So last night, I decided to go take some photos to give Aperture a real workout in RAW image processing. I love the view of Seattle from Gasworks Park and thought that if I hurried, I could catch it at sunset. I drove like hell and unfortunately just missed the sun.
I decided to take a few photos anyway, and when I got to the retaining wall that separates the little lookout area from the water, I saw this stenciled on the retaining wall.
So does Getty Images have the right to copyright anything now? Can they say what we can and can’t take photos of? Should I expect to see one of these tattooed on my favorite NBA player soon?
I don’t know if this is a joke, a spoof or what…if it’s serious, color me concerned.
This post copyright Getty Images.
I have played with this before, but a co-worker, Steve Handy, did something really interesting with it, so I decided to play with it some more. There are several shots on my Flickr feed, but here is one I particularly liked.
I am preparing for a fantastic 7 day cruise with my wife and family to several ports of call in Alaska. In getting ready for this I have been expanding my camera gear so I can take a true photo vacation. So far I have upgraded my Canon 10D Digital SLR to a Canon 40D with a 28-135mm Image Stabilized lens, and added a Canon 100mm Macro and Sigma 10-20mm Wide Angle lens to my bag. Before I go I have a long lens to add and a flash, and by then a new big bag also, but in getting all this together, and planning the most well documented vacation I have ever taken, I decided to check into one other detail, GeoTagging.
What is GeoTagging
GeoTagging is the process of either manually adding, or using GPS to add location data to photos or other media. In my case, I want to use a GPS unit to log my movements in Alaska, and then when I get back to the cabin at night, I want to download my photos and have that GPS data attached to the EXIF data on the photos so my family and friends can see where the photos were taken when going through my vacation photos.
What’s Involved?
Well, of course there is some hardware involved. I am assuming you already have the camera, and it really doesn’t matter what brand or kind of camera you use as long as it’s digital and saves in a common image format that supports EXIF data, usually JPG or one of the brand specific RAW formats. For my tests I tried a Sony DSC-W50 point-and-shoot and a Canon 40D Digital SLR. For the GPS I chose a Garmin eTrex Legend HCx, courtesy of Best Buy, retailing for $199. You don’t have to use a handheld GPS either, you can use a Data Logger GPS device, which is a GPS without a screen or any user features that simply logs to a file..these start at around $60.
Finally, you need some software, I tried two programs, for Mac I tried GPSPhotoLinker and for PC I tried GeoSetter. There are quite a few programs out there that can do this. If you want to do it manually, it can be done natively in Flickr and can also be done with a combination of Picasa and Google Earth.
How Does it Work?
Well, the manual way is simple, it takes the general area you select and writes a latitude and longitude to the EXIF data and you are done, the batch process is a little different.
When the GPS is set to record a track, or your progress as you move, it’s recorded to a text file in a format called GPX. This file is simply a long list of latitude and longitudes that are time/date stamped. The software takes the time/date stamp on the photo, finds either a match or a before and after location and makes a best guess as to your location and writes it to the EXIF data in the photo. Pretty simple stuff really, all you have to do is use the program to take the two data points and merge them.
Results?
Unfortunately, my initial results were 50/50. On the Mac with GPSPhotoLinker, I successfully merged the location details and they were written to the file, and Flickr even sees them in the EXIF data, but it did not automatically locate them on a map. After I had uploaded the files and had no luck with finding them on my map, I found a setting in Flickr that you have to set to make it attempt to auto-detect location information when you upload photos. I set that, but it was not retroactive, so the photos did not show. After I took a few photos with the 40D and used GeoSetter and uploaded to Flickr, they worked perfectly. I decided to delete the original photos and re-upload them from the Mac, and flickr did detect the location data and all was good. So now my test results are 100%, it works great on Mac and PC. The resulting test photos can be seen in my GeoTagTest Flickr Set. You can also view them in a Map View.
Final Thoughts?
Well, I have a few. For one, I made sure to get a GPS that has a removable media slot, in my case a MicroSD card. I picked up a 2GB card to replace the anemic 128MB that came with it for $19.99 at Circuit City. Now I can store a crap load of logs if I need to. Also, the batteries on these puppies promise 25 hours of usage, well keep spare batteries, you don’t want to lose good data you will want later.
Make it a process, if you are going to bother bringing the GPS, get in the habit of turning it on when you are shooting photos, it will log when it’s on so you don’t have to keep it on the entire time, just while you are shooting. Remembering to turn it off when you aren’t shooting will extend that battery life also of course.
Pick a workflow that works for you, I found two nice free apps, and I am sure I will look at plenty more, but do your research. The process is simple, it’s easy to do and adds a cool element to your photo gallery, so make it easy on yourself by refining your process so you don’t get out of the habit of doing it for no good reason.
I took a few photos with the new macro lens today, I thought I would post a couple so you could get an idea what it’s capable of..and how cute Hagrid is.
This is a flower I found in the front yard…
This is my Hagrid, such a good little boy…or girl, not sure.
So you saw my list of updates I wanted to make to this little application I assume, if not, my want list is:
- The ability to separate RAW and JPG files into separated folders if you shoot in RAW+JPG modes.
- The ability to save your previous source and destination folders
- pre-populate the new folder name with the date/time formatted how you want
- Removing the status text and using a progress bar with a label to indicate the current action
- add a preview box so you can view the photos being transferred
- add a cancel button to stop the process
I got some of my updates in so I am posting a new version for your downloading pleasure, unfortunately I didn’t get everything in so there is still no separating RAW and JPGs into different folders and I haven’t added the prepopulate date/time to the new folder dialog but the updates are:
- Different UI Look to support images and progress
- Ability to cancel an operation in progress
- Ability to save and clear your source, work and archive locations
- JPGs being transferred are previewed during transfer
- Progress is tracked on a folder per folder basis
- Status displays current folder being copied and destination
- Fixed Recursive Delete Functionality
Here is a little screen shot of how it looks now, slightly different than the previous version.
As before the source and executables are available for download:
