set all of them to the
modified date/time of the first file. ;-(

Since this tool has been out for 9 months, is there an update or a
workaround for this bug? Or can someone suggest another tool that
can modify the D80 EXIF data?

(BTW, after using Photo Info to *individually* modify a few D80 files,
Exifer is quite happy with the *modified* EXIF data... But there are
a *lot* of files, and doing them individually, entering the time offset
each time, is both error-prone and a real drag!)

-michael

 

[Yves Alarie]

I don't know of a way to get this done via changing EXIF data except
manually and as you wrote this is a pain.
However, you can create a folder and copy each group of pictures and rename
after copying each in the order you want. You would rename using XP. You
could then control the order in a simple and fast way as described here:

http://www.papajohn.org/MM2-OrganizePictures.html

 

[Michael J. Mahon]

I understand, but my intent is to merge several collections
of photos taken by other photographers of the same event. I
want the merging of a couple of thousand photos by time taken.
The number of photos precludes my doing this sequencing by hand. ;-)

I find that using a utility like Exifer to rename the photo files
by prepending the date and time info allows virtually every program
to "see" the files in time order (since that is also filename
lexicographic order).

According to its documentation, it is clear that Photo Info is
*supposed* to be able to handle my job, but a bug is preventing
it from working properly.

I expect that one or two lines of additional code in the application
would fix this bug (by causing it to use the EXIF date/time of the
*current* photo as the basis for modifying the date/time field) but
apparently no one at Microsoft is concerned about fixing it. This
bug was apparently reported in this forum as early as a week or two
after the "tool" was released!

This is a great argument for open source. ;-)

I don't know of a way to get this done via changing EXIF data except
manually and as you wrote this is a pain.
However, you can create a folder and copy each group of pictures and rename
after copying each in the order you want. You would rename using XP. You
could then control the order in a simple and fast way as described here:

http://www.papajohn.org/MM2-OrganizePictures.html

-michael

NadaPong: Network game demo for Apple II computers!
Home page: http://members.aol.com/MJMahon/

"The wastebasket is our most important design
tool--and it's seriously underused."

 

[Michael J. Mahon]

Aha!

I found an easy-to-use utility that does *exactly* what I needed
and works on D80 EXIF data: "EXIF Date Changer". And it's free
for private use! ;-)

I understand, but my intent is to merge several collections
of photos taken by other photographers of the same event. I
want the merging of a couple of thousand photos by time taken.
The number of photos precludes my doing this sequencing by hand. ;-)

I find that using a utility like Exifer to rename the photo files
by prepending the date and time info allows virtually every program
to "see" the files in time order (since that is also filename
lexicographic order).

According to its documentation, it is clear that Photo Info is
*supposed* to be able to handle my job, but a bug is preventing
it from working properly.

I expect that one or two lines of additional code in the application
would fix this bug (by causing it to use the EXIF date/time of the
*current* photo as the basis for modifying the date/time field) but
apparently no one at Microsoft is concerned about fixing it. This
bug was apparently reported in this forum as early as a week or two
after the "tool" was released!

This is a great argument for open source. ;-)

-michael

NadaPong: Network game demo for Apple II computers!
Home page: http://members.aol.com/MJMahon/

"The wastebasket is our most important design
tool--and it's seriously underused."

 

[Yves Alarie]

Very nice. Will keep this for future reference.

Aha!

I found an easy-to-use utility that does *exactly* what I needed
and works on D80 EXIF data: "EXIF Date Changer". And it's free
for private use! ;-)


-michael

NadaPong: Network game demo for Apple II computers!
Home page: http://members.aol.com/MJMahon/

"The wastebasket is our most important design
tool--and it's seriously underused."