ExifTool Forum

[Originally posted by poltsi on 2007-11-24 13:26:14-08]

Hello,

I'm using ExifTool v7.00 (provided by Fedora and I am currently unable to add any xmp-dc tags in the images which are in the Minolta raw (.mrw) format.

Specifically, I'm trying to use the following command:

exiftool -v2 "-xmp-dc:Description=This is a description" Africa-2007-002.mrw

This will result in:


I've tested the command with the exact parameters, but for a .png, .jpg as well as a .nef, and these all complete succesfully, which would point to the fileformat.

I also tested with the newest unstable version (7.03) and get the same error.

My camera is a Minolta dimage A200, software version is 1.01. I can provide sample files if it is of
any help.

Poltsi

[Originally posted by exiftool on 2007-11-25 13:45:03-08]

Thanks for this bug report.  I have an A200 sample MRW and
can reproduce this problem.  There is something different about the
A200 files because this exact command works with MRW images from
the A2, 7i, Dynax 5D, Dynax 7D and Maxxum 7D.

I will let you know when I have come up with a solution. (Probably
within a day.)

- Phil

[Originally posted by exiftool on 2007-11-25 19:07:04-08]

Wow.  Manufacturers never cease to amaze me with they
way they screw up writing images.  The but is in the way
these image are written:  StripOffsets and StripByteCounts
are stored in little-endian byte order even though this is a
big-endian file.  I will have to figure out the best way to
handle this, but it may take me a bit more time to solve this.
I want to figure out the most efficient way to avoid slowing
down processing for properly formatted images.

- Phil

[Originally posted by poltsi on 2007-11-25 20:47:03-08]

*Grin*

Good though that you already found the cause.

And yes, a huge thanks for the software.

Poltsi

[Originally posted by exiftool on 2007-11-26 19:19:31-08]

A quick update:

I have a version now that rewrites A200 MRW images,
but I want to test it myself more before I give it to you.  I'm leaving on a
business trip right now but I should be able to find some time to test things
while I am away and post a pre-release for you to test within a couple of
days.

The problem was a bit trickier than I thought, so I want to check things over
as thoroughly as possible first.

Thanks again for reporting this.

- Phil

[Originally posted by exiftool on 2007-11-27 15:11:51-08]

I've finished my testing and everything looks good, but we still need to verify
that other software packages can properly display the edited images.  Dcraw
handles them OK, but that's the only other sofware I have that reads MRW
images. It would be good to test this with Minolta software and Photoshop
CS if possible.  Do you have these packages?

I have uploaded the pre-release
here
for you to test.

Thanks for your help.

- Phil

[Originally posted by poltsi on 2007-11-28 18:42:37-08]


Well I found the Minolta CD which came with the camera, it only contained the Dimage Viewer 2.37. It did not seem to support the XMP at all, I successfully added a Description-tag with the command mentioned in my original posting. Using Adobe CS3, I opened the .mrw, in Camera Raw actually, then in CS3, this created a .xmp-file which seems to contain the correct Description field.

A funny sidestory. The Adobe Lightroom (1.2) seems to show several different fields in the Caption-textbox, which caused some confusion initially.

Poltsi

[Originally posted by exiftool on 2007-11-29 14:10:16-08]

Thanks for testing this.  I will release this version officially probably in about
a week or so.

- Phil