Need to embed IPTC data-help with EXIFtool, please

[katherinemichael]

Hello everyone,

 

I definitely feel like an idiot right now. I have been working on this problem for over four days and am no

better off than when I started. Research just has me overloaded with information I don't understand and

completely confused. It's time to ask for some help. Here is the issue. I need to embed IPTC catagories in my

final jpeg images that I am uploading to my website in albums. My budget for software at this exact moment is

very limited. I use GIMP for my primary image editor and it does not support metadata editing. I use UFraw with

GIMP to hadle my RAW files, but it only has limited EXIF support. I have PS Elements, but I don't see that it

allows category editing, only captions, copyright, author, etc. I did some searching and downloaded EXIFtool,

but it is a command line application and I have no idea how to use those. I figured out how to open Terminal and

launch the program but using it is completely escaping me. I have done numerous searches for information on

using it, but because I am so inexperienced with that area of computers, none of the information really makes

sense to me. I feel like I am sinking in quicksand. Can anyone please throw me a line? Is there a different

program that I can use? A plug-in for GIMP? Can someone maybe help me use the EXIFtool? I'm sure that I can

learn, I just need it "dumbed down" a little. Any help would be greatly appreciated! I am using mac OS10.4 and

the album generator is JAlbum with the PRO FotoPlayer skin.

 

Thanks in advance!

 

Katherine

[anton_bredell]

Hi Katherine,

 

The answer to your problem is Irfanview, a freeware program that you can download at http://www.irfanview.com/

 

Simply click on the "i" with a red circle and then edit your iptc info. Just click "write" after you are done and the info is saved (no need to re save)

 

Hope this helps you

 

Anton

[robert_hall2]

Irfanview should work OK. To be more specific, open an image. Then look at the menu bar for "Image." Select

Information. In the lower left is the EXIF button that opens that window. Save the image again. If this does

not solve your needs, we will look around for other EXIF writing tools. It might be wise to ask here at

photo.net before you try them.

[Richard Williams]

Maybe a couple of examples would help? First, take a look at this tutorial to learn about the basic Terminal commands for navigating between directories (folders), copying files etc.:

 

http://guides.macrumors.com/Terminal

 

Here's an exiftool example that writes the IPTC category 'S' (standard Press code for 'Sports') to file 'example.jpg' in your current working directory:

 

exiftool -Category=S example.jpg

 

(note the spaces after the exiftool command and before the filename)

 

Or to write supplemental category 'TEN' (for 'Tennis') to the same file:

 

exiftool -SupplementalCategories=TEN example.jpg

 

Or to write the category 'I' (for 'International') to every file in the subdirectory 'examplefolder' within your current working directory:

 

exiftool -Category=I examplefolder

 

For general information about writing tags, see:

 

http://www.sno.phy.queensu.ca/~phil/exiftool/exiftool_pod.html

 

Especially:

 

http://www.sno.phy.queensu.ca/~phil/exiftool/exiftool_pod.html#writing_examples

 

For the names of the IPTC tags that ExifTool can write, see:

 

http://www.sno.phy.queensu.ca/~phil/exiftool/TagNames/IPTC.html

[rainer_t]

Should you decide to give IrfanView a try ... read this thread ...

 

http://www.photo.net/digital-darkroom-forum/00Owg0

 

... to apply changes in the IPTC data to multiple images at the same time.

[Richard Williams]

Unfortunately IrfanView is Windows only.

[katherinemichael]

Yeah, I checked out InfranView earlier. I suppose if it came down to it I could put InfranView on my old Toshiba

laptop but I don't know if that would really work. That computer hasn't been used in a while and still runs 98.

I don't really want to switch between computers anyway. I'm sure I can learn to use EXIFtool. Thank you for

the links and examples Richard. They will be very helpful. I have a question about the categories and

subcategories. Are there set ones that you have to use or can you create your own? I ask because I am setting

the categories to create different pricing structures in my shopping cart with FotoPlayer. I have some images

that are for display only, some that I want to offer prints of, and there will eventually be password protected

client galleries. All these need different pricing and the simplest way to do that with FotoPlayer is to set the

IPTC categories to different names in the images and then set the shopping cart to assign certain sizes and

pricing depending on the category. Otherwise I would have to redo the shopping cart for every album. I would

like to set the categories to things that make sense for my application, but I could make set ones work I guess.

 

Thank you to all who commented!

 

Katherine