Tagging Digital Photos (Exif, IPTC, Geocoding)

There is a huge amount of data hidden in your digital photographs. Many search engines are now starting to look at this data.
You can easily add your name, location, copyright, description, and a title to each of your digital photographs. You can even add GPS coordinates for the photo location. Here are a few key concepts that you will need to know…

  • JPG or JPEG – File format used by most digital cameras.
  • EXIF – (Exchangeable Image File Format) Your camera uses this format to store setting, timestamp, and equipment info in your JPG files
  • IPTC – (International Press Telecommunications Council) Group responsible for the creation of header information in the JPG format to store metadata (name, title, description, copyright, location, etc)
  • Geocoding – Placing lat/lon coordinates and elevation in the EXIF data of your photo

Software (freeware) that I use to tag and geocode my photos…

  • Microsoft photo info – edit IPTC tags by right clicking the file in explorer
  • Exifer for Windows – edit EXIF and IPTC tags. This one will allow you to reset file dates and times back to the EXIF time stamp.
  • KUSO EXIF Viewer – Good EXIF viewer (limited editing)
  • Panorado Flyer – Geotag photos with Google Earth. Right click files in explorer to assign the current position in Google Earth. Find you location and tag your files.